Hello!

My name is Adnan Askari and I competed in PF Debate for four years at St. Paul Academy, traveling moderately on the national circuit my senior year. I am a freshman at Yale and this is my first year judging.

What I Like to See in a Round

- Weighing in both summary and final focus: please tell me what the most important voting issues are and why

- Warrants extended in summary and final focus

- Second rebuttals that cover offense from first rebuttal

- Teams that actually put in work to reconcile clash on arguments (i.e. give me specific reasons to prefer your analysis over your opponents' -- timeframe, specificity, clearer internal warrants, etc.)

- DATES ON SOURCES

- Clear signposting

- First summary does not have to extend defense that the second-speaking team has not addressed

Things You Should Know About Me

- I can generally handle speed well, but if you spread you will lose me

- I am not super familiar with Ks / theory so I probably will not vote on them unless you very clearly delineate your path to the ballot

- I only have a surface-level understanding of the September / October topic so please don't assume that I know every argument inside and out

- Please don't shake my hand

Background:

My background is in public forum. I competed all throughout high school on the national circuit and local circuit in Georgia. Currently, I am the President of the New Haven Urban Debate League and coach parliamentary debate at Yale.

PF Paradigm:

WEIGHING IS THE MOST IMPORTANT THING YOU WILL EVER DO IN DEBATE! IT IS MORE IMPORTANT THAN KNOWING YOUR OWN NAME!! PLS WEIGH.

If you don’t weigh, I’ll have to resort to my own weighing mechanism, which may be different every round depending on my mood. You don’t want that, so pls for the love of god, make my life and yours easier by weighing. It’s the easiest way to my ballot.

Other stuff:

-I can handle 250 words/minute. Go over, well...your arguments might not make it on my flow.

-I don't expect the first speaking team to extend defense in summary. However, you need to respond to turns. Second speaking teams need to extend defense and respond to turns.

-Second speaking team should TRY to respond to turns in rebuttal.

-Voters in final focus should be mentioned in summary.

-If your links don’t logically make sense, I’m probably not going to buy it, so warrant everything.

-I don't weigh anything in cross in terms of the ballot, so bring it up in speeches if there's something important.

Parli Paradigm:

I'm familiar with East Coast parli. I don't do well with theory, so I might not understand it. You can try it, but you still must interact with your opponents' arguments. The way to my ballot is by weighing. You don't need to go for everything at the end of the debate, but you should still respond to opponents' arguments and not extend through ink! Break the last speech into voters and weigh!

Other points (very similar to my paradigm for PF, so take that for what you will):

-Because you're not using evidence, please maintain a 200 word/minute maximum.

-Rebuttals should not be in the final speech. I believe that your rebuttals, at the very minimum, should begin in the member speeches. This allows for final interactions in the final speech between the two sides, and this avoids the idea of "no new arguments in the last speech."

-No tag teaming.

-If your links don’t logically make sense, I’m probably not going to buy it, so warrant everything. If I don't buy it, I will most likely not vote for it...

-Do not extend through ink! Conceded arguments are arguments that were poorly responded to or not at all; to which, you can extend, but if your opponents provide multiple warrants/responses to the argument, you must also respond to the rebuttals.

If you have any questions, please ask in rounds or after by emailing me at mary.chen@yale.edu

Mel DeBlasio (she/her) Yale '23.5

General Info

I'm a New England girlie who judges West Coast tournaments every once in a while. Parli experience only.

Be kind, be chill, and above all be respectful!! Any act of aggression (table banging), intimidation (yelling), disruption (whispering during speeches), or abusive argumentation will result in the lowest possible speaker points awarded. Please tell me your pronouns prior to round start.

Include trigger and content warnings. Let me know if you have preferences or accommodations that you're uncomfortable sharing with your opponents directly, and I will make an anonymous announcement prior to round start.

If your opponents have strong prefs due to different debate backgrounds/experience, you must try your best to accommodate them. There is nothing satisfying or educationally valuable about gatekeeping your opponents out of a round.

Debate Preferences

I hand-write all of my flow and have the attention span of a four year old on methamphetamine. I can keep up with fast rounds easily but if you spread, I will stop listening and the only RFD you'll get is how many ceiling tiles there are in the room. Spreading is unnecessary and an accessibility concern, and in my mind spreading = bad debater.

Please please please do not rely on tech jargon in the round to describe your arguments. If you cannot explain your case to a random person on the street, it is meaningless. The only "perm" I care about is the one Elle Woods used to win her third-act court case in the 2001 cinematic masterpiece "Legally Blonde", and if you start using half words, acronyms, and other nonsensical ten dollar words I will stop the round to perform the Cincinatti Stroke Scale on you. Techy terminology does not replace actual warranting.

Please no tag-teaming or verbal team communication during speech times, save it for flex time!

ELI5 and pretend that I have never read a book in my life.

I will listen to whatever type of round you want to have, however keep in mind that I don't have a tech background. All arguments will be evaluated the same, regardless of the technical or stylistic context: is it well-warranted? Is it unique? Are the impacts clearly linked? Did you weigh your impacts? And at the end of the day, you have to tell me in the PMR/LOR why your arguments win you the round. Lowest pref is theory because I find it uninteresting.

Please give me your creative, crazy, and radical cases. Please try to present unique and entertaining arguments, and feel free to joke around a bit and have a good time. My Breaking Baby brain loves it, and if you're having fun in the round then I'm having fun in the round. But leave your edgy bigoted "death and suffering are good, actually" cases for your Discord meme channel. And don't try to go OTT on details and style in sacrifice of argument quality... you still have to run a good debate round to win!

