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Grapevine Classic

2021 — NSDA Campus, US

PFD Paradigm List

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Misha Adams Elkins High School 6 rounds

Raif Ahmed Half Hollow Hills HS East 3 rounds

Last changed on Fri March 8, 2024 at 3:51 PM EDT

Tech judge. Please do not do off time road maps unless if you say where you are going to start and end on the flow. Please keep it below 5-10 seconds.

Hi! My name is Raif, I debated PF from 2016-2020 at local, state, and nat circ tourneys in the northeast. I coached TOC qualifying and judged extensively from 2020-2022. Once we are in the round, I will provide my email for a email evidence chain or a google doc whichever u prefer. On any other event than PF you can treat me like a well meaning lay judge.

PF:

General Stuff:

-I live for the line by line debate, a rebuttal that clearly signposts what part of a contention that the second speaker will be responding to and then applying responses that are actually responsive and not just topshelf is awesome, and same thing goes for summaries/final foci. "Big picture/voters style debate" is tolerable, but nothing beats a good line by line round.

-All Offense(Contentions, Turns, or Disads) has to be properly FRONTLINED(Improperly frontlining is when you just straight up extend through ink pretending that explaining your link story actually responds to your opponent's response when it clearly doesn't or drop any response on any argument you collapse on), EXTENDED(An extension that isn't sufficient is one that extends a link, but then drops the impact, or just only extends an impact without a link, please do both), and probably WEIGHED in BOTH SUMMARY AND FINAL FOCUS IN ORDER TO BE EVALUATED. In non-debate jargon: Explain the arguments you want me to vote for you off of, answer your opponent's responses, and explain why your arguments are more important than your opponents in both summary and final focus.

-WEIGH YOUR ARGUMENTS. "Weighing" by saying "we outweigh on probability and magnitude" with no further explanation is not weighing. You genuinely have to compare your impacts or links and explicitly explain why I prefer one link or impact over the other. Weighing will boost your speaks, but weighing by just using buzzwords with no additional analysis will make me physically cringe. Don't take advantage of Probability/Strength of Link Weighing to read new link or impact defense that wasn't in the round already. If you start weighing in rebuttal, +.5 speaks for you and an imaginary cookie! The only time I will accept new weighing in either final foci is if there has literally been no weighing in the past speeches by either side(if u reach this scenario, your speaks won't be as high compared to if yall started weighing earlier).

-Turns read in the first rebuttal have to be responded to in the second rebuttal, or I consider it as a clean line of offense for the first speaking team(hey first speaking team you should probably blow that up!). The second rebuttal probably should also frontline defensive responses for strategic purposes, but that is not mandatory.

-UPDATE: 3-minute summaries require defense to be extended in first summary.Because of 1st Summary not being able to definitively know what the second speaking team is collapsing on in summary and final focus, 1st Final Focus CAN extend defensive responses from rebuttal to Final Focus ONLY IF the response was dropped(uncontested). That being said, I would much rather prefer if you could also extend the responses you want to collapse on in FF be in summary too. Please don't say a certain response was dropped when it wasn't. If a link turn is read by a team in rebuttal, and then is not read in summary, but is dropped by the opposing team in their summary, I am willing to evaluate the turn as terminal defense in final focus if the team who read it in rebuttal decides to extend the response in their final focus.

-If there is no offense at the end of the round I will presume the status quo(default con), but before that I will try to find some trivial piece of offense on on the flow that may seem insignificant to the debate if it comes to that(please do not let it come to that).

-Signpost: If I can't tell where you are on the flow, then I cant flow what you say, and that sucks for everyone!

-Warranted analytic>Carded response with no warrant most of the time

-Tech>Truth

Lay-------------Flay---------X---Tech

-Defesne is sticky, even if a response isnt extended in summary and final, if said response was read onto one of the arguments that would be collapsed on in the latter half of the round, I would be more hesitant to vote off of that argument compared to other arguments collapsed in the latter half of the round that have less ink on them or no ink that hasnt been frontlined.

-For concessions in crossfire to be evaluated, CONCESSIONS HAVE TO BE BROUGHT UP IN THE NEXT SPEECH.

Speed:(<275 Words Per Minute)

-Please don't spread, you can honestly just work on your word economy!

-I’ve been less involved recently, and if it’s online please speak at a normal pace.

-Def pref 180-200wpm the most but above that is bearable untill 275wpm.

-If you can speak CLEARLY AND QUICKLY, you should be fine!

-If you go fast, and I yell clear more than twice, your speaks are getting docked(there is literally no educational or tangible real-world benefits made from spreading so quickly that neither I nor your opponents can comprehend your arguments).

-Quality of responses>Quantity of response

I trust you to count your own prep time, please do not abuse that.

Theory/Ks/Other Progressive Args:

-As someone who debated mainly in the Northeast, I don't know how to evaluate progressive arguments because I have never really debated them nor have I been exposed to them much. I am open to hearing them and don't plan on hacking against them, but I would much rather not have to judge fast progressive rounds if I do not have to.

-2 exceptions tho:

A) Impacting to structural violence if it is warranted, frontlined, and continuously extended in a logical and intuitive manner.

B) If your opponents are genuinely being abusive in the round, at that point you don't need to read a shell, just straight up say they are being abusive and warrant it quickly(i.e. "they read a new and unrelated contention in second rebuttal that does not interact with our case, that's abusive bc of timeskew.")

Evidence:

-I try to avoid calling for evidence as much as possible.

-Paraphrasing is okay so long as it is within the context of the actual evidence

-After two minutes(Im sympathetic to those w slow laptops bc I had one when I used to debate), if you can't get your evidence, I'm just not evaluating it, and we are moving on with the round. If want to use your team's prep time to still get the evidence after the two minutes, you can do that too if it is so important.

-Your speaks are getting DOCKED if you're misrepresenting evidence and I will drop the evidence/or even the argument entirely from the round based on how severe the misconstrual is.

-Unless the opposing team tells me miscut evidence means I should drop the debater and why, the team that miscut the evidence WILL NOT have an auto-drop.

These are the scenarios I call for evidence:

A) A debater tells me to in the round

B) It sounds hella sketch/too good to be true

C) It is important for my decision

-Evidence weighing or whatever is generally really cringe, but there are exceptions like in this vid(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=siA9SmHyO7M&t=2610s) at 42:15.

Good luck, don't be mean, and have fun!

Max Banach Pine View School 3 rounds

Last changed on Sat November 11, 2023 at 7:38 AM EDT

Add me to the ev share doc: maximumbanach@gmail.com (do not use an email chain it's tedious)

Short Version

- I debated PF for three years at Pine View School and was ranked 193 out of 2889 on the nat circuit. I currently double-major in Economics & Electrical Engineering at the University of Florida. I coached Pine View KP 2022-23. I'm voting off the flow so put any offense you want in final focus in summary. First summary only needs to extend defense on arguments that were frontlined in second rebuttal. Second rebuttal should answer all offense on the flow if you want me to vote for you.

- Truth > tech, the point of debate is trying to convince someone; you have a higher burden of proof the longer the link chain and thus a higher threshold for my vote. I will still evaluate complex arguments obv

- Tabula rasa, don't expect me to know topic-specific terminology especially if it's the first round of the tourney

Long Version

Extensions:

- Warrants and impacts need to be extended for an argument to be voted off of

- Don’t just read author names and expect me to remember what they say, contextualize each piece of evidence as the round goes on

Weighing:

- The earlier you start the better (rebuttal is great)

- If you weigh in summary (which you should) final focus should mirror the mechanisms used

- good teams always craft a narrative

Evidence:

- Include author name and year published if you want me to evaluate it (postdating is good).

- I will call for evidence if it's contested and key to my decision.

- Tell me if you want me to read a card, but don’t start showing me random ones to try and argue the round after is over.

- My threshold for dropping teams for misconstruing evidence is very low, BUT you need to run T saying why it makes the round unfair if you want it as a voter (this includes the interpretation, the violation, standards, and the voter(s)).

Prep time:

- prep stealing is bad but again I won’t vote off an unfairness claim unless a full theory arg is fleshed out by the opponents.

- if you can’t pull up a piece of evidence within a minute, I’m dropping the ev off the flow.

- if you don’t cut cards shame on you.

Speed:

- 300 wpm is probably my higher comfortability range, anything greater and you risk cards not getting on the flow.

- If you can’t speak fast, don’t.

Progressive Argumentation:

- I am comfortable evaluating theory and have taken philo coursework. Understand that prog arguments often don't fit into the PF speech timing and I will frown on you if you do try it against an opponent who isn't comfortable

- I don't evaluate 30 speaks theory and I have a high threshold for disclosure theory (often teams will just use it as a cheap way to the ballot)

- Don’t just run T as an easy way to pick up against inexperienced teams, ask your opponents if they’re comfortable arguing it (if they aren’t and you go ahead and do I’ll be sad).

Misc.:

- Reading cards > paraphrasing, but paraphrasing is fine

- Preflow before the round

Speaker Points Scale

30 - you're one of if not the best debater I have seen.

29 - 29.9 - You're one of the best debaters at the tournament

28 - 28.9 - You're good, you’ll probably break (hopefully).

27 - 27.9 - You're an okay debater, you need some work, you didn't drop anything major.

26 - 26.9 - You dropped at least one or more important arguments that lost you the round.

25 - 25.9 – You did something very wrong.

At the end of the day, debate is an educational event. If you’re not having fun, there’s no reason to be doing it. Above all, try your best, and be civil.

Shabbir Bohri Hire 6 rounds

Last changed on Fri February 16, 2024 at 10:19 PM CDT

Yes, I want to be on the email chain - shabbirmbohri@gmail.com. Label email chains with the tournament, round, and both teams. Send DOCS, not your excessively paraphrased case + 55 cards in the email chain.

I debated 3 years of PF at Coppell High School. I am now a Public Forum Coach at the Quarry Lane School.

Standing Conflicts: Coppell, Quarry Lane

If there are 5 things to take from my paradigm, here they are:

1. Read what you want. Don't change your year-long strategies for what I may or may not like - assuming the argument is not outright offensive, I will evaluate it. My paradigm gives my preferences on each argument, but you should debate the way you are most comfortable with.

2. Send speech docs. I mean this - Speaks are capped at a 27.5 for ANY tournament in a Varsity division if you are not at a minimum sending constructive with cards. If you paraphrase, send what you read and the cards. Send word docs or google docs, not 100 cards in 12 separate emails. +0.2 speaks for rebuttal docs as well.

3. Don't lie about evidence. I've seen enough shitty evidence this year to feel comfortable intervening on egregiously bad evidence ethics. I won't call for evidence unless the round feel impossible to decide or I have been told to call for evidence, but if it is heavily misconstrued, you will lose.

4. Be respectful. This should be a safe space to read the arguments you enjoy. If someone if offensive or violent in any way, the round will be stopped and you will lose.

5. Extend, warrant, weigh. Applicable to whatever event you're in - easiest way to win any argument is to do these 3 things better than the other team and you'll win my ballot.

Online Debate Update:

Establish a method for evidence exchange PRIOR to the start of the round, NOT before first crossfire. Cameras on at all times. Here's how I'll let you steal prep - if your opponents take more than 2 minutes to search for, compile, and send evidence, I'll stop caring if you steal prep in front of me. This should encourage both teams to send evidence quickly.

PF Overview:

All arguments should be responded to in the next speech outside of 1st constructive. If is isn't, the argument is dropped. Theory, framing, ROBs are the exception to this as they have to be responded to in the next speech.

Every argument in final focus should be warranted, extended, and weighed in summary/FF to win you the round. Missing any one of these 3 components is likely to lose you the round. Frontlining in 2nd rebuttal is required. I don't get the whole "frontline offense but not defense" - collapse, frontline the argument, and move on. Defense isn't sticky - extend everything you want in the ballot in summary, including dropped defense.

