The show involves teams of students from secondary schools in Singapore debating against each other on issues of topical interest.

The Arena was one of the four nominees for the 2007 International Emmy Award in the 'Children and Young People' category, alongside shows from Australia, Brazil and Poland.

Participating speakers stood on the central podium, and spoke directly to one opponent from the other team (rather than facing to the audience and the judges as in most other debate formats).

[4] The defending champions, United World College of South East Asia, was initially selected but did not take part this season as their student examination clashed with their planned recording dates.

Ashraf and Olsen did not return to the judging panel, though the former appeared as a judge in the unaired preliminary selection rounds (alongside former sporting coach and former President of Debate Association Singapore Geetha Creffield, and Secretary of the World Schools Debating Council and Tournament Director of the Singapore Secondary Schools Debating Championships Mark Gabriel.

An award was given for the Best Speaker of the Series at the end of the season, which went to Nicholas Quah of Raffles Institution.

[5] The show was generally well received by the public and the press, though some criticisms were also raised by the Singapore media.

– Today's youth are motivated by self-centeredness alone'), saying that it was significantly easier for the team arguing against the topic (MGS – who won by a 72-28 scoreline).

The scoreline of the second semi-final between the United World College of South East Asia and Raffles Institution, which ended in a 94-6 victory for UWC, was particularly highlighted as being an unfair reflection on the closeness of the match-up.

The show concluded around the same time as a series of letters from members of the public were published in the Forum section of The Straits Times, discussing the relative merits of Singapore's education system and that of international schools in Singapore.