HumasUPNVJ - Talking about the Covid-19 pandemic will be endless, various sectors are affected, one of which is in the field of education. Even though it has been more than a year, the pandemic is not over yet. Even so, many students can prove that the Covid-19 pandemic is not a barrier for them to continue to make achievements. Many UPN Veteran Jakarta students take part in productive activities such as taking part in national competitions. Ali Zhafir Talmullah, Reycha Nabila Oktaviani and Rama Fathurachman who are members of one team are examples of students who use their best time by participating in productive activities so that they achieve proud achievements amidst the current pandemic. They won 1st place in the 2021 National Level Student Debate Competition which was organized by the BEM FKIP University of Jember. The 2021 National Level Student Debate Competition is one of the prestigious competitions held to commemorate Education Month. In his written report, Ali and the team explained in detail about the competition they took part in, "This activity was carried out in order to broaden knowledge, to become a place to accommodate creativity and skills, and to increase competitiveness among students. The National Debate Competition carries the theme Optimizing the Role of the Millennial Generation in Efforts to Improve Education in the New Normal Era which is held via social media via Zoom meeting with active S1/D4 student participants throughout Indonesia. This national debate competition activity is also an activity carried out to optimize the role of the millennial generation in efforts to improve education in the new normal era . Obviously

"The flow of the competition in this activity is that all participants register on April 6-May 1 2021 accompanied by the submission of our essay manuscript entitled "The Role of the Millennial Generation in Improving Education through the SMARTLEADERS Application". Next is the first round of essay judging, participants who qualify for the top 20 will enter the final round May 11 which has been postponed to May 17 2021. The second stage is the debate session which will be held via the zoom platform on May 22 2021. he explained.

Apart from the written report, the UPNVJ Public Relations team also had the opportunity to conduct an interview directly with Ali Zhafir Talmullah as the team leader via online . In his interview, Ali talked a lot about his preparation process and the team to take part in this competition, "In this competition, I represented the Faculty of Social and Political Sciences International Relations study program in collaboration with two of my friends who are members of one team, including Reycha Nabila Oktaviani from Faculty of Medicine Medical Science study program and Rama Fathurachman from the Faculty of Economics and Business Management Science study program. In our opinion, the debate is an art in speaking and broadening horizons in order to produce useful output in society. We are interested because indeed the education sector, especially in this pandemic era, really needs a multi-sectoral breakthrough, so we decided to collaborate between faculties, namely FISIP, FEB and FK. Participants were followed from various campuses throughout Indonesia. Participants who passed totaled 60 people. But the selection can be said to be quite tight because we have to be selected by essay first then enter the top 20 then compete again to win the top 8, then the top 4 and the final. In 4 rounds, we achieved the highest score in 3 rounds and succeeded in being superior to several other campuses such as the University of Jember, UIN Sunan Kalijaga, UISI, IPB, Brawijaya University, UNY, State University of Gorontalo, UNNES and Muhammadiyah University of Jember. All participants competed in teams using the Asian Parliamentary debate system. Said Ali to PR

"If asked about the preparation, of course we prepared many things, namely a place to gather. And the place chosen was precisely in my house so that coordination would be easier to do especially during case building . We also prepared several motions which became general motions or general motions. We also often hold discussions through G-Meet and also always exchange sources of news and readings before race day arrives. We have gone through many things, there have been many ups and downs on this journey, for grief we were hopeless when determining the top 8 because we were worried that we would be wrong with the motions given, but when there was a break for the Asr prayer we continued to pray and Alhamdulillah our voices were heard because indeed the steps everything has to be with prayer, we really enjoy the joy at the end of the trip.” continued Ali

"My hope is that in the future students can take part in many competitive activities like this which are positive in nature and practice speaking skills . Practicing the power of fast and precise analysis is really needed because in our opinion it will be useful for students in college.” Close the interview session.