Theory: I believe that disclosure is good and paraphrasing is bad. I will not hack for these arguments, but these are my personal beliefs that will influence my decision if there is absolutely no objective way for me to choose a winner. I will vote on paraphrasing good, but your speaks will get nuked. I think trigger warnings are bad. The use of them in PF have almost always been to allow a team to avoid interacting with important issues in round because they are afraid of losing, and the amount of censorship of those arguments I've seen because of trigger warnings has led me to this conclusion. I will vote on trigger warning theory if there is an objectively graphic description of something that is widely considered triggering, and there is no attempt to increase safety for the competitors by the team reading it, but other than that I do not see myself voting on this shell often.

I think RVI's are good in PF when teams kick theory. Otherwise, you should 100% read a counter-interp. Reasonability is too difficult to adjudicate in my experience, and I prefer an interp v CI debate.

K's/Non-Topical Positions: There are dozens of these, and I hardly know 3-4. However, as with any other argument, explain it well and prove why it means you should win. I expect there to be distinct ROBs I can evaluate/compare, and if you are reading a K you should delineate for me whether you are linking to the resolution (IMF is bad b/c it is a racist institution) OR your opponents link to the position (they securitized Russia). I think K's should give your opponent's a chance to win - I will NOT evaluate "they cannot link in" or "we win b/c we read the argument first".

I will boost speaks if you disclose (+0.1), read cut cards in rebuttal (+0.2), and do not take over 2 mins to compile and send evidence (+0.1).

Ask me in round for questions about my paradigm, and feel free to ask me questions after round as well.

Brett Bonnete Hire 6 rounds

Jon-Carlo Canezo St John's School 6 rounds

Araceli Casasola Dulles High School 6 rounds

Last changed on Wed January 3, 2024 at 5:59 AM CDT

(she/they)

Who am I?
I am a social studies teacher the assistant debate coach. I mainly judge public forum and believe it is a positive space for open and healthy rhetoric. I hope you agree with my view that public forum is an event for the common person.

I am hard of hearing

I will be using a transcription aid on my phone to follow the round. It is not recording the speech and the transcript is deleted after 24 hours. Please, speak loudly and clearly for me and the transcription.

How I evaluate debate.

Treat me like a lay person who can flow. Use email chains, cut cards rather than paraphrasing, and avoid the use of debate jargon. I want to see clear defense, impacts, and links. I am a social studies teacher, so focus on your ability to use evidence and real-world understanding. I will vote on understanding of the issue, evidence, and explanation.

### Speeches

If you don't talk about it in summary, I'm not evaluating it in final focus.

### Cross

Don't use crossfire as an opportunity to bicker. I don’t pay attention to cross. In my opinion, cross is meant to examine your opponent’s case and clarify any questions. Seeing people using cross just to dunk on the opponent is not useful.

### Spreading

I am new to debate and English is not my first language so I cannot judge spreading - nor do I believe it has a place in *public* forum. I need to understand your argument and your ability to adapt to your audience will be judged.

### Theory

If your opponent does any of the Big Oofs and you read theory about it, I'm inclined to think you're in the right.

I don't want to listen to K debate - I will be honest and admit I do not know enough about debate to evaluate them fairly (except for the aforementioned exception)

Big Oofs

These are things that will make a W or high speaks an uphill battle. If you read theory against any of these (when applicable), I’m inclined to side with you. Avoid at all costs.

1. Misuse Evidence. Know the evidence and cut rather than paraphrase. Use evidence that is relevant, timely, trustworthy, and accurate. Use SpeechDoc or an email chain to keep each other accountable and save time.
2. Be late to round. Especially for Flight 2. I understand the first round of the day, but please try your best to be in your room on time. Punctuality is a skill and impressions are important.
3. Taking too long to ‘get ready’ or holding up the round. Have cards cut, flows setup, and laptops ready to go before the round. Especially if you’re going to be late.
4. Not timing yourself. Self-explanatory.
5. Not using trigger warnings. Debate is better when it’s accessible. Introducing any possibly triggering topics or references without consent is inaccessible.
6. Doing any of the 2023 no-no’s. Homophobia, misogyny, transphobia, racism, ableism, etc. is a one-way free ticket to a 25 speak and an L for the round.

The Respect Amendment

This section was added for minor offensives that rub me the wrong way. No, I will not vote on these. I might dock speaks for not following these - depending on severity.

I want to forward a respectful, fair, and accessible environment for debate. The Big Oofs are a good place to start. But I hope that every debater would…

1. **Respect their partner.** Trust that they know what they’re doing.
2. **Respect their opponent.** Don’t belittle them or talk down to them. Aim to understand and give critiques on their argument, not to one-up them on something small.
3. **Respect the judge.** All judges make mistakes and lousy calls - especially me. We can respectfully disagree, and that’s okay. However, not a single judge has changed their mind because you were a bad sportsperson.

Morgan Copeland Westwood 6 rounds

Last changed on Fri March 29, 2024 at 4:29 PM EDT

About me:

Email: mcopeland2017@gmail.com

Background: Currently, I am a coach for Liberty University, where I also debated for four years, NDT Octofinalist and CEDA Octofinalist; I started by doing policy args, moved to Kritical/performance things with most of my arguments starting with black women and moving outward such as Cap, AB, Set Col, and so on). As a novice, I started debate in college and worked my way to varsity, so I have a pretty good understanding of each division.

Judging wise (general things)

How I view debate: Debate is, first and foremost, a game, but it's full of real people and real consequences, so we should keep that in mind as we play, even though it's a game with real-life implications for many of us.

Facial Expressions: I often make facial expressions during the debate, and yes, they are about the debt, so I would pay attention to it; my face will usually let you know when I am vibing and when I'm confused

Speaker points: --- subjective these days. I try to start at 28.7 and then go up and down based on a person's performance in a debate. Do you want to earn higher speaks? Don't risk clarity over speed. I'm not straining my ear to understand what you are saying. And a 2NR and 2AR that have judge instruction and tell me what I am voting on are chefs ki.ss

K AFFs --Tend to think these should be in the direction of the room. You should be prepared to answer these questions if you read these affs. What is the point of reading the 1AC in debate? What is your beef with the debate or the resolution? I think you need to have a reason why people should have to engage with your model of debate and why the education you produce is good.

K's --- What's the link? Links need to be contextualized to the aff; generally, don't be generic or links of omission unless they are entirely dropped—the more specific the aff, the better. Leveraging the framework in your favor is an underrated strategy, but I enjoy those debates. At the end of the debate, some explanation of the alternative that solves the links needs to be explained. Less is more condensed than the K in the 2NR, and you can sit and contextualize the args you go for to the 1AC and what is happening in the debate. In general, I understand most K's. Still, you should assume that I don't explain your literature base/theory or power, especially if you read psychoanalysis, Baudrillard, or anything like that in front of me.

(Putting the K on the case page makes my flow so messy, and I like pretty flows....lol)

Policy AFFs -- I always think less is more; the more advantages and scenarios, the less likely those internal link scenarios make sense.

Framework -- Framework makes the game work. The most important thing with the framework is getting OFF your blocks and answering the specific offense. I don't think TVA has to solve all of the AFF, but I do think they need to be TOPICAL, and I think you need to prove that they can access the same scholarship under the TVA.

DAs and CPs -- These are fine; CPs need to be competitive and solve the aff or significant portions of the aff with a net benefit. DAs are okay links that should be specific to the aff, and impact weighing in the 2NR is key.

Theory: Theory is fine, but just reading blocks back and forth at one another is not --- to win theory, a significant portion of the 2NR and 2AR need to be dedicated to them to win this in front of me -- and disclosure is something I would say I have a higher threshold on really need to prove in round abuse to win

Amod Daherkar Seven Lakes High School 6 rounds

Ipsita Das Foothill High School 3 rounds

Ashwin Desai Hire 6 rounds

Lars Deutz Bergen County Academies 6 rounds

Last changed on Tue January 2, 2024 at 11:21 PM CDT

Did PF and Policy for 4 years in high school. I now actively coach PF and attend UT Austin.

Contact info (for email chains): lnj.deutz@gmail.com

Basics

I'll try my best to adapt to your style - debate the way you want and enjoy the activity
I have little patience for people stealing prep and for long evidence exchanges. you will be in my good graces if you make sure the wasted time between speeches is reduced. send cards before your speech for a boost in speaks.
If you follow (2), my speaks usually range around 29. If you get 29.5+, I was very impressed.
As for speed, I am ok with it generally but I flow on computer so if you conjure up a blip-storm in summary (ie- read a bunch of one-liners) because you don't properly collapse, I will end up missing something.

PF Basics

I'll vote off of the least mitigated link chain with an impact at the end of the round
To make an argument into a voting issue, it should be properly extended in the latter half of the round, warranted throughout the round, and weighed against other arguments
Have tangible impacts (extinction works) - statistics about the economy growing don't count and reading "x increases trade and a 1% increase in trade saves 2 million lives" doesn't make the impact of your individual argument 2 million lives

PF Rebuttal

Frontlining is required in second rebuttal - if you drop offense, it becomes conceded and defense on an argument you collapsed on should be frontlined or it'll be an uphill battle
Each response should have a warrant - you can read as many as you'd like, but no warrant means it doesn't matter. 10 warranted responses with weighing is generally far more effective then reading 30 blips
In my experience, most rounds can benefit from collapsing early & weighing in second rebuttal

PF Summary/Final Focus

Any argument (defense or offense) that wants to be a voting issue needs to be in both speeches - "sticky" anything doesn't exist
Extend and weigh any argument you go for
Arguments not responded to in the previous speech are conceded - just call it that and extend it and move on
Metaweighing is good but hard - try your best to do it when needed and you'll be rewarded

Theory

Read what you want but I'd prefer shells to be accompanied by examples of in-round abuse; for example, if you are reading paraphrase theory, it would be nice to see which piece of evidence in their case is misconstrued (although it's not required).
Out-of-round abuse cannot be adjudicated by me - this stuff needs to be reported to your coach or the tournament's committee if a reportable offense

Other non-standard arguments in PF

I'm down to vote on anything that is well warranted. I'm a big fan of frameworks (with clear standards) and will vote on K's as long as they are well laid out (ie- if you want me to vote on biopolitics, explain in a couple of sentences what that means and what it looks like in the real world). For reference, in high school, I read versions of neolib, imp, bioptx, spark, and cap in pf
Try something new! I've gotten to the point where I've judged so many debates that look virtually identical to another that I will probably reward you with speaks if you try out a new strategy/case position/argument, etc.

Evidence

Every piece of evidence needs to be cut - you can choose to paraphrase but must still have cut evidence for it
Make evidence issues part of the debate rather than out-of-round issues - each team should be given a chance to justify the abuse or explain why it warrants a loss.
I'll never call for evidence unless explicitly told to - if you want me to read evidence don't just call it bad and tell me to read it, take the time to explain why you believe it's bad if it's a critical part of the debate

Post-Round Info

I will always disclose as long as the tournament allows it - if they don't, shoot me a message on messenger and I will
Ask questions! You should use the post-round opportunity to learn what you could've improved on.

William Fan Acton-Boxborough Regional High School 3 rounds

Glenda Ferguson Coppell High School 3 rounds

Jefferson Patrick Freeman Hire 3 rounds

Muralicharan Gurumoorthy Foothill High School 3 rounds

Brent Halliburton Winston Churchill High School 3 rounds

Last changed on Thu May 26, 2022 at 9:30 AM EDT

I am a parent judge, my son is a junior in high school. He did not write my paradigm.

And awayyyyyy we go!

TLDR: Tech > Truth, Line-by-Line good, Signposting good, writing my ballot good, progressive good.

I have found the best thing to do from an evidence sharing perspective is to put a link to a google doc in the chat that we can all edit and view. Please do this.

I self-identify as a progressive tabula rasa flow judge.

Tech > Truth. Underdeveloped or ridiculous arguments are hard to vote on (low bar for !truth).

Speed: I will clear you if I feel the need. I like a speech doc as much as anybody, but I feel like it is intellectual laziness on my part or poor speechifying on your part if I rely on it. I should be able to understand and flow what you are saying, right? But I do like to spell an author's name correctly when flowing citations.

Theory and T are fine. I am a bit out of touch with reasonableness vs. competing interps debates. I am a bit out of touch with modern CP theory, so make sure you are clear on your advocacy. I am familiar-ish with K but not up to speed on my Heidegger or whatever. You will need to make sure your argument is extremely clear. Frivolous theory or tricks seem easy to vote against, but you are welcome to try your luck.

