The 2011 “Resources Recycling” Environmental Cup Debate Competition attracted a total of 27 teams consisted of students majored in Environmental Protection at universities in Taiwan. The topic this year was “Shall our recycling process better be managed by government or civil groups?” It aimed to educate students how recycling process was operated at Taiwan, and, by this chance, to review pros and cons of the entire recycling management process. The objective of this competition is to equip students with better understanding of environmental issues throughout the program, including preparation, information collection, process analysis, along with experts’ comments and recommendations. Meanwhile, during the competition, innovative ideas can be triggered and developed to shape environmental policies. In order to promote this activity as well as fundamental concepts of environmental policy essence and debating methods, we planned 7 introduction sessions respectively in northern, central, southern, and eastern university environmental protection departments, prior to the competition. The debate topics were designed in two aspects in order to fully explore pros and cons of the topic. Furthermore, the competition rules were also tailor made for students with environmental related majors to lower down the entry barrier for them. Two sessions of team leader meetings were conducted to provide more insights of the topics. In the beginning stage of this activity, we arranged experts in environmental protection field to comment and input to enhance the profession and knowledge level. In the latter stage, presentation with power point was mandatory for participant to show their articulation capability. Meanwhile, the activity was relayed in live through internet to increase exposure and attract more audiences. Post to the activity, we also collected the debate content as well as feedback by questionnaire to evaluate the effectiveness of this activity. In addition, the execution unit added a number of innovative approaches in activity design to enhance participant’s interests in environmental protection debating. For example: invited The Chinese Institute of Environmental Engineering to co-lead the promotion, and arranged dancing performing in media conference to show the diversity of the approaches in environmental debating, which we found aroused a lot of echoes and positive feedback. The objectives of “The 2011 Environmental Cup Resources Recycling Debate Competition” were successfully met, in terms of environmental protection and resources recycling concept enhancement, and environmental education promotion. By this activity, the participants, those students majored in environmental protection related subjects, were well trained in logical thinking and public policy elaboration capabilities. We look forward to further deepening the insights of resources recycling and environment policies, and holding everyone accountable for environmental protection by this activity.

Debate;Recycling;Environment