Vietnam wins 2 global championships at the 2025 World Scholar's Cup in BangKok

Vietnam won the highest victory in both groups for the first time

For two consecutive days, the two Vietnamese teams, in the Junior and Senior groups, were named in the highest position in the contest. This is also Vietnam's highest achievement at WSC to date.

On the afternoon of September 9, three contestants in the Junior group won the championship in the Team Bowl category, including Dinh Ngoc Minh, Pham Quynh Chi, Pham Truong Giang. They are all students of a private school in Hanoi. These three contestants simultaneously won the top 2 globally in the Challenge category.

Late on the afternoon of September 10, three contestants in the Senior group including: Vu Ngoc Tue Lam, Hoang Trong Bao, Tran Do Quyen continued to be named in the championship, Team Bowl category. Also in this group, contestants Nguyen Hoang Viet, Trinh Phan Anh, Nguyen Ngoc Bao Phuc of Vietnam won the top 2 in the Challenge category.

Notably, Vu Ngoc Tue Lam (S Senior group) and Pham Truong Giang (Jular group) are both contestants who won the Jak Khor award in the regional round in Hanoi (May 2025).

Leading both teams to the highest victory in Bangkok this time was coach Ngu To Duy. He is also the coach of 16 teams competing in the WSC in BangKok - Thailand this season. The teams led by Duy all achieved many impressive results when becoming the group with the most awards among the groups participating in the competition.

Present in Vietnam since 2015, after 10 years, debate has become the hottest extracurricular subject in secondary and high schools in recent years.The Regional round of the World Scholar's Cup (WSC) held in Hanoi in May 2025 attracted more than 2,000 contestants, about 1.3 times higher than the previous year's tournament.

The main competition categories of WSC include writing, debate, and general knowledge competition.Specifically, WSC has 4 parts divided into 2 parts: half skill (includinglabor Colative Writing and Debate - debate) and half knowledge (including Challenge and Scholar's Bowl: an overview knowledge contest on many different topics: music, history, art, technology, geography, socio-politics).

What skills does WSC train students?

Ngu To Duy said that the journey to victory in the WSC competition has two main areas: first is the excellence of the contestants and coaches, second is the fighting spirit - the will of the contestants. Any victory behind it is not only a training session but also a sacrifice of time, health and fun outside.

The WSC contest or the debate, writing, etc. subjects all encourage students to form critical thinking and good listening skills. The basis for forming an independent mindset comes from the philosophy that when people are confident, they will know how to face obstacles. When students are equipped with enough basic knowledge, they will be able to reason.

To participate in the debate competition like WSC, all candidates must go through the same process: research and clearly understand the 2,000-page outline in English on in-depth topics such as science, technology, classical literature, famous symphonies, famous scholars or socio-political issues, etc. This knowledge is very heavy compared to high school students.

The key to helping them become interested is when creating an inspiring learning environment. To be able to win prizes in the rounds, students not only need to remember but also have a deep enough understanding to analyze and judge questions and situations. The process of acquiring a large amount of knowledge requires endurance and learning methods to help students fully exploit their potential.

When guiding them, I always apply a method that right from the learning process, each day feels like finding a new person, a new lifestyle of mine because I have broken my own limits, coach Ngu To Duy shared.