I sometimes judge Novice and JV rounds. If I had to identify the thing I have enjoyed the least in these rounds, it would be the technical lack of proficiency most commonly expressed through the cliche “two ships passing in the night”. Good flowing leads to good line-by-line. Good line-by-line leads to a good story. Write my ballot for me. If any of this is unclear, make sure you ask before the round. If this is a novice round or JV, if you show me a good flow after the round, I will bump your speaks.

A common pre-round question I am asked is how I feel about tag-team CX. If your partner is about to give away the farm, by all means jump in. If you have a question prior to your speech that you just really need to ask, jump in. Otherwise, why not just let the appropriate people interact in the usual way? Do you enjoy CX that much? Also, I'm probably not listening.

This is an educational activity and I don't like a hostile environment. Let's keep it fun.

Public Forum:

Everything above applies. If it is in Final Focus, it was in Summary, right? People ask me if defense is sticky and while these terms of art are somewhat confusing to me, my response is that if you want to do stuff in the Final Focus, it should be in Summary, but you can extend dropped arguments very, very quickly. I don't need you to do this (common in PF) line-by-line, card-by-card extension in Summary. You can tell the story in Final Focus.

I expect, starting in Rebuttals, people to answer arguments in prior speeches. I know this makes the 2nd Rebuttal hard, but I believe in you and can think of no reasonable alternative. Happy to discuss.

I see people saying they will bump speaks if you read cards instead of paraphrasing. I am on the train: If you show me before the round that you are reading carded constructives, I will bump your speaks. Paraphrasing may have started as an attempt to increase persuasion, but I feel like it devolves to blippy args. I am considering transitioning to "paraphrase = lower speaks".

I find that with the volume of paraphrasing, people can blur through tags and authors. Please be articulate on the tag and author so I know what you want me to flow. In policy, I feel like I have the time they spend reading the card to write down the tag and author and the tag/citation/card model makes it easy to differentiate between tags and cards. PF seems to be somewhat sub-optimized for flowing by blurring the tag and content via paraphrase. I assume you want me to flow a tag and author if you go to the trouble to say something, but I probably can't write as fast as you read.

After judging several rounds at a recent tournament where I had a problem, let me say this: If your 1st constructive is paraphrased and has more than 20 citations, you are probably over paraphrasing and/or going too fast. I write down your citations. I have seen multiple instances where cases or arguments are so heavily paraphrased that there are two or more citations in a single sentence. I will not be able to write down your argument if you are expecting me to write down two arguments and two citations in a single sentence. And it is probably abusive to the other team. This is a real opinion. If you think this is an unfair standard, I would love to discuss.

Progressive PF is fine.

And I just want to say, for whoever happens to be reading this: It's strange to me that a judge would say that they don't like theory or progressive arguments. I understand if you say you have a bias against tricks, but if people can't feel comfortable making an argument about abuse in round in front of you, that opens the door for off-topic advocacy. Why would we want that? Policy debaters didn't have theory day one, theory evolved to check abuse. I get that people may not have experience with theory, but close-mindedness and a pre-conceived idea of what is acceptable seems super meh and interventionist. Just putting it out there as a check against all the judges that try to actively discourage theory, which I dislike. Happy to advocate for theory before or after round if people want to shoot the breeze.

I have more opinions, just ask.

Olivia Hardage Westlake 6 rounds

Miguel Harvey L C Anderson High School 6 rounds

Last changed on Sat February 10, 2024 at 4:31 AM CDT

grossly overqualified parent judge

Current affiliations: Director of PF at NSD-Texas, Taylor HS

Prior: LC Anderson (2018-23), John B. Connally HS (2015-18), TDC,UTNIF LD

Email chain migharvey@gmail.com ; please share all speech docs with everyone who wants them

Quick guide to prefs

Share ALL new evidence with me and your opponents before the speech during which it is read. Strike me if this is a problem. A paraphrased narrative with no cards in the doc does not count. This is an accommodation I need and a norm that makes debate better. I have needed copies of case since I was a high school debater. Even with me complaining about this, it often doesn't seem to make a difference. The maximum amount of speaks you can get if you don't share your constructive with me is 28.4 and that's if you are perfect. This guideline does not generally apply to UIL tournaments or novice debate rounds unless you are adopting national circuit norms/speaking style

PF:

Tech > truth unless it's bigoted or something

Unconventional arguments: fine, must be coherent and developed (K, spec advocacies, etc)

Framing/weighing mechanism: love impact framing that makes sense; at the very least do meta-weighing. "Cost-benefit analysis" is not a real framework. Must be read in constructive or top of rebuttal

Evidence sharing/disclosure: absolutely necessary but i won't ever vote for a disclosure shell that would out queer debaters. I will err toward reasonability on disclosure if there is contact info on the wiki and/or the case is freely shared a reasonable time before round.

Theory: I am gooder than most at evaluating theory but don't read it if you don't know how. Evidence ethics is very very very very very important

Speed: Fine. Share speech docs

Problematic PF bro/clout culture: ew no

Weighing: wins the majority of PF debates, especially link weighing

Default: offense/defense if there's no framing comparison or reason to prefer one method of weighing

Flow: yes, i flow

Sticky defense: no

LD/Policy:

LARP/topicality/MEXICAN STUFF: 1+

1-off ap, setcol, cap/1nc non-friv theory: 1-2

kant without tricks: 1-2

deleuze/softleft/psycho/non-pess black studies: 2

most other k/nt aff: 3

rawls/non-kant phil/heavy fw: 3-4

Baudrillard/performance: 4-5

queer pess/tricks: probably strike although I'm coming around on spikes a little bit

disability pess/nonblack afropess: strike if you don't want to lose

UIL: Pretty much anything is fine if it gets us through the round with minimal physical or emotional damage. Try to stay on the line by line. Read real evidence. Weigh, please. For CX, maybe don't read nontopical affirmatives against small schools or novices. For LD, make sure your offense links to your framing and that you have warranted justifications for your framework. Read on for further details

TLDR: Share speech docs. Don't be argumentatively or personally abusive. Debate is a game, but winning is not the only objective. Line by line debate is important. No new case extensions in 2AR or final focus. I will intervene against bigotry and disregard for others' physical and mental wellness. I don't disclose speaks, sorry :). I promise I'm trying my best to be nice. LD and policy-specific stuff at the bottom of this doc. I love Star Wars. I will listen to SPARK, warming good, and most impact turns but I generally believe that physical death is not good. Pronouns he/him/his.

Speaks range: usually between 27 and 29.8. 28.5 is average/adequate. I usually only give 30s to good novices or people who go out of their way to make the space better. If you are a man and are sexist in the space I will hack your speaks.

Note on ableism: It is upsetting for me personally to hear positions advocating unipolar pessimism, hopelessness, or the radical rejection of potential futures or social engagement/productivity by the disabled or especially the neurodivergent subject.DO NOT read disability pessimism/abjection or pandering arguments about autism to get me to vote for you. You will lose automatically, sorry

Post-rounding: I can't handle it. This includes post-rounding in email after rounds. I am autistic and it is psychologically and behaviorally triggering for me. I'll take the blame that I can't handle it, just please don't.

Afropessimism: I will vote you down regardless of any arguments made in the round if you or your partner aren't Black and you read afropess. Watch me I'll do it

I have the lowest threshold you can possibly imagine for a well-structured theory argument based on the refusal to share evidence not just with me but with your opponents.

Long version:

Personal abuse, harassment, or competitive dishonesty of any kind is strictly unacceptable. Blatantly oppressive/bigoted speech or behavior will make me consider voting against a debater whether or not the issue is raised by their opponent. If a debater asks you to respect and use preferred pronouns/names, I will expect you to do so. If your argument contains graphic depictions of racial, sexual, or otherwise marginalizing violence, please notify your opponent. Also see mental health stuff below, which is personally tough to hear sometimes. You do not need to throw trigger warnings onto every argument under the sun, it can be trivializing to the lived experience of the people you're talking about. Blatant evidence ethics violations such as clipping are an auto-voter. Try not to yell, please; my misophonia (an inconvenient characteristic shared by a lot of autistic people) makes unexpected volume changes difficult.

Our community and the individual people in it are deeply important to me. Please do your part to make debate safe and welcoming for competitors, judges, coaches, family members, and friends. I am moody and can be a total jerk sometimes, and I'm not so completely naive to think everything is fluffy bunnies and we'll all be best friends forever after every round, but I really do believe this activity can be a place where we lift each other up, learn from our experiences, and become better people. If you're reading this, I care about you. I hope your participation in debate reflects both self-care and care for others.

(cw: self-harm)

Mental and emotional well-being are at a crisis point in society, and particularly within our activity. We have all lost friends and colleagues to burnout, breakdown, and at worst, self-harm. If you are debating in front of me, and contribute to societal stigmas surrounding mental health or belittle/bully your opponent in any way that is related to their emotional state or personal struggles with mental wellness, you will lose with minimum speaks. I can't make that any more clear. If you are presenting arguments related to suicide, depression, panic, or self-harm, you must give a content warning for me. I am not flexible on this and will absolutely use my ballot to enforce this expectation.

PF: Speed is fine. Framing is great (actually, to the extent that any weighing mechanism counts as framework, I desire and enthusiastically encourage it). Framing should be read in constructive or at the TOP of rebuttal. Nontraditional PF arguments (K, theory, spec advocacies) are fine if they're warranted. Warrants in evidence matter so much to me.

PF Theory: I agree with the thesis behind disclosure theory, though I am less likely to vote on it at a local or buy an abuse story if the offending case is straightforward/common. Disclosure needs to be read in constructive. Don't read theory against novices. I will have a low threshold for paraphrasing theory if the violation is about the constructive and/or if the evidence isn't shared before the speech. Don't be afraid to make something a paragraph shell or independent voter (rather than a structured shell) so long as the voter is implicated.

I will always prefer evidence that is properly cut and warranted in the evidence rather than in a tag or paraphrase of it, especially offense and uniqueness evidence. I have an extremely LOW tolerance for miscut or mischaracterized evidence and am just *waiting* for some hero to make it an independent voter.. So nice, I’ll say it twice: Evidence ethics arguments have a very low threshold.

DO NOT PERPETUATE THE TOXIC, PRIVILEGED MALE PF ARCHETYPE. You know *exactly* what I’m talking about, or should. Call that stuff out, and your speaks will automatically go up. If you make the PF space unwelcoming to women or gender minorities, expect L25 and don’t expect me to feel bad about it.

I absolutely expect frontlining in second rebuttal, and will consider conceded turns true. I will not vote on new arguments or arguments not gone for in summary in final focus. No sticky defense.

"It's not allowed in PF" is not by itself a warranted argument.

Crossfire: If you want me to use something from crossfire in my RFD, it needs to be in subsequent speeches. I am not flowing crossfire; I am listening but probably also playing 2048 or looking at animal pictures. I don't really care if you skip Grand, but I won't let you use that practice as an excuse to frontload your prep use then award yourselves extra prep time.

LD/Policy Specifics:

Speed: Most rates of delivery are usually fine, though I love clarity and I am getting older. If you are not clear, I will say "clear." Slow down on tags and analytics for my sake and for your opponent's sake, especially if you don’t include your analytics in the doc. For online debates, the more arguments that are in the doc the better. I will listen to well-developed theoretical or critical indictments of spreading, but it will take some convincing.

Kritik: I have a basic understanding of much of the literature. Explain very clearly why I should vote and why your opponent should lose. For me, "strength of link" is not an argument applicable to most kritik rounds - I ask whether there is a risk of link (on both sides). Your arguments need to be coherent and well-reasoned. "Don't weigh the case" is not a warranted argument by itself - I tend to believe in methodological pluralism and need to be convinced that the K method should be prioritized. A link is *not* enough for a ballot. Just because I like watching policy-oriented rounds doesn't mean I don't understand the kritik or will hack against them. If you link to your own criticism, you are very unlikely to win. I believe the K is more convincing with both an alternative and a ballot implication (like most, I find the distinction between ROB and ROJ somewhat confusing).Please be mindful and kind about reading complicated stuff against novices. It is violent and pushes kids out of debate.

