Southern Minnesota District Qualifier

for the 2024 National Tournament

Speech Qualifier

2024 Southern MN NSDA Speech Tournament

March 8 – Woodbury High School
March 9 - Eagan High School

All Southern MN NSDA schools are invited to participate in the Southern Minnesota NSDA District Speech Tournament on March 8-9, 2024 at Woodbury High School (Friday) and Eagan High School (Saturday). Once again, we will hold the tournament in conjunction with Central Minnesota.

The NSDA has many important procedures in registering for the tournament. If at any time you have questions or need assistance with the registration process, please do not hesitate to contact DJ Brynteson at dj@brynteson.info for more information.

Before The Tournament

1. Register at southernminnesota.tabroom.com by Friday, March 1st at the latest. No new entries will be allowed after this date. Teams will be allowed to make changes to their entries (drops and substitutions) on the registration website until Wednesday, March 6th; after that, all changes must be emailed to dj@brynteson.info. Please make sure to fully complete all portions of tournament registration, including submission of Original Oratory, POI, and Informative Speaking titles and all script information for interpretation events. Students must be members of the NSDA by March 1st.

2. Be sure that you have paid all outstanding membership fees for new members. If you have not paid, you will need to pay these fees at tournament registration. A list of outstanding fees will be sent the week of the tournament.

3. Make sure that any double-entered student has had a single-entry preference set on Tabroom.com in case they double-qualify. This must be done prior to registration.

To Bring To Registration:

1. A check to cover entry fees. There is a $20 fee for each entry.

Minnesota Debate Teachers Association
c/o Cort Sylvester
250 Marquette Ave. South
Suite 800
Minneapolis, MN 55401

2. If you have NSDA dues that must be paid prior to competition you must pay them online via Credit Card or a check to.:

National Speech and Debate Association
6600 Westown Parkway
Suite 270
West Des Moines, IA 50266

3. (if applicable) Completed Auto-Qualification Forms for students that are auto-qualified to the national tournament based on performance at the 2024 National Tournament.

Other Required Items - not collected at registration, but must be on hand and immediately produced in case of protest:

1. Copies of all Original Oratory and Informative Speaking Scripts (see below for more information).

2. Copies of scripts for all interpretation events in accordance with the rules found in the NSDA District Tournament Manual.

2024 Site Information:

Friday's competition will be held at Woodbury High School (2665 Woodlane Drive, Woodbury MN 55125.)

Saturday's competition will be held at Eagan High School (4185 Braddock Trail, Eagan, MN 55123.) It will run in conjunction with the Eagan Wildcat Speech Tournament.

Tournament operations are conducted by the District Committee, but coaches are welcome in Tournament Headquarters with any questions or concerns at any point throughout the event. Results for rounds will be released on Tabroom.com (to coaches only); results from each round will be released at some point AFTER the start of the next round.

Qualification to Nationals:

The Southern Minnesota NSDA District continues to maintain Level Three Qualifier status. Southern is guaranteed three entries to attend the NSDA National Tournament in Des Moines, Iowa in each main speech and debate main event, as long as those events have the minimum number of entries established in the NSDA Unified Rules Manual.

SPEECH RULES AND PROCEDURES

The rules found on this page are not exhaustive. All students and coaches should consult the NSDA High School Unified Rules Manual (found at www.speechanddebate.org) to ensure they are meeting NSDA requirements. This page merely highlights important guidelines. If you need clarification on any rule, please email dj@brynteson.info BEFORE the first day of competition.

Note: each school will be permitted to bring a maximum of four entries in each main speech event (as long as they do not go over the quota it is allowed by its chapter strength). An individual student may enter no more than two speech and debate events (with the exception of Congress and Big Questions) at the NSDA District Tournament Series in a single year.

Tournament Format

All entries will have three prelim rounds. Elimination rounds are based on total number of entries. Please see the Southern MN Speech Tournament procedure for more details.

Each preliminary round will be judged by two judges. The semifinal round will be judged by a panel of three judges, and the final round will be judged by a panel of five judges. In accordance with the Unified Rules Manual, entries will be ranked with all preliminary ranks (dropping the lowest rank); mandated by the NSDA in 2022-2023, elimination round ranks will no longer be multiplied.

