My Opening Statement in the Debate
Our topic as the Against side: College students should not do part-time jobs. After the first debater of the For side made his speech, I made the following statement. Yeah I know it’s very cheesy and illogical and lacks profound reasoning (so do have a good laugh over it), but this is what contributed to our success, hehe.
Ladies and Gentlemen, Honourable Judges, Dear Opponents: I’d like to open my statement by saying that we disagree with the For side’s argument. In our view, college students should not do part-time jobs.
The For side has just made a strenuous effort to show the benefits of doing part-time jobs; they have, however, chosen to neglect the negative aspects involved. Now please allow me to show you the other side of the coin.
There are three points that I’d like to make:
Firstly, as college students, our number one priority is our college studies. Doing part-time jobs, however, often conflict with this higher interest―― not only do they consume our valuable time and energy, but most importantly, they also divert our attention from what we should be focusing on: our studies.
Secondly, it must be pointed out that the overall quality of the part-time jobs offered to us college students is quite low. It is truly sad to say―― yet I must say so―― that in most of the cases we are only used as cheap labour. The undeniable fact is, since we’re still in college, and our future careers are very much undetermined, most companies will not be interested in recruiting us and really help us develop our potentials―― instead, they’re only looking for the cheap labour that we can offer them as of now. Hence there is really little to gain from doing part-time jobs.
Thirdly, most college students (perhaps including me), are very much unaware of the risks and hazards involved in all those part-time jobs floating around us. In the simplest cases, naive students have been cheated of their money; in some instances students have been tricked into doing illegal activities; and sometimes female students’ rights have even been violated.
In order to reach the correct conclusion on any subject, it is imperative that we compare the pros and the cons, and see which outweighs which. In our case, as I have just shown you, it is clear to see that the negative aspects are much more dominant. And this is why our conclusion is: college students should not do part-time jobs. Thank you.