Theory/T: Fine, including 1AR theory. Just like with any other winning argument, I tend to look for some sort of offense in order to vote on either side. I don't default to drop the debater or argument. My abuse threshold on friv shells is much higher. I will not ever vote for a shell that polices debaters' appearance, including their clothes, footwear, hair, presentation, or anything else you can think of (unless their appearance is itself violent). I'll have a fairly high threshold on a strict "you don't meet" T argument against an extremely common aff and am more likely than not to hold the line on allowing US/big-ticket affs in most Nebel debates. One more thing - all voters and standards should be warranted. I get annoyed by "T is a voter because fairness and education" without a reason why those two things make T a voter. I don't care if it's obvious. Don't abuse theory against inexperienced debaters. A particularly egregious example would be to read shells in the 1AC, kick them, and read multiple new shells in the 1AR. Underviews and common spikes are fine. Please, I strongly prefer no tricks or excessive a prioris.A little addendum to that is that I do like truth testing as an argument, but not to justify skep or whatever dopey paradox makes everything false

Frameworks: Fine with traditional (stock or V/C), policy, phil, K, performance, but see my pref guide above for what I am most comfortable evaluating. While I don't think you have to have your own framework per se, I find it pretty curious when a debater reads one and then just abandons it in favor of traditional util weighing absent a distinct strategic reason to do so. I think TJF debates are interesting, but I seldom meet frameworks that *can't* be theoretically justified. Not sure if there's a bright line other than "you need to read the justifications in your constructive," and I'm not sure how good that argument is. I will vote on permissibility/presumption, on which I often lean aff in LD/policy.

LARP: My personal favorite and most comfortable debate to evaluate. Plans, counterplans, PICs, disads, solvency dumps, case turns, etc. Argue it well and it's fine. I don't think making something a floating PIK necessarily gets rid of competition problems; it has to be reasoned well. I'm very skeptical of severance perms and will have to be convinced - my threshold for voting on severance bad is very low. Impact turns are underutilized, but don't think that means I want you to be bigoted or fascist. Cap/heg good are fine. I'm very skeptical of warming good but will vote for it. To the extent that anyone prefs me, and no one should ever pref me under any circumstances, LARPers ought to consider preffing me highly.

Condo: Be really, really careful before you kick a K, especially if it is identity-related - I think reps matter. I am more likely to entertain condo bad if there are multiple conditional advocacies. More likely to vote on condo bad in LD than policy because of time/strat skew. One conditional counterplan advocacy in LD or 2 in policy is generally ok to me and I need a clear abuse story - I almost never vote for condo bad if it's 1 conditional counterplan.

Flashing/Email/Disclosure: I will vote for disclosure theory, but have a higher threshold for punishing or making an example of novices or non-circuit debaters who don't know or use the wiki. Reading disclosure at locals is silly. Lying during disclosure will get you dropped with 25 speaks; I don't care if it's part of the method of your advocacy. If you're super experienced, please consider not being terrible about disclosure to novice or small-school debaters who simply don't know any better. Educate them so that they'll be in a position to teach good practices in future rounds. My personal perspective on disclosure is informed by my background as a lawyer - I liken disclosure to the discovery process, and think debate is a lot better when we are informed. I won't vote on disclosure theory against a queer debater for whom disclosure would potentially out them. One caveat to prior disclosure is that I do conform to "breaking new" norms, though I listen to theory about it. In my opinion, the best form of disclosure is open-source speech docs combined with the wiki drop-down list. Please include me on email chains. Even if you don't typically share docs, please share me on speech docs - I can get lost trying to listen to even everyday conversation if I'm not able to follow along with written words. Seriously, I have cognitive stuff, please send me a speech doc.

Sitting/Standing: Whatever.

I do not care how you are dressed so long as your appearance itself is not violent to other people.

Flex prep/open CX: Fine in any event including PF. More clarity is good.

Performative issues: If you're a white person debating critical race stuff, or a man advocating feminism against a woman/non-man, or a cis/het person talking queer issues, etc., be sensitive, empathetic, and mindful. Also, I tend to notice performative contradiction and will vote on it if asked to. For example, running a language K and using the language you're critiquing (outside of argument setup/tags) is a really bad idea.

I do NOT default to util in the case of competing frameworks. If the framing debate is absolutely impossible to evaluate (sadly, it happens), I will try to figure out who won by weighing offense and defense under both mechanisms.

I tend to think plan flaw arguments are silly, especially if they're punctuation or capitalization-related. I have a very high threshold to vote on plan flaw. It has to be *actually* confusing or abusive, not fake confusing. I do like interp flaw arguments as defensive theory responses in the 1ar

I won't ever hack against trad debaters, but I am what you’d call a “technical” judge and if a debater concedes something terminal to the ballot, it’s probably game over. If you’re a traditional debater and the field is largely circuit debaters, your best bet to win in front of me is probably to go hard on the framework debate and either straight-turn or creatively group your opponent’s arguments.

Warrant all arguments in both constructives and rebuttals. An extended argument means nothing to me if it isn't explained. “They conceded it” is not a warranted argument.

Policy:

New for 2022: I'm older than most judges and I don't judge policy regularly anymore; I need you to slow down just a tick (300 wpm is fine if clear). I generally don't get lost in circuit LD rounds; think of that as your likely standard.

I was a policy debater and consultant at the beginning of my career. Most of this doc is LD and PF-specific, because those are the pools to which I'll generally be assigned. Most of what is above applies to my policy paradigm. I am most comfortable evaluating topical affirmatives and their implications, but I am a very flexible judge and critical/plan-less affs are fine. That said, just like in LD I like a good T debate and I will happily vote for TFW if it's well-argued and won. One minor thing is different from my LD paradigm: I conform a little bit more to policy norms in terms of granting RVIs less often in policy rounds, but that's about it. Obviously, framework debate (meaning overarching framing mechanisms, not T-Framework) is not usually as important in policy, but I'm totally down with it if that's how you debate. I guess a lot of policy debaters still default to util, so be careful if the other side isn't doing that but I guess it's fine if everyone does it. Excessive prompting/feeding during speeches may affect speaks, and I get that it's a thing sometimes, but I don't believe it's particularly educational and I expect whomever is giving the speech to articulate the argument. I am not flowing the words of the feeder, just the speaker. While I'm fairly friendly to condo advocacies in LD, I'm even more friendly to them in policy because of norms and speech times. I'll vote for condo bad, but it needs to be won convincingly - I'll likely err neg if it's 1 or 2 counterplans. Much more likely to vote for condo bad if one of the advocacies is a K that links to the counterplan(s).

Everyone: please ask questions if I can clarify anything. If you get aggressive after the round, expect the same from me and expect me to disengage with little to no warning. My wellness isn't worth your ego trip. I encourage pre-round questions. I might suggest you look over my paradigm, but it doesn't mean you shouldn't ask questions.

Finally, I find Cheetos really annoying in classrooms, especially when people are using keyboards. It's the dust. Don't test my Cheeto tolerance. I'm not joking, anything that has the dust sets me off. Cheetos, Takis, all that stuff. I get that it's delicious, but keep it the hell out of the academy.

Wubet Jean-Baptiste Scarsdale High School 3 rounds

Daniel Johnson Stephen F Austin High School 3 rounds

Jackson Johnson Oak Grove HS 3 rounds

Sheereen Khan Plano East Sr. High 1 rounds None

Nate Kruger Oakwood School 3 rounds

Last changed on Wed April 24, 2024 at 11:33 AM EDT

for speech: im cool with whatever and am excited to judge!

hey! i'm nate. put me on the email chain. natenyg@gmail.com facebook.com/nate.nyg

he/him! will boost speaks +.1 for debaters who ask before round :)

i did ld at hunter and qualled to the toc my senior year. I was a 2n at wake forest for 2 years where my partner and i reached quarters of ceda. i did pf my freshman year, so i'm familiar, but don't assume i know every single thing about the activity and its conventions.

i'm willing to vote on anything and am purely tab with the caveat of intervening against oppressive argumentation. if you're reading theory or k's in pf, i'd vote on it, but please make an effort to make your arguments accessible to your opponents -- pf has not entirely adapted to new norms and if you don't try to adapt your arguments to pf and instead just assume your opponents will know your exact format and everything i'll be annoyed and speaks will suffer. bad theory and k debates are lame, frivolous theory in pf is probably the stupidest thing i can think of lol

oh also i'm judging policy now lol -- what i said above is still true -- was a 2n at wake, haven't debated in like a year, my partner and i quartered ceda reading black feminist lit on the aff and cap on the neg, that's a pretty good indicator i think of the types of arguments i enjoy voting on and judging the most. i'll judge a policy round if you want to have it obviously, i also have been coaching pf 2 years now so my ears are at least a little more attuned to util impacts than previously. in the same way that critical teams are expected to justify why they are moving away from the topic, i believe policy teams should be justifying why they are choosing to debate the topic in clash rounds -- this doesn't mean i'll hack for Ks -- it just means that the same standards apply because i view topicality/its reading as a speech act and i'm not sure why the fact that a speech act is also a procedural would mean i should disregard its implications or its context. that being said, my sophomore year my partner and I won R1 at the season opener reading disclosure, i'm willing to vote on whatever. if you're racist or talk down to women or misgender your opponent or do some other messed up stuff without both making good faith attempts to repair the potential for a safe debate and apologizing without reservation for said messed up act you will get an L20. one time my partner and i debated this guy who would only respectfully talk to me and refused to listen to her whatsoever, talking over her constantly. when we called him on it he said it was because of his adhd and then kept doing it (as a psych major i have never heard of adhd that only appears when you're talking to women!). please use that as an example of what NOT to do.

in the same way i try to hold policy teams to higher standards -- if you're reading a k -- i'm not just gonna hack. justify why the aff is necessary in debate, this round particularly, what my ballot does, make and justify spill up claims, have an awesome theory of power, make material arguments (the best thing i ever learned as a debater is how to read cap links that are 100% disads to the aff -- do that)

good luck have a great round hope it's fun feel free to ask me any questions i am happy to answer them

if you're curious -- my thoughts on debate right now are most influenced by asya taylor, darius white, jacob smith, and the wake coaches who read Ks when they debated (jgreen also)

for k teams -- i am in big support of high schoolers reading k's, i think it's super educational and definitely made me a lot of who i am now (ew. hate typing out that debate made me part of who i am, kinda gross), in support of that practice please feel free to after rounds ask me any random questions you have about lit or strategy, even if it's not related to the round you just had -- i'll do my best to give you some help! it's my understanding these tournaments are designed in part to increase debate access/let teams that might not otherwise get to too many nat circuit tournaments attend -- i coach a lot and have worked at ld camps the past few summers, i also understand wake has a very genius/expensive coaching staff and would be happy to redistribute some of what i've learned from debating here down because truthfully the coaches here are incredible and it should not just be a few debaters at random colleges getting their knowledge!!

Aditya Kumar Plano West Sr High School 6 rounds

Last changed on Fri February 4, 2022 at 8:28 AM CDT

hello friends! I debated for 4 years at Plano West.

chain: adikumar0306@gmail.com

If you have any questions that weren't answered here, I'll be happy to clear them up before round.

1. the warranting of an argument must happen completely the first time you read the response and should ideally be implicated out fully (new warrants/implications from a new warrant will be disregarded, should have theory read against them, and will tank your speaks)

2. I'm a big fan of early weighing in PF. With that being said, if you're just gonna restate your impact and throw out a buzzword, you might as well not weigh at all (make your weighing comparative). I also don't evaluate new weighing in second final unless there is no weighing done in the round prior to that.

3. If you want to dump turns against your opponents, go for it (just make sure the responses are actually responsive because if either a. the response isn't originally responsive and gets turned into something responsive or b. the response gets extended as a blip until final focus, I will intervene to drop the response even if your opponents dropped it completely). I want to make it clear that I am not opposed to reading lots of responses against an argument, but a response must consist of a claim, a warrant, and an implication to how it affects the original argument. offensive overviews in rebuttal are kinda abusive imo, so while ill evaluate it like any other DA/Advantage in the round, I have a lower threshold for responses against the argument and encourage people to read theory against it.

