
28/03/2025
Ethics Bowl 2025: Promoting Critical Thinking and Ethical Reasoning
Last March 26, 2025, Ethics Bowl 2025 with a theme of “Balintuna”, was held at St. Vincent School of Theology in Tandang Sora Ave., Quezon City, in the school’s Audio-Visual Room, where Senior High School students from Adamson University won 2nd place in the competition.
The event started at 1 pm with an opening prayer, followed by the singing of the national anthem and the Adamson University Hymn. The event officially started with an opening remark from Atty. Maria Katrina A. Sales-Macatiag, AdU SVST SOPhia Adviser.
Different schools were invited to participate and compete in the said event. After the roll call of the school and audience, the Panel of Judges was introduced. 3 judges from different schools that teach Philosophy were invited, namely Mr. Wilzen Adriarico, Mr. Michael Ner Mariano, and Mrs. Gerlie Ogatis.
After the introduction of the judges, the guidelines and criteria for judging were announced. The Ethics Bowl is divided into two (2) rounds: the Elimination Round and Final Round. Each team must consist of three (3) Senior High School students from the same school, and a coach or advisor to provide guidance in preparation. For the Elimination Round, the team from different schools were given 2 minutes to confer with each other after choosing their case. They have five (5) minutes to give their evaluation for the actual case and seven (7) minutes to answer the judge’s cross-examination.
The Criteria for Judgement were the following: Ethical Relevance (30%), Clarity and Intelligibility (20%), Deliberative Thoughtfulness (20%), Depth and Substance (20%), and Team Spirit (10%).
Before proceeding with the remaining teams, the champion who won over 12 participating schools in the Southern Manila Educational Consortium Ethics Bowl was introduced. After all the teams, the elimination round was ended and the certificate of participation was awarded to all of the participants.
The awarding was followed by an Intermission by Koro Pilosopo from AdU SVST. The top 3 were announced where Group 6, from FEU Diliman, Group 4 from Dr. Yanga’s Colleges Inc., and Group 5 from Adamson University Senior High School will be the teams to compete for the Final Round.
The judges were the one who picked the case number for the Final Round. They were given five (5) minutes for their evaluation of the actual case and five (5) minutes to answer the judge’s cross-examination. After the intense presentation, the venue was filled with joy and angelic voices as the Koro Pilosopo performed again, reducing the pressure while waiting for the result. Before announcing the winners, the certificate of appreciation for the judges were given.
Top 3 speakers from each team were chosen. The Adamson University Senior High School won as the 2nd runner-up and Antonio R. Guiruela III was chosen as the best speaker. We would like to also congratulate the other members of the team which are Keane Allen T. Zacarias and Jhorelie Joi A. Valenzuela for winning and bringing pride to our University. The event formally ended with a closing remark by Rev. Fr. Kenneth Centeno, CM (
AdU SVST Philosopy Program Coordinato) and a closing prayer.
That concludes the event for today. Congratulations, Klasmeyts!
Caption by: Mary Allana Cuya
Photos by: Alexa Lague