GFCA First and Second Year State Debate & Varsity Congress

Dates and Location

February 7-8 at Carrollton High School, Carrollton, GA

LD, Policy and Public Forum will run Friday/Saturday with the first debate starting at about 5:00pm on Friday.

Congressional Debate will run Saturday only with the first session starting at about 8:00am on Saturday.

Schedule

Registration for LD, Policy, and PF will be 4:00-4:30pm on Friday, and Round 1 will be at 5:00pm.

Registration for Congressional Debate will be 7:30-8:00am on Saturday, and the First Session will be at 8:30am.

Complete schedules forthcoming shortly.

Events Offered

- First Year Lincoln Douglas Debate
- Second Year Lincoln Douglas Debate
- First Year Policy Debate
- Second Year Policy Debate
- First Year Public Forum Debate
- Second Year Public Forum Debate
- Varsity Congressional Debate — House
- Varsity Congressional Debate — Senate

Entry Criteria — LD, Policy, PF

First Year students are defined as students competing in their first year of high school speech and debate activities.

Second Year students are defined as students competing in their second year of high school speech and debate. 

It is the coach’s responsibility to affirm that their debaters are eligible to compete. Email maggiekb@gmail.com if you have questions about a particular student — I’m happy to help you figure it out in advance!

Unlike in previous years, students need not have attended a particular number of previous tournaments to attend state.

Entry Criteria — Varsity Congressional Debate

Students may qualify for Varsity Congressional Debate via any of these methods:

1. Invitational Tournament Results — see GFCA By-Laws for details. You can verify whether a student has already qualified here.

2. Member School — each GFCA Member School receives two automatic entries for the Senate chamber.

3. Varsity State Qualification — for every two (2) qualified students to the Varsity State Championships, each member school may receive one (1) entry to the House of Representatives up to ten (10).

Judging Qualifications — LD, Policy, PF

Experienced students may judge these events. Students must be two years “out” of that division to judge — so a student in their third year of high school debate can judge first year events only and a student in their fourth year or beyond of high school debate can judge first or second year events.

Please ask your judges to make sure they have an updated judge philosophy on Tabroom.com — it really helps the students that they are judging!

Judging Qualifications — Congressional Debate

Hired judging for Congressional Debate is included in the entry fee.

Other Notes

The novice policy division does not limit students to debating arguments in the novice packet.

LD will be using the January/February NSDA topic. PF will be using the February NSDA topic.