4. With the new three minute summaries, the extension of an argument consists of a re-explanation of the uniqueness, link, internal link, and impact (failure to extend any one of these in summary or final focus drops the argument from my flow). For specific card extensions, idrc if you extend the card name, but it would be preferred.

5. I've debated my fair share of theory rounds, so I think I feel comfortable evaluating a basic theory debate. Additionally, I have a low threshold for responses against "no RVIs" and friv theory. With that being said, while I will do my best to understand non-topical K positions, high theory, tricks, and counter-plans, I can't promise that you'll like my decision at the end of the round.

6. I debated at a fairly fast pace throughout high school, so speed is fine. if you're gonna be spreading, please use an email-chain. If you don't send a speech doc and you're going too fast for me, I will clear you once and proceed to put my pen down and stop flowing.

8. at a base level, i really enjoyed my time in the debate space. I know I'm one of the lucky ones who was surrounded by great friends and coaches that genuinely cared. My number one goal is always to make that space more accessible to others. For that reason, any exclusionary language or action will result in a loss and the lowest possible speaks tab will let me give you.

good luck!

Susan Luo Winston Churchill High School 3 rounds

Zefei Lyu West Windsor Plainsboro High School North 3 rounds

Meredith Macleod St. Luke's School 3 rounds

Last changed on Thu January 4, 2024 at 3:23 PM CDT

Hello Debaters!

Good for you at checking paradigms.... I judge several different types of debate:

As a communicator, you should be able to adapt to your audience...ie Judge.

Have fun! Debate is a wonderful activity where you can be smart, have fun, and learn at the same time.

Some items I think you should be aware of that I think weakens your presentation:

Being rude, forgetting to tag your cards, not having cards formatted correctly, and not making some kind of eye contact with judge during cross.

DO NOT say please vote for Aff/NEG...your argumentation and evidence should demonstrate your side should win.

Things to help your presentation: Smile, being polite, and organizing your arguments with internal signposting...sharing cards and evidence before using them.

Public Forum- DO NOT PROVIDE AN OFF TIME ROADMAP- I do not need it.

Please have started the email chain and flipped as soon as you can.

include me in the email chain macleodm@friscoisd.org

Or use a speech drop

General Ideas

There is not enough time in PF for effective theory/K to run. I will not vote for you if tricks or theory are your only arguments. I expect the resolution to be debated and there needs to be clash.

I think you should be frontlining offense (turns and disads) in rebuttal. Straight up defense does not need to be frontlined, but I do think it's strategic. Summary to final focus extensions should be consistent for the most part. Overall, the rule of thumb is that the earlier you establish an argument and the more you repeat it, the more likely I will be to vote for it, i.e., it's strategic to weigh in rebuttal too, but it's not a dealbreaker for me if you don't.

To me warrants matter more than impacts. You need both, but please please extend and explain warrants in each speech. Even if it's dropped, I'll be pretty hesitant to vote on an argument if it's not explained in the second half of the round. Also, I have a relatively high standard for what a case extension should look like, so err on the side of caution and just hit me with a full re-explanation of the argument or I probably won't want to vote for you.

The most important thing in debate is comparing your arguments to theirs. This doesn't mean say weighing words like magnitude and poverty and then just extending your impacts, make it actually comparative please.

Technical Debate

I can flow most of the speed in PF, but you shouldn't be sacrificing explanation or clarity for speed.

I will try my best to be "tech over truth", but I am a just a mom of two five year olds and I do have my own thoughts in my head. To that end, my threshold for responses goes down the more extravagant an argument is.

If you want me to call for a piece of evidence, tell me to in final focus please.

If you have any questions, feel free to ask me before the round.

Policy I am a stock issues judge when adjudicating Policy. I am fine with speed/spreading with signposting and roadmaps.

I can't stand the K. Please don't run one. Debate the resolution or run a T argument but very rarely will I vote off case arguments.

Parli/World Schools- Need to see fully developed warrants, impacts and confidence. I love stories and learning new TRUE stuff...

LD- I love debates about Criterion and no neg cases are great if ran with logic, links, and detailed examples. Tell stories. I will buy it if presented professionally and with logic. I need weighing of worlds and chrystalization.

Congress- Please make sure to reference previous representatives speeches and show me you have been flowing and are responding to what has been said in round.

Showing decorum and being polite- like thanking the previous representative always a good thing :)

PLEASE DO NOT ask if I am ready- I am always ready or I will say to please wait.

World Schools- I love the decorum/Parli element and terminology usage. Attacking the premise of arguments, call out logical fallacies, and weigh the worlds please....Make sure to give examples that are not just made up- I know Harvard studies everything, but please refrain from making stuff up.

I do appreciate puns/tasteful humor and use those POI requests and answers strategically.

Ritvik Mahendra Hire 6 rounds

Last changed on Sat January 13, 2024 at 2:32 AM CDT

PF/LD in HS, former UT policy debater (2A/1N).

PSHS '20, UT '24

Conflicts: Plano Senior HS (Plano, TX), Jasper HS (Plano, TX), Clark HS (Plano, TX)

plano.speechdocs@gmail.com (Email for email chain)

Judges who I largely agree with:

Aryan Jasani

Vandan Patel

Pref Sheet for all Events (1 is highest, 5 is lowest)

1 - LARP/theory

2 - K

3 - phil

4 - tricks

5 - K aff, performance

Defaults

Theory - DtA, Reasonability, RVIs*

Presumption/Permissibility flows neg

Policymaking in the absence of a RotB and Utilitarianism in absence of an alternative framework

Note that these are just what I default to in the absence of arguments made for any of these issues, if any arguments are made on these I will obviously evaluate them.

*Check theory section if you do CX Debate

As a general note, my favorite rounds to judge are really solid LARP/theory/K rounds, but don't worry if that's not your strat because I'm fine with anything as long as you do a really good job of it. Good flow-oriented debate will always beat grandstanding and not flow-oriented debate.

TLDR if you are pressed for time: Debated LARP style and a little bit of K. Do your strat and I will do my best to evaluate it.

- +0.5 speaks for disclosure on the NDCA wiki before round with proof

- just because you have a piece of evidence doesn't mean it has a warrant - make sure each card you provide in any speech has sufficient warranting

- second rebuttal should frontline offense in the first rebuttal

- defense isn't sticky in summary

- summary and final should ideally mirror each other

- weigh, weigh, weigh! good weighing will reward you in round

LD/CX

LARP - favorite style of debate. I really like smaller affs and specific case debate. Good weighing in the 2NR/2AR is a good way to get my ballot in a LARP round. Finally, please extend case in the 2AR if you want me to evaluate it at the end of the round. If case was conceded in the 2NR, a small 2AR extension at the top of the 2AR will suffice.

Theory - I prefer more fleshed out arguments rather than blips. I would also like you to go a little slower through analytics and on the interp text/counterinterp text. I will vote on disclosure theory but I think there is a difference between someone not disclosing at all and someone not adhering to every single little interp you have. I also probably won't evaluate disclosure on people who can prove in a verifiable way that their school policy prevents it. Other than that, I don't have any strong preferences on theory but I will say the bar to responding to friv theory is much lower. Good standard weighing and clear abuse stories are easy ways to get my ballot in a theory round. *CX Specific - theory/T are not RVIs, so don't try it.*

T - I only really ask that you have a TVA/caselist with any topicality argument or I will err more on the aff side of topicality. Other than that, anything is fine.

Tricks - I mean, I guess you can but I won't be too thrilled about it. Just delineate them, err on the side of overexplaining the arguments (like don't be blippy) and be up front in CX. I will not vote off condo logic - its a terrible argument (tbf all tricks are terrible but this one just is worse than the rest).

Phil - I'm familiar with Kant, Rawls, Hobbes and virtue ethics at a basic level but assume I don't know your lit and err on the side of overexplaining what the framework is and how the offense links under it.

K - I've only really read cap and security as a debater so assume I don't know your lit so err on the side of overexplaining the theory of power in the 2NR. I really like well done K debates, so please don't forgo the line-by-line for overarching overview answers and shallow explanations of the arguments that regurgitate buzzwords, that will make me sad. Including examples to explain the theory of power and/or alternative are also good. I also like specific links to the 1AC, generic links are fine but specificity will always better your chances of winning and/or getting good speaks.

K affs/performance - I don't really know the ins-and-outs of this style of debate too well because I never really debated in this style, but I will say I tend to lean on the neg side of T-framework just because I ended up on that side in a lot of debates.

Jacob Mammen Hire 3 rounds

Last changed on Fri February 18, 2022 at 12:54 PM CDT

Plano West Senior High School ’19; 4 years of PF, 4 FX/DX

Myself:

I debated four years on the North Texas, Texas, and National circuits in PF and extemp. I did alright. If you want to email any speech docs/have questions about the round, here is my email (jamammen01@gmail.com).

PF Paradigm:

My paradigm is kind of long but there is an abbreviated version below. I don't think it is that different than the standard tab paradigm. Couple key points to bear in mind for those of you scanning 5 minutes before round begins:

I will not buy unwarranted arguments even if the warrants are in previous speeches. This is true for simple claims, citations of evidence, and weighing. If a warrant is properly carried through, then the impacts that subsequently follow from previous speeches will be implicitly carried through. If neither side does the legwork necessary, I will lower my threshold for requisite warranting until I find the argument best warranted. Also weigh, I like that.

1) Tech>Truth, argument conceded = 100% true, no intervention (barring #11) unless you make a morally reprehensible claim

2) The 2nd rebuttal has to cover turns or I consider them dropped. On the flip side if turns are dropped, they act as terminal defense. Also in 2nd rebuttal don't read new offensive overviews it doesn't give the opponent's enough time to respond.

3) Defense is sticky even with a 3-minute summary. i.e. even if defense on case is dropped, it must be responded to for case to be evaluated. Offense evaluated must be in the summary, but an uncontested impact will be implicitly flowed through even when not terminalized if the warrant is read (read the full description below).

4) Crossfire is non-binding in the sense that you can tack extra analysis in the next speech to try and get out of a concession

5) If offense survives 2 speeches untouched (barring case), it's dropped

6) Don't use "risk of offense" unless absolutely necessary

7) Need parallelism in summary/final focus, offensive extensions must be in both speeches

8) All extensions should include a warrant and impact (including turns). Summary must extend full argument

9) Proper weighing and collapsing are crucial to having the best possible round

10) No new args/weighing in second ff

11) If they have an argument straight turned, you cannot kick it

12) No new evidence in second summary unless it is responding to new evidence in the first summary

13) Do not try and shift advocacy after rebuttals

14) Anything you want me to write on my ballot should be in summary and final focus. If your opponents drop an argument or don’t respond to sticky defense, you still have to extend it for me to evaluate it.

15) PF is a debate event, but part of it is speaking. speaks are given on how well you speak (more details below)

Debate is meant to be a fun sport, so win or lose, try to enjoy the round. Have fun!

Whole paradigm below:

Personal Preferences

Preflowing - Preferably already done before you walk into round. I don't mind if you take a few minutes before the round starts but after 5 minutes, we are starting the round.

Coin Flip – Flip outside if you want or in front of me, either one is fine. Just make sure that both teams are in agreement

Sitting/Standing/etc. - If you guys want to sit in all the crossfires then go ahead. I do prefer however that during actual speeches you stand, it just looks more professional that way

Asking Questions after I disclose/RFD - post round discussion is good for the activity, ask away.

Lastly, I’ll always try to disclose my decision and reasoning if permitted to do so, and always feel free to approach me and ask me questions about the round (jamammen01@gmail.com). I firmly believe round feedback is the best way to improve in this event, and I would love to be a contributor to your success.

Too many judges get away not evaluating properly, not paying attention in round, etc. and while people do make mistakes, I think direct discussion between competitors and the judge offers an immediate partial fix. Asking questions ensures that judges are held accountable and requires them to logical defend and stand by their decisions. I do ask that you refrain from making comments if you didn't watch the round.

O Postround me if you want to. I am happy to discuss the round with anyone who watched, regardless if you were competing.