Hi there,

My name is Alex Gordon -- I competed in Congressional Debate for 4 years at the Dreyfoos School of the Arts in West Palm Beach, FL. I debated a decent amount nationally, placing 3rd in Senate at NSDA Nationals my senior year, and ranked well at a few other tournaments over the years. I am now a sophomore at Yale University, where I compete in parliamentary debate.

I judge congress rounds holistically, preferring the best overall legislator over the best orator, best debater, etc. That said, here are a few things you may want to consider in reference to how I evaluate speakers:

1. If you are disrespectful, rude, or violate decorum, I will refuse to rank you, no matter how good your speeches are.

2. Feel free to use humor, but always make sure you are taking the competition seriously and with respect.

3. Don't be afraid to take risks. I reward creativity and unique argumentation and styles.

4. I am fine with speed, but some judges are not, so check their paradigms, too. Also, make sure your computer can handle speed through Zoom, too. The last thing I want is to not understand what you are saying as a result of the technology

5. Every speech after the first affirmative should have refutation. There is no excuse not to, because that just shows you are not listening to your fellow representatives.

6. Please have warrants! I should not be left asking "Why" or "How" after you make your argument. Also, please do not rehash.

7. Please do not say, "According to the New York Times" and move on. Provide a name and/or date with sources, if possible.

8. Be passionate. Show me why I should not only care about your side of the debate, but about your particular argument and why it is the most important in the round. Connect to the humanity of debate -- paint a narrative of what will or will not happen as a result of the vote. Make me want to vote for you and your side.

9. Have fun. Show off your personality.

As a final note, I want to say how inspiring it is to see you all still dedicated to the activity and willing to put the time into competing this weekend. I know there is a lot going on in people's lives, and debate can oftentimes be a stress-inducing activity. If at any point you just need a break, or need to leave and get a glass of water, always feel free to take care of yourself first.

Be well, and be kind to one another.

Alex

Please feel free to contact me at alexgordon003@gmail.com with any questions.

Paradigms are silly as is tabroom!

Hey y’all! My name is Trent Kannegieter (he/him/his), and this is my paradigm for the 2020 Tournament of Champions. Congratulations to everyone who made it! I’m excited to see some great rounds.

Briefly about me:

I am a junior in college studying history and human rights. I competed nationally for Bayside Academy (in Daphne, Alabama) from late 2015 to early 2017. While Congressional Debate was my main event, I also competed briefly in Extemp, PF, and LD, qualifying for national championship tournaments in each. I currently compete in parliamentary debate and continue my engagement with high school speech & debate through the Yale Invitational, which I co-directed in 2019.

When I’m judging a round:

The best debater in any given cycle is the one who wins the judges’ support for their side of the legislation through their unique contributions to the round. My ratings in any given round are a function of which debaters, on aggregate, were most “persuasive” as measured by this standard. This paradigm means that I’m primarily an “argument-driven” Congress judge, especially relative to some other judges. Early speeches, even if they cover what some may call “stock” points, can win rounds. But smooth presentation, while important, is insufficient to carry my ballot. They only matter insofar as they push the judge toward your side of the legislation. (Thus, the benefit of speaking first is getting the first crack at selecting and explaining these key issues. The tricky part is anticipating where the rest of the round will go and not allowing later speakers to make render contributions irrelevant.) There are many ways to convince a judge, from compelling data to inventive warranting and deep impacting. However, at the Tournament of Champions especially, many of you will likely do this. In light of this talented pool, refutation and engagement of other speakers is at an even higher premium than normal. That is, lots of you will probably be convincing. Prove to me why your stuff is more important than the stuff others bring to the table. Quality wins my ballot over quantity.

I check my biases at the door. That means that you don’t have to worry about running any type of argument in front of me because it seems “conservative” or “progressive.”

Relatedly, this also means that I’m not going to fill in any blanks in your argument for you. If you’re going to make an argument that seems “intuitive,” I still expect you to prove that point to me. (Put in the way I would explain it when coaching, your claim is only as strong as your warranting, data, and impacts.) Be aware of this while competing in front of me. An earlier speaker might make a claim, but not warrant or impact the point sufficiently (or provide good enough data) for the point to stand. Depending on how the round shakes out, this means you can still be the debater who “wins” a point whose claim was first introduced by an earlier speaker. Don’t dogmatically fear being tagged as “rehash” if you do this well. (This is of course distinct from making the exact same point with similar warranting and impacting as earlier speakers did. That’s rehash. Don’t do that.)

I care about questioning blocks! If questions weren’t supposed to factor into ranks, we wouldn’t have them at all. Good engagement, both as questioner and respondent, will be rewarded. Bad engagement will be noted. Respectful exchange (I.e. keeping questions short; not cutting people off) is a must.

Things you can assume:

You can assume that I know a bit about the world, but no more than information that would be on the front page of a paper like The New York Times. Anything else needs to be explained to me. (Don't just say terms like "contact theory" or "stagflation," explain what they are and why they matter.)

You can assume that I'm rational. If you make an argument based on a logical fallacy (such as ad hominem or is/ought), I won't pick it up.

You can assume that, like most people, I tend to be more skeptical of evidence from sources that aren't either peer reviewed or well-respected publications. If your data is from a source that isn't intuitively "trustworthy," it's your responsibility to explain why I should trust it.

On Presiding Officers:

Good (and impartial) presiding is imperative to the integrity of Congressional Debate. I am also aware that presiding in this format presents a unique challenge. Here, as with anywhere else, good presiding should be rewarded. My ballots reflect this belief. That said, presiding does not automatically earn you a place on my ballot. (No funny business. I used to preside frequently in high school, and I’m stuck at home right now and myself school just went to Universal Pass/Fail grading for the semester, so I’ve been spending some time with my old copy of Robert’s Rules of Order.)

That’s it! Best of luck this weekend and beyond!