Three students from Loretto Abbey Catholic Secondary School in Toronto have been crowned this year’s High School Ethics Bowl National Champions after outlasting 300 of the country’s top high school debating teams.

Grade 12 students Simone Beshtoev, Simone Kang and Minnie Suriyapunpong returned from Winnipeg’s Canadian Museum for Human Rights, where the national championship took place on April 26, as the victors. There, the girls competed against 12 other qualifying teams from across Canada in rigorous discussions and analysis of various complex ethical dilemmas.

For Kathleen Steele, the teacher moderator and coach of Loretto Abbey's ethics team, the credit goes solely to the three students who spent the past seven months dedicating themselves to further their critical thinking, teamwork skills, intellectual curiosity and performance under pressure.

“The whole process for us in this year’s Ethics Bowl has been very tumultuous. They get their cases in October, and from there, they do so much to understand them on a level that is so focused and encompassing,” she said.

“These three are just outstanding, they did all of this work themselves, and while I helped along the way and was always there when they needed me, their dedication to this event is unparalleled by any kids I have ever seen.”

The Ethics Bowl is a competitive yet collaborative event where teams of students discuss pre-provided ethical dilemmas with an emphasis on reasoned argumentation, more so than a traditional debate. The High School Ethics Bowl was launched in 2016 by the Manitoba Association for Rights and Liberties in Winnipeg before expanding to more than 20 cities in eight provinces by 2025. Ethics Bowl Canada, incorporated in 2023, now oversees the competition.

 ”All the cases pose significant ethical dilemmas. An example of the case we worked on was: Do we have ethical duties to care for our aging parents? You have to think about the moral tensions, and then you have to come up with a thesis that kind of encapsulates it, plus your responses and objections to those theses,” Steele explained.

The point of the competition is rooted in collaboration to find the best answer, which differs from the typical "you versus me" debate structure. Judges, often PhD and graduate students, professors and teachers, also ask each team detailed, in-depth questions regarding their topics.

While each team remains focused on winning, the goal is not to prove they are absolutely correct, but to prove they understand where the moral tension lies.

This year marks the all-girl Catholic school’s second year participating in the competition, having been eliminated during regionals in 2024. Steele, who is also the school’s  English and library department head, said a remarkable display of perseverance and resolve, coupled with some fortuitous seeding, ensured this year’s team would not receive the same fate as last year.

“ The door just kept getting opened for them. We actually did lose and were knocked out of the competition at regionals back in February, but I got a call a couple of days later and they said they had heard such exceptional things about our girls and that they wanted to ensure the best possible competition, so they gave us a place at provincials,” she explained.

“We made it to the semifinals, where we ended up losing to the number one team. As we were about to leave, the convener said there was an error in rankings and they gave us another chance.”

What followed was another round of virtual playoffs before the students had to face the judges and two other schools weeks later. Nationals followed, where Loretto Abbey swept the competition, winning all six rounds of the event.

“They were down and out so many times, but they just showed this resilience and the ability to adapt," said Steele. "At nationals, they took in the weekend so fully, made friends with every team, participated in all the social aspects and professor-led events, they just enjoyed it all so much.”

As each student returned to class following the competition, still exhausted from the weekend's event, Steele says the reality of being named the top team in the nation still may not have sunk in. However, amidst the chaos, each girl is starting to come to terms with just how special their time on the ethics team has been.

“The experience was pure joy, and even before we looked out to the audience, our instant reaction was to just give each other a huge hug,” said Beshtoev.

“ Awards and the fact that we have this title tied to our names aside, the support that we got from the people around us, both family and staff, I think was like the real special part of the weekend,” Kang added.

As the three students approach their graduation later this semester, they hope younger students give themselves the chance to experience the lessons, be it perseverance, patience or victory, that the ethics team gave them during this year’s championship run.

“I think the most valuable thing we have gotten from the Ethics Bowl is not the championship, but what we have learned along the way: the steep learning curve, the intellectual challenges that we had to take and just my team, our friendship has really been the most important thing that has come out of this along with the community that Ethics Bowl exposed us to,” said Suriyapunpong.

It’s a sentiment Steele agrees with wholeheartedly.

“ I'm hoping it will inspire us as a school, not just that we can see that it's possible to win, but that we can see that this type of conversation is important, essential and that we have to engage in it ”