O I'd encourage anybody reading this who disagrees with general postround discussion to read this article which goes in depth about the benefits of post round oral disclosure and why this practice is more beneficial than harmful to the debate space

Spectators - In elims, anyone is allowed to watch. You don't have a choice here, if you're trying to kick people out who want to watch I'm telling them they can stay. In prelims, if both teams can agree to let a spectator watch then they are allowed in. That being said, be reasonable, I will intervene if I feel compelled. I would ask that if you are watching, watch the full round. Do not just flow constructives and leave.

General Evaluation

- Tech>truth. In context of the round, if an argument is conceded, it's 100% true. The boundaries are listed right above. Other than that, I really don't care how stupid or counterfactual the statement is. If you want me to evaluate it differently, tell me.

- I go both ways when it comes to logical analysis v. strong evidence. Do whichever works better for you. Be logical as to what needs to be carded.

- Well warranted argument (carded or not) > carded but unwarranted empiric. In the case both sides do the warranting but it is not clear who is winning, I will likely buy the carded empiric as risk

- Conceding nonuniques/delinks to kick out of turns, etc. are all fine by me. However, if your opponent does something dumb like double turn themselves or read a nonunique with a bunch of turns, I will not automatically get rid of the turn(s). Once it flows through two speeches you've functionally conceded it and I'm not letting you go back and make that argument.

- Reading your own responses to kick an argument your opponents have turned definitively is not a thing. Even if your opponents do not call you out A) you will lose speaker points for doing this, B) I'm not giving you the kick.

- If offense is absent in the round, I will default neg. I believe that I have to have a meaningful reason to pass policy and change the squo.

- I would highly encourage you to point out if defense isn't responsive so I don't miss it. That being said, I try my best to make those judgement calls myself based on my understanding of the arguments being made so I don't require you to make that clarification. A non-offense generating dropped arg that doesn't interact with an offensive extension is meaningless.

- Another thing I hate that's become more common is debaters just saying "this evidence is really specific in saying _____", "you can call for it, it's super good in saying _____", and other similar claims to dodge having to engage with warranting of responses. If you say these things explain why the warrant in it matters and how it interacts with your opponent’s case.

- If neither team weighs or does meta comparison, I will intervene. Preference: Strength of Link > Subsuming Mechanisms > Comparative Weighing > Triple Beam Balance.

Speech Preferences

- Second speaking rebuttal MUST address turns at the very least from first rebuttal or I consider them dropped. I think that both teams have a right to know all responses to their offense so they can go about choosing what to go for in summ/ff in the best possible way. Second speaking team already has a lot of structural advantages and I don't think this should be one of them.

- I need parallelism between summary and final focus. This means all offense, case offense, turns, or whatever you want me to vote off need to be in both speeches. Do not try to shift your advocacy from summary to final focus to avoid defense that wasn't responded to.

- Highly would prefer line by line up until final focus, this should be big picture. This doesn’t mean ignore warrants, implicating impacts, and weighing. I will evaluate line by line final focuses however.

Framing

- If framing is completely uncontested, I don't need you to explicitly extend the framework as long as you're doing the work to link back into it. On the other hand, if framework is contested, you must extend the framework in the speech following a contestation as well as the reasons to prefer (warrants) your framing or I will consider it dropped. If framework flows uncontested through two speeches it is functionally conceded and becomes my framework for evaluation. If framing is not present in the round, the LATEST I am willing to buy any framing analysis is rebuttal. Any time after that, I expect you to do comparative analysis instead.

-I usually default CBA absent framing. Of course, if you present and warrant your own framework this doesn't really matter

Weighing/Collapsing

- Weighing is essential in the second half of the round if you want my ballot. It can even be done in the rebuttal if you feel it is helpful. I believe collapsing is a crucial aspect that allows for better debate, don’t go for everything.

- I think that second final focus shouldn't get access to new weighing unless there has been no effort made previously made in the round in regards to weighing. Weighing should start in summary AT LATEST. Exception is if there is some drastically new argument/implication being made in first final which shouldn’t happen.

- Weighing and meta weighing are arguments. Arguments must be warranted. Warrant your weighing.

- No new terminalization of impacts in final focus (i.e. do not switch from econ collapse leading to job loss to econ collapse leading to poverty)

Extensions

- Extensions should include the warrant and impact, not just the claim and/or impact. Also just saying "extend (author)" is NOT an extension. I don't need you to explicitly extend an impact card if your impact is uncontested but I do need to get the implication of what your impact is somewhere in your speech. When evaluating an argument as a whole I generally reference how I interpreted the argument in the constructive unless distinctions/clarifications have been made later in the round.

- THE SUMMARY MUST EXTEND THE FULL ARG (UNIQ, LINK, Internal Link, Impact) This is especially true for case args or turns. On defense, the warrant and how it interacts/blocks your opponents arg is fine. A 3-minute summary increases my threshold for this extension.

- I advise that even though defense is sticky, extend critical defensive cards in summary and weigh them. I am more inclined to buy it.

- My threshold for extension on a dropped arg is extremely low but even then, I need you to do some minimal warrant/impact extension for me to give you offense

-Even if the opponents don't do a good job implicating offense on a turn (reference above), the turn still functions as terminal defense if extended. Just saying the opponents don't gain offense off of a turn doesn't mean the defensive part of an extended turn magically disappears....

-Turns need to be contextualized in terms of the round or you need to give me the impact for me to vote on it by summary/ff. They don't have to be weighed but it'd probably be better for you if you did. A dropped turn by the other team isn't a free ballot for you until you do the work on some impact analysis or contextualization.

Progressive arguments:

*Under NSDA Rules/Not TFA* - Please run args within the boundaries of NSDA competition rules. If you don't, I can't vote for you even if you win the argument

I don’t like these arguments and am inclined not to vote on them as they should not be very prominent in pf and should not be seen as free wins. I think that the discussions that are created through theory are good, but should be had outside the setting of round. That being said however, if there is a clear violation by your opponents, run theory and I will vote on it. Do not run disclosure theory, you will get dropped.

Speaks/Speed:

TLDR: My range is generally 27-30. Below 27 means you were heavily penalized or said something offensive, 29+ means I thought you did an exceptionally good job. I give all 30s on bubble rounds, anyone with a good record should clear. Speaks should not be the difference in you breaking if you win the bubble round.

- I can handle moderate speed, just don’t spread or you’ll lose me. I will clear if I cannot understand you and if I have to clear multiple times, we're going to have a problem. If I miss something, not my problem. If you think an email chain would be helpful, start one and add me (jamammen01@gmail.com). Good job for reading this long you deserve a reward, creative contention names geet +.5 speaker points .

- General Penalties (This is just a condensed, but not all inclusive, list of speaker point issues listed elsewhere in the paradigm):

1) Taking too long to preflow (.5 for every extra minute after first 5 min)

2) Taking too long pull up evidence

3) Unnecessary clears during opponent speeches (.5 per)

4) Stealing Prep. This is unacceptable, you will be punished heavily if I catch you

5) Severe clarity issues that aren't fixed after consecutive clears

6) Using progressive args to try and get free wins off novices

7) Trying to do anything abusive - read your own responses to turns, reading conditional cps, floating pics, etc.

8) Severe evidence misrepresentation (Trust me you probably won't want to see your speaks if you do this)

-Bonus speaks. I have added more ways to get bonus speaks, whether you utilize them is up to you

1) Reading case off paper (.1 bonus for each partner)

2) Appropriate humor and/or Crossfire power moves (varies)

3) +1 if your laptops are just closed(without misrepresenting evidence)

Evidence:

- I will call for evidence if I am explicitly told to do so or if there is a gap in both warranting and/or card comparison. I will also call if I am just curious.

- I would suggest having cut cards for anything you read available.

- If your evidence is shifty through the round (I.e. what you claim it to say changes notably between speeches), I'm calling for it and dropping it if misrepresented.

- Powertagging: It happens, pretty much everyone does it but it better not be misrepresented.

- "Made up"/ "Can't Find" Evidence Policy: In the case I call for evidence after the round, I may request for the citations and your interp/paraphrase/etc. to look for it myself if you claim you "can't find it", but it will be looked down upon.

o L/20 and probably a report to coaches if you refuse to give me this information when asked because that sends me a strong signal there's something really sketchy about this ev that you don't want me to see.

o If you cannot produce the original card you cited, it is dropped

o If I think what you are citing sounds ridiculous/doesn't exist I will search for it. Low Speaks if I cannot find anything similar to what you cited with the given quotations/interp - I assume it's either severely powertagged or made up.

Round Disclosure:

- I’ll always try to disclose with rfd and critiques after the round. I am also open to disclosing your speaks if you want to know.

-I will still disclose even if I am the only judge on the panel to do so.

- No disclosure policies are dumb as I think these policies encourage bad judging but I will respect them.

Lastly, if you're still slightly/somewhat/very confused on understanding my ideology and position as a judge, I've linked the paradigms of a couple people who have probably had the biggest personal influence on how I view debate and the role of a judge:

https://www.tabroom.com/index/paradigm.mhtml?judge_person_id=53914

https://www.tabroom.com/index/paradigm.mhtml?judge_person_id=54964

https://www.tabroom.com/index/paradigm.mhtml?search_first=art&search_last=tay

https://www.tabroom.com/index/paradigm.mhtml?judge_person_id=84007

Feel free to ask me any other questions before or after the round (jamammen01@gmail.com)

Debate is meant to be a fun sport, so win or lose, try to enjoy the round. Have fun!

LD/CX Paradigm

If you get me as a judge in these events, I AM SO SORRY. My best advice would be to treat the round like a pf one, as this is how I will be evaluating it. This means going a bit slower and keeping theoretical/progressive arguments to a minimum. I will however, evaluate these arguments to the best of my ability if they are presented to me. Again, very sorry.

Extemp Paradigm

IDK if anyone is actually going to be looking at this, but I will write one just in case. I am a very flow judge even in extemp. I believe that what you are saying matters more that how you say it. That being said, this is a speaking event and how you say things matters. (I say like 70% what you say, 30% how you say it). This means not just reading off a bunch of sources like an anchor, give me your analysis on the topic. That is what will boost your rank. In terms of speaking speak clear and confident. Also, I like humor, make me laugh. Any Marvel references are appreciated.

If you say anything super questionable or unreasonable, I will fact check it. If it turns out you were making things up, it will be reflected negatively on the ballot.

Random

Also if the round is super late and you guys don't want to debate (i.e. not bubble round or higher bracket) we can settle the round with a game of smash or poker or smthg...if you guys are good with it.

Lastly, have fun!

Eric Melin Hire 6 rounds

Last changed on Thu February 15, 2024 at 5:59 AM CDT

Email chains are good. Include me ericmelin76@gmail.com

Debate Coach @ Coppell (9th Grade Center and Coppell High School)

Greenhill 2022

Top Level

I will work hard to be the best judge possible for your debate. I will flow your speeches and cross-ex and base my decisions as much as possible on your words. I love debate and know how much work you put into it and the least I can do is be the best judge I can be for you. Tech over truth. I’m doubling down here this year because so few judges do this in practice. I would rather vote for high quality execution of untruthful argument that is won than interject myself into the debate.

Some thoughts you may care about when doing your pref sheet in no particular order:

1. I don't have any massive preferences in terms of argument content. Please forward a well-developed ballot story. Compare methods and offense. I don't care what you do as long as you do what you do best. Tell me what you want me to vote on. Judge instructions are good. I prefer lbl to long overviews.

2. Evidence quality matters a great deal to me. I enjoy debates where cross-ex is spent digging in on your opponents claims and referencing their ev. Re-highlighted evidence should be read.

3. T - I rarely see 2nr’s that go for T unless a massive mistake has been made by the aff.

4. KAff/TFW - Appeals to Fairness and clash are both persuasive. I find it extremely difficult to overcome the notion that an unlimited prep burden for the neg is undesirable. To me that means the aff should probably be related to the topic in some way. That said, I often vote aff in these debates. The neg either isn't prepared to deal with case cross-applications and impact analysis of the team they are debating, don't do sufficient work establishing the impact to limits , and sufficiently leverage TVA's and Switch Side arguments to mitigate aff offense. Aff teams often lose when they are too defensive, insufficiently develop their counter model of debate, or make mistakes on the technical portions of this debate.

