Debate Rooms

Addendum: The doors that should be used to enter Williams Hall for the weekend should be the ones at 36^th and Spruce Street and the doors for Cohen should be on the west side of the building. They are doing construction on the Penn Commons side.

We are very tight for debate rooms at Penn. Here are some things you should know:

All prelim pairings will be released at least 45 minutes before start time. 

On Saturday, the 3 Varsity divisions (PF, LD and Policy) are sharing the same rooms, in alternating 2-hour slots. That is, PF gets the rooms for two hours, then LD and Policy get the same rooms for 2 hours, then back to PF, etc., for the day. There is no leeway, there are no extra rooms, everything must run precisely on time. This means that everyone—judges and debaters—must be in the rooms at the posted start time, and that the rounds must start immediately at that point. And rounds must end promptly, and everyone must be out of the room by the time the next posted round is supposed to start in the other division. If that means critiquing in the hallways, so be it. (Or, perhaps, don’t critique so much. You can put comments into your e-ballot at any time during the tournament. After all, the coaches would like to see those comments too.)

Let me repeat that prelim pairings will be released at least 45 minutes before start time. This means that you will have plenty of time to find your room. Debaters not in their rooms and prepared to debate at the start time will be forfeited. Judges who are not in their rooms at the start time will be considered no-shows for the tournament, and their schools fined accordingly. We have no choice on this. We have no leeway.  

The university has an exhaustive set of maps at https://www.facilities.upenn.edu/maps All attendees should have this url in hand for the duration. Additionally, I would suggest that coaches print maps for their teams and mark them up in advance. I have seen debaters in my day who could not find the building they were already in, I have seen debaters take 50 minutes to find the building directly across the street, and I have seen debaters disappear into Azkaban for twenty years to return as mere husks of human beings. Don’t let this happen to your students. 

To help you stay the course, I provide the following for geographic pre-flowing. 

VPF:

On Friday, rounds will be in Williams and Fisher-Bennett.

On Saturday, rounds will be in Cohen, Evans (access from the Schattner entrance at 240 S. 40th Street), Fagin, Houston, and Williams.

VLD:

On Friday, rounds will be in DRL (David Rittenhouse Labs) and Fisher-Bennett.

On Saturday, rounds will be in Cohen, Evans (access from the Schattner entrance at 240 S. 40th Street), Fagin, Houston, and Williams.

Policy:

On Friday, rounds will be in College Hall, Evans (access from the Schattner entrance at 240 S. 40th Street), DRL (David Rittenhouse Labs), and Fagin. 

On Saturday, rounds will be entirely in Williams.

JV Divisions:

JV LD on both Friday and Saturday is in Schattner and Evans (access both from the Schattner entrance at 240 S. 40th Street) and Van Pelt.

JV PF on Friday is entirely in Van Pelt. 

JV PF on Saturday is in Schattner (access from the entrance at 240 S. 40th Street), Steinberg-Dietrich, Education Commons, and Van Pelt.

By the way, while the JV rounds will need to move along, they are not as critically stacked as the Varsity divisions. 

Sunday:

Sunday rounds for all the debate divisions are much more centralized. We will be using Williams, Fisher-Bennett, Cohen Hall and College Hall. 

Yes, this is all very complicated. Which is why we’re sending it to you early. Waiting till the last minute to find out where you’re going on the day of the tournament virtually guarantees that you won’t get there. Do you really want to deal with the Dementors at Azkaban?