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Debate kit Grade 7 Social Studies & Civics

Should Combermere Sell Water to the Blackthorn Data Center?

A two-session grade 7 debate on whether a fictional town should sign a 20-year water contract with a data center, with two-sided evidence, roles, and a rubric.

Objectives

  1. Students will compare a water contract's revenue against its effect on summer supply.
  2. Students will distinguish documented figures from figures invented for this debate.
  3. Students will answer an opposing argument using evidence rather than assertion.

Vocabulary

Recycled water
Wastewater that has been cleaned and used again, often to water parks, golf courses, and crops instead of being thrown away. Purple pipes usually carry it.
Ratepayer
A person or business that pays a utility bill. Ratepayers provide most of the money that keeps a water system running.

Also: contract, peak day demand, property tax, capacity

Teacher overview

This is a two-team structured debate that runs across two class periods, with the first used for reading and preparation and the second for the debate itself. The resolution asks whether a small town should sign a long water contract with a large industrial customer. It stays genuinely contested because both teams argue from the same concern, which is the condition the town's water system will be in twenty years from now. One team holds that the revenue and the jobs would strengthen the system, while the other holds that the town would be selling a summer supply margin it cannot get back. Students should finish the debate able to say what each side would need to prove.

Should Combermere Sell Water to the Blackthorn Data Center? — Grade 7 Social Studies & Civics
Name: ____________________________ Date: ______________

Resolution & Background

Resolution: Combermere should sign a 20-year contract to supply water to the Blackthorn Data Center.

Background. Combermere and Blackthorn Systems are fictional. A data center is a building full of computers. The computers give off heat. Many data centers move that heat outdoors using water, which evaporates and does not come back into the pipes. On hot days the cooling runs hardest, so the water use rises exactly when a town's own use is highest.

Combermere is a town of about 9,000 people. Its treatment plant can produce up to 4.0 million gallons a day. On the highest day last August the town used 3.4 million gallons. The rest of the year the plant runs well below its limit.

Blackthorn Systems wants to build on 60 acres east of the highway. The company has asked the town for a 20-year water contract. The town council will vote in the spring.

Roles. Divide the class into two teams of four or five. One team argues for the contract and one argues against it. One student serves as moderator and keeps time. Three students serve as judges. Judges score with the rubric below and give one reason for each score.

Format. Session one is preparation. Each team reads the whole evidence file, including the other side's case. Each team then writes an opening and two rebuttals it expects to need. Session two is the debate. Each team gives a four-minute opening. Both teams then get six minutes to prepare. Each team gives a three-minute rebuttal and a two-minute closing.

Evidence File

Case for signing the contract

  1. The fictional company would pay the town about $400,000 a year for water. The fictional Combermere water department runs on about $2,000,000 a year. The new revenue would be about a fifth of the budget, and it would be paid by one customer rather than by households. (Illustrative figures created for this debate, not documented statistics.)
  2. Fixed costs do not fall when a town uses less water. Pipes, pumps, and the plant cost the same whether they run full or half full. A large steady customer spreads those costs over more gallons, which holds down the rate every household pays.
  3. The fictional company promises 90 permanent jobs and about 500 construction jobs. It also expects to pay about $1,200,000 a year in property taxes, most of which would go to the school district. (Illustrative figures created for this debate.)
  4. The plant already has room. Combermere can make 4.0 million gallons a day and used 3.4 million on its highest day last August. On an ordinary day the unused capacity is much larger, and unused capacity earns the town nothing.

Case against signing the contract

  1. The fictional data center would use up to 300,000 gallons a day on the hottest days. The average American household uses about 300 gallons a day, so that is about as much as 1,000 households. (Household figure: EPA WaterSense. Data center figure created for this debate.)
  2. The margin the town is selling is the summer margin. On last August's highest day Combermere used 3.4 million of the 4.0 million gallons it can make. Adding 300,000 gallons on that day would leave about 300,000 gallons of room for a hot spell, a main break, or a large fire.
  3. A 20-year contract is hard to change. If the town later wants to limit lawn watering, it will be asking households to cut back while the largest customer keeps its guaranteed supply.
  4. The town could serve the site with recycled water from its wastewater plant instead of drinking water. A fictional engineering estimate puts that pipeline at about $9,000,000, and the company has not offered to pay for it. Signing a drinking-water contract now removes the reason to build it later. (Illustrative figure created for this debate.)
  5. If the company closes or moves after ten years, Combermere still owes for any capacity it added, and the households left behind pay for it.

From Water for Schools (waterforschools.org). This material is in the public domain (CC0) and may be copied, edited, and shared freely.

Rubric
Criterion Emerging Developing Proficient Advanced
Use of evidence States a position with no evidence from the file Names one point but does not explain it Names at least two points and explains how each supports the team's position Names several points, explains each, and shows how they fit into one argument
Handling of sources Treats every figure as equally settled Notices that some figures are illustrative but does not use that distinction Identifies which figures are documented and which were created for this debate Uses the distinction in argument, such as pressing the other team on an illustrative figure
Rebuttal Does not respond to the other team Mentions an opposing point without answering it Answers one specific opposing point using evidence Answers more than one opposing point and explains why its own evidence outweighs them
Organization and delivery Hard to follow, with no clear order Has an order, but the connections are unclear Follows a clear claim, evidence, and conclusion order and stays in time Clear and well paced, speaks from notes rather than reading, and closes by returning to the resolution

Differentiation

Support

Give these students a one-page card carrying the two strongest points for their assigned side, with the source line already marked as documented or illustrative. Provide rebuttal frames that read "The other team says ___, but the evidence file shows ___." Let them deliver the opening from the card rather than from notes of their own.

Extension

Ask students to write the three contract terms the town should insist on before signing, such as a cap on summer use, a payment if the company leaves early, or a requirement to switch to recycled water once a pipeline exists. They should then name which of the fictional evidence points each term answers, and say which term the company would fight hardest.

ELL supports

Pre-teach "contract," "capacity," "peak day," "ratepayer," and "recycled water" with a labeled drawing showing a plant, a tank, a town, and a large building with cooling towers. Provide the evidence file with each point summarized in one short sentence above the full text. Allow judges to deliver their scores using the rubric wording itself.

Extensions

Have the class hold a second, shorter round in which the roles are swapped, so each student argues the side they opposed. Afterward, ask every student to write one sentence naming the argument they found hardest to answer and one sentence explaining what evidence would have helped them answer it.