5. K - Like most judges, case-specific links pulled from ev, tags/rhetoric, established in cx, etc. are what I'm looking for. I find that too much of the debate often devolves into reading framing blocks which means argunents aren't ansered in a satisfactory way by both teams. This means that framing is rarely decisive. Moreover, I am not usually persuaded by arguments that say that aff offense just poof goes away unless the neg is substantially ahead on framing. The sooner you realize that framework may not be decisive, begin to engage what often become comparisons of apples and oranges (in round scholarship vs the results of hypothetical policy scenarios), and give me a way to wade through that muck, the better. Please do us a favor and stay organized - clearly label different portions of the debate on the k. Signpost! Please stick to the line-by-line. Short overviews are ok but long are not.

6. CP - Case-specific is best here again. There's almost nothing better than specific cp with high quality evidence. 2ac permutation explanations are your friend. Later in the debate, I tend to think your explanations are just flat out new and not spin. Just invest a bit more time to unpack your initial permutations and I will hold them to answering the nuance.

7. DA - Not a lot to say here. Good evidence matters. Creative spin is welcome. Zero risk is possible and extremely small risk of an extinction scenario can matter a great deal or not much at all depending on the evidence and analysis accompanying these arguments.

8. Theory - Defaults: Condo -> drop team. Everything else = drop argument.

Keith Milstead Hebron High School 3 rounds

Aamir Mohsin Southlake Carroll 6 rounds

Eric Mueller BASIS San Antonio Shavano 5 rounds

Last changed on Thu February 22, 2024 at 2:00 AM CDT

Eric Mueller Judging Philosophy

I debated in college and was a collegiate debate coach for 15 years. I was research assistant at Guyer High School for five years.

Generally I like you to tell me how I vote. I have no natural hatreds for any argument although I am not high on tricky theory or standards debates. Otherwise I see myself as about as tabula rasa as you can get. I mean that. Tell me how to vote and on what argument and I will genuinely evaluate it. And I am willing to vote on almost anything.

I like evidence debates where people pull out warrants from cards and I like the last speaker to explain why the other side loses and they win. Think offense. I like debaters who demonstrate their intelligence by understanding their arguments. I like to have fun too. So enjoy yourself.

I give pretty good speaks I think. 29s and above in solid debates. I always disclose.

That's the short form.

More....

I can be convinced to be a policy maker with some exceptions. Default mode of policy making is policy advantages weighed against risks of disadvantages and consideration given for counterplans and possible solvency deficits. Multiple CPs can be irritating but also at times strategic. Obviously advantage CPs can be an exception.

I read evidence. I like comparisons of the quality of evidence compared to the other team. Not just qualifications, but unanswered warrants in the evidence. Take the time to pull warrants out of the cards and explain them. It will go a long way here. Explain why your evidence should be preferred.

I also like you to take the time to explain specifically how you think you win. Put the whole round together in a quick "story." How do you want me to view it? Compare it the other team's "story." Tell me how this is taken out and that outweighs this. It makes it easier for me to frame your approach as I decide. Give me some "big picture analysis." Don't just get mired down in line by line. I don't need 4 minutes of overview or "canned" overviews. Make specific to what is occurring in this debate round. Otherwise, it's boring.

Put me on your email chain. My email address is eric.mueller@gcisd.net

I also often break with the conventional format. I am willing to vote for kritikal negative and affirmative arguments. So, yes. I will vote for your kritikal affirmative. In fact, I would prefer the negative debate about the offense the affirmative advocates rather than a constant resort to framework debate. That said, I will also vote negative on framework against kritikal cases. However it often comes down to an impact debate that many negatives are not very prepared for and the affirmative is usually very prepared to debate. I am always looking for something new.

It is the job of the negative to explain how K functions with respect to affirmative solvency. I think that needs to be hashed out in more specific ways than I often see occur. How do advantages with short time-frames factor into the question of whether to vote on K first? It is more clear for me with things like settler colonialism than it is with Marxism, for example. But don't assume. Take the time to explain. Make the reason it comes first very clear. How does the K undercut their turns? Be specific. Use examples. Don't make it just a non-unique disadvantage with a floating pic alternative. Sell it.

I also think there are reasons why there might be advantages left for the affirmative even given the criticism provided by the K. I think sometimes more specific affirmative evidence proves the plan can still have advantages to weigh vs. K impacts (as in Marxism) especially when the time frames are quick. Why does K come first? Has that been explored?

Framework against critical cases:

I also believe that it is necessary to answer clearly case claims by critical affirmatives that answer the voting criteria on framework. Think of framework as the disad, and case arguments as solvency that allows the framework disad to outweigh the case. Framing matters. I think "competitive equity" as a standard against critical affirmatives is often untenable for the negative. Focus more on the nature of voices and representational aspects of the need for grammar. Think semiotics. That makes voting negative on T easier in these cases. You need offense, not just terminal defense. T must be framed as offense against the case.

Quickly worded "Do both" or "Do plan and K" sometimes leave me confused as to what the world of the perm really looks like. Take the time to frame your perm for me clearly. How does it take out CP/K? How does it interact with the link to any net benefit? On the negative, hold the affirmative to clearer explanations of how the perm functions. Confusion for me usually breaks negative in the presence of a net benefit.

I’m not a big theory guy. I understand theory but I don’t like voting on it. I will if necessary.

All in all, I’m a quality of argument person. Focus more on making quality arguments rather than quantity. Kick out of stupid things early and focus on what you want to win in the block. I have a tendency to allow new explanations of old arguments in the rebuttals and love a crafty 2AR.

Naufil Mulla Hire 6 rounds

Bret Nelson St Agnes Academy 3 rounds

Boomba Nishikawa Hire 6 rounds

Last changed on Fri December 16, 2022 at 11:43 AM EDT

I debated 2 years of PF at Fox Chapel in Pittsburgh, PA; currently debating BPD and CPD at the University of Toronto.

Include me in email chains: Boomba.Nishi@gmail.com

I will vote off the flow and what gets extended the cleanest. Tech over truth to an extent just don't be stupid about it.

FOR USC SEASON SPARKLE:

I’m one of the most flow judge you'll get at locals (not to toot my own horn). I’m not as fast as I used to be for flowing probably cap out at 200ish but test my limits at your own risk. Its local so I doubt you can go too far for me. I know what I say about offs below but I don't think there's a reason not to run k/thoery at locals. Rather, I'd almost encourage it as I think a lot of the harms these try to correct go unnoticed in locals simply because parent judges don't know how to vote for/evaluate these arguments so teams are afraid to run them. But that's the whole point right – to make positive change in the debate space. READ WHAT I SAY ABOUT DISCLOSURE. If I’m feeling goofy and there's no offence at the end of the round I’ll probably just flip a coin.

Voting Issues: Only losers use them.

No: Tricks.

Speed: I’m okay with some speed just don't go nyooooom or I’ll stop flowing.

Theory/Ks: I think theory and Ks are on net good ie. they push for positive change and create positive norms. I don't really care if it's a local tournament if you genuinely want to read theory/Ks to make this change I will be more than happy. Please do not read progressive arguments as an easy way to roll inexperienced teams. I never ran theory/Ks so I’m willing to vote off of them just not the most experienced evaluating them.

2nd Rebuttal: Preferably putting down some defence

Cross: Don't care, Didn't ask

Don't Be: Rude

Timing: Please time yourself, I will also be timing and stop flowing after 4 minutes. Feel free to ask what impacts/responses I didn't flow but I’ll probably just tell you.

Disclosure: I will always disclose unless like tab tells me not to and is sitting in the room. Not disclosing is stupid and not conducive to actually learning. Just hang out and I’ll either disclose or just think out loud what my thoughts on the round are.

Make judging easy for me:

-Signpost

-Warrant

-Weigh

-Collapse

-Cleanly Extend: Not just card names. If it's dropped it's donezo.

I enjoy some banter in speeches (this doesn't mean be mean) and big fan of thought experiments

I'll give +.25 speaks for chess or footie references

Henry Nomeland Seven Lakes High School 6 rounds

Last changed on Sun April 21, 2024 at 6:36 AM CDT

henrynomeland@gmail.com

I look at the chain to check evidence. I won't be flowing off of a doc.

Debated circuit PF for Lakeville. I study Statistics at UW-Madison. Briefly did instructing/coaching after High School.

UPDATED FOR TOC 2024

I haven't thought a lot about debate since around 2021 so keep that in mind.

PLEASE be chill and nice to everyone in crossfire and during speeches.

I flow extensions and care about them being good.

Have cards. Avoid going for multiple case arguments in summary. Have your evidence ready to be sent I'm fed up with ridiculously long evidence exchanges.

My favorite arguments are relatively niche, relatively small impact scenarios concerning interest groups that get less attention in most debates.

I evaluate arguments and not the labels of arguments. Pointing out that your opponent's responses don't use the jargon and preconceived frameworks that you're anticipating them to use isn't going to win my ballot.

Voting where debaters tell me to vote >>> Voting where I personally think you messed up

I prefer debaters who call out their opponent’s mistakes.

If everyone is making mistakes, I generally try to give each side some risk of offense and attempt to vote off of clash/defense/weighing. If there's no clash and no weighing I will be sad.

Prog Stuff

I would seriously prefer to judge a substance round. I don't understand postmodernism, philosophy, and the state of debate discourse over the past three years nearly well enough to judge these issues as accurately as many other judges. This being said,I will vote for reasonable arguments that you win and weigh. I debated theory a lot more than Ks when I was in debate. Frivolous theory, truth testing, and tricks are bad and my threshold for responses is low. In particularly egregious cases I will simply not vote for arguments along these lines, even if they survive to final focus.

Other Stuff

These people taught me debate:

Maddie Cook

Bryce Piotrowski

Gus Gerlach

I reserve the right to drop you for making the space unsafe.

I also reserve the right to drop you for blatantly violating NSDA or tournament rules (there are probably rules that are bad, I promise I won't arbitrarily enforce bad rules or trivial technicalities). Fabricating or egregiously misrepresenting evidence is basically always an instant loss.

Arizechukwu Okolo BASIS San Antonio Shavano 4 rounds

Rajendra Parida Brookfield East 6 rounds

Elizabeth Perry L D Bell High School 3 rounds

Bryce Piotrowski Seven Lakes High School 5 rounds

Last changed on Wed May 8, 2024 at 7:16 AM CDT

In short:

Put me on the email chain before I show up. Send speech docs (i.e., Word docs as attachments) before any speech in which you are going to read evidence. Read good evidence. Debate about what you want. I'd strongly prefer it have some relation to the topic. Speed is fine so long as you're clear, slow down/differentiate tags, and clearly signpost arguments. I will not read the document during your speech. Theory is silly and I'd rather vote on anything else. Critical arguments are fine, if grounded in topic lit and you can articulate what voting for you is/does. Debaters should read more lines from fewer pieces of evidence. If you have time, please read everything in my paradigm. It's not that long.

he/him

I've been involved in competitive speech and debate since 2014. I am the Director of Speech and Debate at Seven Lakes High School in Katy, Texas. I competed in PF and Congress in high school and NPDA-style parliamentary debate in college at Minnesota.

I am also a Co-Director of Public Forum Boot Camp (PFBC) in Minnesota. If you do high school PF and you want to talk to me about camp, let me know.

I am conflicted against Seven Lakes (TX), Lakeville North (MN), Lakeville South (MN), Blake (MN), and Vel Phillips Memorial (WI).

Put me on the email chain. Please flip and get fully set up before the round start time. My email is my first name [dot] my last name [at] gmail. Add sevenlakespf@googlegroups.com, sevenlakesld@googlegroups.com, or sevenlakescx@googlegroups.com depending on the event I am judging you in. The subject of the email chain should clearly state the tournament, round number and flight, and team codes/sides of each team. For example: "Gold TOC R1A - Seven Lakes CL 1A v Lakeville North LM 2N".

In general:

Debate is a competitive research activity. The team that can most effectively synthesize their research into a defense of their plan, method, or side of the resolution will win the debate. I would like you to be persuasive, entertaining, kind, and strategic. Feel free to ask clarifying questions before the debate.