General Rules

1. Time limits for speeches are as follows:

Extemporaneous Speaking: 7 Minutes | All Other Events: 10 Minutes

In addition, each event is given a 30 second "grace period". If the panel of judges all agree that an entry went beyond the time allowed by grace period, that entry is not allowed to get the "1" in the round.

2. No scripts or notes are permitted (with the exception of Program of Oral Interpretation, in which use of a manuscript is REQUIRED). In everything else, all speeches must be memorized.

3. All coaches and contestants are responsible for reading and understanding all rules pertaining to their events. All rules can be found in the Unified Rules Manual available at speechanddebate.org.

Script Requirements in Main Interpretation Events (not including POI)

A cutting in each main interpretation event must be a single work of literature: one short story or one play or one novel or one or more poems. The district committee will not collect it at registration, but the original published source of any selection used in Drama, Humor, or Duo must be immediately available at the tournament as well as a complete script of the cutting used. A complete script of the cutting includes:

a. A photocopy of every page from which any line of the cutting is taken; pages are to be in the order in which they are performed.

b. All words used from the script should be highlighted (any words/lines not used should be left unmarked).

c. Any word changes (to eliminate profane language) and/or additions (for transition) must be indicated clearly in ink.

It is the affirmative duty of each coach and each student entered in NSDA Interpretation contests to ensure that the cutting performed meets NSDA rules.

Script Requirements in Program of Oral Interpretation

A cutting in POI must include at least two separate pieces of literature that represent at least two separate genres (prose, poetry, drama). The use of a manuscript is required. The original published source of any selection used in POI must be immediately available at the tournament as well as a complete script of the cutting used. A complete script of the cutting includes:

a. A photocopy of every page from which any line of the cutting is taken; pages are to be in the order in which they are performed.

b. All words used from the script should be highlighted (any words/lines not used should be left unmarked).

c. Any word changes (to eliminate profane language) and/or additions (for transition) must be indicated clearly in ink.

It is the affirmative duty of each coach and each student entered in NSDA Interpretation contests to determine that the cutting performed meets NSDA rules.

Script Requirements in Original Oratory and Informative Speaking

All entries in original oratory and informative speaking must have a script with them at the tournament in case of protest. The script must identify the quoted materials, state the number of quoted words, include a work cited page in A.P.A. or M.L.A. format (which includes published pictorial material in informative speaking), and both the student and the coach must attest by signature that the speech is the original work of the student. The Southern Minnesota Committee will not collect scripts during registration, but you must have them available at all points during the tournament in case of protest.

Informative Speaking: Visual Aids

PLEASE REVIEW THE FOLLOWING AS SOME RULES DIFFER FROM MSHSL RULES. Audio/visual aids may or may not be used to supplement and reinforce the message. During the presentation, no electronic equipment is permitted. The use of live animals or any additional people as visual aids is not allowed during the speech. Items of dress put on and removed during the course of the presentation are considered costumes and may not be part of the contestant’s presentation. Visual aids may not violate law (weapons, drugs, etc.) The host school is not responsible for providing any facilities, equipment, or assistance in a contestant’s use of visual aids. Expedient set up and take down of aids is expected. If a visual aid displays published pictorial material, the source must be included in the works cited page but does not need to be cited orally.

Judges

Each school is required to provide one judge per every five entries or fraction thereof. All judges must be at least three years out of high school. A judge who is an active coach may be two years out but that must be noted on their registration.

In order to facilitate the paneling of judges, all preliminary rounds are flighted with panels of two judges. This means that Friday could be a very long day. To make the tournament function, it is critical that each school completely fulfills their entire judge requirement. To help alleviate the long day for judges, it may be advisable to find multiple people to share a single judge obligation. For instance, two persons can share one judge slot by having Person A assigned to rounds 1A- 2B, and Person B assigned to rounds 3A- 4B. If you choose to do this, please make sure to clearly notate within tabroom.com the availability your judges have, as well as any schools they should not judge.

All judges will utilize electronic ballots through tabroom.com. In order to get through rounds as efficiently as possible, we ask that judges not write any comments; instead, judges will just need to submit ranks.

Southern and Central Minnesota NSDA will be sharing judges to ensure clean judge assignments.

Hospitality

A HUGE thank you to the Woodbury and Eagan coaching staffs and administrations for their willingness to host this event. A judges lounge will be provided both days of the tournament. Student concessions will be available on both days of the tournament.