Cambridge Schools 2025-26

Registration for Cambridge Schools 2025-26 is open! You can find the registration form here

  1. Provisional Timetable
  2. Workshop
  3. Regionals Policy
  4. Payment Policy
  5. List of UK & Irish Regionals
  6. International Regionals

Provisional Timetable

Registration Timeline:

  • Registration Closes: Friday 28 November 2025
  • Regional Allocations Announced: By Monday 8 December 2025
  • Payment Deadline: Friday 19 December 2025

Finals Day will be held in-person, at the Cambridge Union, on Sat 21 Mar 2026
The schedule for finals day will be as follows:
08:00 Registration

09:15 Briefings

09:45 Round 1

11:45 Round 2

13:45 Lunch

14:15 Round 3 (Please be back by 14:10 for check-in)

16:15 Round 4

18:00 Break Announcement

18:15 Semi-Finals

19:30 Dinner

20:00 Grand Finals

22:00 Closing Ceremony

Workshop

As part of Cambridge Schools 2025-26, we hope to produce an online workshop on British Parliamentary debating in advance of the regionals. Additionally, the resources page contains a guide to BP debating.

Regionals Policy

  • All regionals will either be held fully in-person or fully online
  • The maximum number of teams per institution is 4
  • Students must be in years 7-13 to participate (note that students in the younger side of this range can also participate in ICYD, which is for younger students and hosted by Oxf*rd this year)
  • Our preference is for regionals to be fully in-person (organised either by us or our partner institutions)
  • If it is not possible to organise an in-person regional (due to events such as but not limited to our inability to secure a suitable partner institution, insufficient available adjudicators, train strikes etc), then:
    • Subject to there being a sufficient number of teams and logistical feasibility, we will organise an equivalent, fully online regional (which may have less than 4 rounds) to ensure high quality adjudication and proportional geographical representation of participants
    • If your school does not wish to participate in an online regional please consider hosting yourself, if this is not possible you have the option to participate in the closest available in-person regional, at your own expense
    • If your school is unable to participate in your preferred online regional and your closet in-person regional, you will have the option to participate in another online regional

Payment Policy

  • In a bid to make our competition more accessible Cambridge Schools will be using a differentiated pricing system this year. Private (fee paying) schools will be charged a price of £60 per team while State (non fee paying) schools will be charged a price of £40
  • As a result of our new pricing system we will be able to increase the amount of money available for fee waivers this year. The form includes a registration fee waiver application, so if you believe that your school may be eligible for that and could not otherwise attend please fill that section out.
  • Unlike previous years, and unless otherwise indicated, the payment deadline for all regionals is Friday 19 December 2025. If your school needs an extension, please ensure that you email us before the deadline.
  • We aim to send you your school’s invoice within 2 weeks of you submitting the registration form to your email address.
  • Please note that, due to our charitable status, we are unable to offer any refunds.

List of UK & Irish Regionals

Last Updated: 1st of October 2025

Unless otherwise indicated, we hope to hold all regionals in-person. Please note that all dates are tentative and subject to change.

  • Welsh*
  • Scottish – unconfirmed (note Scotland will have an early payment deadline due to this regional happening in December – we will update it when details are confirmed)
  • All-Ireland (Sun 25th Jan)
  • South West – unconfirmed
  • Oxford – unconfirmed
  • Cambridge (either 31st jan or 21st feb) Cambridge Union
  • South East (Sat 7 Feb) Maidstone Grammar school
  • London Central (Sat 08 Feb)
  • London North – unconfirmed
  • London South (Sat 14 Feb) Ibstock Place school
  • Northern^ – we hope to have several in person northern rounds, we are still seeking partner institutions

* Indicates that we have already secured a partner institution and are in the final process of finding a suitable time and date for an in-person regional. We may change the payment deadline (including bringing the payment deadline forward) depending on when the regional will be held and when we are able to announce the time and date for these regionals.

^ Indicates that, at the time of opening of registration, we have not been able to secure a partner institution. If your school has any affiliation or connections with a local institution, please do let us know so we can try our best to arrange an in-person regional. If we are unable to come to an agreement with a local institution, this regional will be held online to ensure that we are able to provide high quality adjudication. We may change the payment deadline (including bringing the payment deadline forward) depending on when the regional will be held and when we are able to announce the time and date for these regionals.

International Regionals

We offer regionals internationally through our partners:

Asia:

Canada: Canadian BP Championships

Australia and New Zealand: Speakers’ Corner

India: AugLi

Dubai:

Tunisia: The Debate, Eloquence & Rhetoric Society

If you are unsure about whether a regional is affiliated with us please email us at debating@cus.org.