How I decide rounds/preferences:

I can judge whatever. I will vote for whatever argument wins on the flow. I want to judge a small but deep debate about the topic.

I've judged or been a part of several thousand debates in various formats over the past decade. I have seen, gone for, and voted for lots of arguments. My preference is that you demonstrate mastery of the topic and a well-thought-out strategy during the round and that you're excited to do debate and engage with your opponents' research. The best rounds consist of rigorous examination and comparison of the most recent and academically legitimate topic literature. I would like to hear you compare many different warrants and examples, and to condense the round as early as possible. Ignoring this preference will likely result in lower speaker points.

I flow, intently and carefully. I will stop flowing when my timer goes off. I will not flow while reading a document, and will only use the email chain or speech doc to look at evidence when instructed to by the competitors or after the round if the interpretation of a piece of evidence is vital to my decision. There is no grace period of any length. I will not vote on an argument I did not flow.

There is not a dichotomy between "truth" and "tech". Obviously, the team that does the better debating will win, and that will be determined by arguments that I've flowed, but you will have a much more difficult time convincing me that objectively bad arguments are true than convincing me that good arguments are true. In other words, an argument's truth often dictates its implication for my ballot because it informs technical skill.

I will not vote for unwarranted arguments, arguments that I cannot explain in my RFD, or arguments I did not flow. I have now given several decisions that were basically: "I am aware this was on the doc. I did not flow it during your speech time." Most PF rounds I judge are decided by mere seconds of argumentation, and most PF teams should probably think harder about how to warrant their links and compare their terminal impacts than they do right now.

Zero risk exists. I probably won't vote on defense or presumption, but I am theoretically willing to.

An average speaker in front of me will get a 28.5.

Critical arguments:

I am a decent judge for critical strategies that are well thought out, related to the topic, and strategically executed. I am happy to vote to reject a team's rhetoric, to critically examine economic and political systems of power, etc. if you explain why those impacts matter. In a PF context, these arguments seem to struggle with not being fleshed out enough because of short speech times but I'm not ideologically opposed to them.

I am not a great judge for strategies that ignore the resolution. I will vote for arguments that reject the topic if there are warrants for why we ought to do that and you win those warrants. But, if evenly debated, relating your strategy to the topic is a good idea.

I am a terrible judge for strategies that rely on in-round "discourse" as offense. I generally do not think that these strategies have an impact or solve the harms with debate they identify. I've voted for these arguments several times, and I still find them unpersuasive - I just found the other team's defense of debate worse.

Theory:

Theory is generally boring and I rarely want to listen to it without it being placed in a specific context based on the current topic.

I am more than qualified to evaluate theory debates and used to go for theory in college quite a bit.

I would strongly prefer not to listen to debates about setting norms. Disclosure is generally good. Paraphrasing is generally bad.

Here is a list of arguments which will be very difficult to win in front of me: violations based on anything that occurred outside of the current debate, frivolous theory or other positions with no bearing on the question posed by the resolution, trigger warning theory, anything categorized as a trick or meant to evade clash, anything that is labeled as an IVI without a warranted implication for the ballot.

I recognize the strategic value of theory and that sometimes, you need to go for it to win a debate. If you decide to do that, you might get very low speaker points, depending on how asinine I think your position is. I will be persuaded by appeals to reasonability and that substantive debate matters more than your position.

Evidence:

Evidence ethics arguments/IVIs/theory/etc. will not be treated as theory - I will ask the team who has introduced the argument about evidence ethics if I should stop the debate and evaluate the challenge to evidence to determine the winner/loser of the round. The same goes for clipping. This is obviously different than reasons to prefer a piece of evidence or other normal weighing claims. I reserve the right to vote against teams that I notice are fabricating evidence during the round even if the other team does not make it a voting issue.

You should read good evidence and disclose case positions after you debate.

I have lots of other thoughts on speech and debate that you can read here if you would like - it encompasses some past paradigms, etc.

Archana Rao Plano East Sr. High 3 rounds

Jake Reed Hire 6 rounds

Last changed on Wed January 3, 2024 at 4:07 AM CDT

Email contact: jrr289@msstate.edu - please add me to any email chains being used in the round

Background: I competed in speech and debate for three years in high school. I primarily participated in public forum debate and international and domestic extemporaneous speaking, but I occasionally competed in LD, congress, and various other limited prep speech events. I attended the NSDA tournament twice in international extemporaneous speaking. I competed at the CFL National tournament three times: once in extemporaneous speaking, once in public forum, and once in congress. I have stayed active in speech and debate by judging a few tournaments a year and helping coach public forum debate teams on the high school level.

Speeches and case organization

I have a fundamental aversion to jargon and unexplained abbreviations or acronyms in debate. Explain and define everything.

The best constructive speeches contain at least some background information on the resolution. Many teams overlook this, perhaps due to time constraints, but this is a critical step. In other words, you need to answer this question up front: how have we arrived at the topic before us?

Organized speeches with clear signposting are an absolute must. Evidence is obviously important, but I will pay special attention to how it is woven throughout your speeches. Are you making it clear why this evidence is important? Why I should trust it? What is its impact? Do you have multiple levels of evidence to support every argument you plan on making?

Crossfire

I will pay attention to everything said during crossfire. While a debate may not be won solely by the crossfire performance, it can quickly be lost. A great debater is one who does not lose their persuasiveness even when they have to think fast on their feet. You should be able to defend all your arguments and evidence without hesitation during crossfire. What I believe to be an extremely effective communication strategy during crossfire that you may want to consider is not forgetting to make eye contact and speak to the judge. Do not limit your focus during crossfire to your opponent or your papers in front of you. Engaging me in crossfire and making me feel included will absolutely earn you some extra speaker points.

Miscellaneous

I will flow each debate carefully, but I do not consider myself a technical judge. You are free to run whatever arguments or strategies you choose; if you can sell it well, I will probably buy it. At the end of the round, my decision is usually for the team who wows me the most. Sometimes that is the team who I think wins the most number of arguments. Sometimes that is the team who wins the strongest arguments. Sometimes it is the team that had the best delivery and persuasiveness.

Please feel free to contact me via email if you have any questions.

Venkat Abhishek Sambaraj Hire 6 rounds

Last changed on Wed March 2, 2022 at 1:22 PM CDT

Hey my name is Venkat Abhishek Sambaraj and I debated all four years of my high school career at local, state, and national level so I am well experienced with the debate community. I focused heavily on Domestic Extemporaneous speaking and Public Forum but also participated in Oratory, Informative, and Congress. My paradigms are as follows:

Speech: I weigh analysis over presentation, especially in extemporaneous. Presentation is still required but if you provide solid analysis I may be convinced to give you the higher rank. Oratory and informative of course is all about presentation.

Public Forum: Did public forum for three years so I am able to flow and keep track of the round. I like to see clash and please WEIGH, that lets me know what to vote on in the round. Collapsing/crystalizing is important, don't go for every single argument on the flow. Always have frontlines and the second-speaking team should address any attacks made by the opponents. I don't really like to see K's and theories in PF, leave that to LD and Policy. If you ask for a card to be looked at, I will most definitely look at it and if I feel there is a card that's been heavily clashed upon I may request it myself once the round ends. The final thing, when it comes to crossfire ask questions that are relevant and don't be a douche when it comes to questioning. I like aggressiveness but as long as it stays respectful and isn't rude.

WSD: I like to see clash and please WEIGH, that lets me know what to vote on in the round. Collapsing/crystalizing is important, don't go for every single argument on the flow. The logic and the strategy of the round is what I value heavily and how it affects the world rather than individual ideals. No k's theories and things all that because those are for LD so don't be arguing with those strategies. The final thing, when it comes to crossfire ask questions that are relevant and don't be a douche when it comes to questioning. I like aggressiveness but as long as it stays respectful and isn't rude.

Eric Schwerdtfeger Westside High School 3 rounds

Last changed on Thu May 9, 2024 at 4:22 AM CDT

Director of Debate

Dulles High School 2022 - Present

Westside High School 2017 - 2022

Magnolia High School 2016-2017

Summer Debate Institutes

Lab Leader - Texas Debate Collective 2020 - Present

Admin - National Symposium for Debate 2022

Lab Leader - Houston Urban Debate League 2019 - 2021

Emails

All Rounds: esdebate93 at the google messaging service

Policy Rounds: dulles.policy.db8 at the google messaging service

LD Rounds: dulles.ld.db8 at the google messaging service

TL;DR

Tech > Truth. I'll reward deep content knowledge, organization, clarity and depth of explanation, judge instruction, efficient file sharing, and flowing. Other than that, do your thing and do it well. Read the full thing to get a sense of how I understand what it means to debate well. Non-Policy event specific thoughts are at the bottom.

General Thoughts

I am a full time classroom teacher who oversees a large team and judges frequently (over 100 rounds in the 22-23 season). I debated for a small rural high school and read exclusively policy style arguments; however, I have since coached students who go for the K on both sides and every other kind of argument under the sun. I am probably fine for whatever you want to do. Although most of my experience competing, judging, and coaching is in Policy and LD, I have worked with debaters across all formats. My preference is for national circuit style debate, but I have worked with a number of traditional debaters and judge traditional rounds quite frequently. I believe that debate can be one of the single most transformative activities for high schoolers who engage deeply in the processes of research, argument refinement, skill development, and content mastery that it requires to be done well. As such, I am committed to the educational integrity of the activity. This has a few different implications for you, regardless of format:

Safety, inclusion, and access are my first priorities because students can’t get the benefits of the activity if they feel unsafe, unwelcome, or lack access to the materials they need to be successful. For you, this means to be cognizant of your words/actions and their effects on other people, especially those coming from social locations different from your own. Assume less, listen more.

Respect people’s pronoun preferences, honor requests for accommodation, and be kind to novices and those less experienced than you. Don’t bully or harass people, don’t be racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic or ableist. If something is happening and I’m not picking up on it, please bring it to my attention either verbally or via email. If I am part of the problem, please let me know so that I can do better.

Recording your speeches is fine. You must get consent from everyone in the room to record the whole round. It would also be polite to offer to send your opponents a copy of the recording if they consent. If you record others sans consent and I find out, you will be reported to the tabroom.

Content/Trigger warnings should be read if you suspect a position might be triggering to someone, and you should be ready to read something else if your opponents or I say we are not comfortable with the position being read. If an observer objects, they are free to leave, but we have to be there.

I will not be evaluating arguments about people’s character or their conduct outside of the round we are in and the prior disclosure period. Any significant issue of safety or comfort that impacts your ability to engage with someone is not something that a ballot can resolve. That needs to be taken to the tabroom.

If you debate for an under-resourced program and would like some materials to help you improve, let me know and I’ll send you some of the resources I make sure my students have access to.

The rigor of academic debate is the main reason it has such a large and long lasting impact on people’s lives. I will reward displays of it with generous speaker points and will tend towards being punitive with regards to practices that compromise the rigor of the activity.

The two teams on the pairing are the only entities taking part in the debate. Coaches, teammates, random spectators, and AI chatbots are not to be assisting once the door closes. Chatbots shouldn’t be used before the door closes either. If I find that academic dishonesty of this variety has occurred, I will go to tab and lobby for you to be disqualified.

You should do your own research, reading, card cutting, and block writing. Using open evidence, the wiki, or published briefs is fine as a starting point, but that hardly constitutes research. Similarly, it is fine if some of your blocks are written by a coach or more veteran teammates, but overreliance on things cut/written by other people is detrimental to your learning and development. This will put a cap on your speaker points. I will bump speaker points for quality work that is obviously your own.

When cutting cards, make sure not to clip or power tag. For those who don’t know, clipping entails cutting around parts of cards that are inconvenient for your argument, not cutting at paragraph breaks, reading more or less than what is highlighted, and failing to mark cards if you decide to move on. Power tagging is simply when the tagline you have written does not represent what the body of the card says. Evidence ethics challenges are limited to claims that evidence is fabricated in whole or in part, so you should be confident that you are correct before staking the round on it. In the event of a challenge, you win if you are right and you lose if you are wrong.

Citation drives research, which is the source of argument innovation over the course of a topic. Complete citations contain the following information: The author’s complete name (you only need to read the last name), the date of publication (read month and day if the evidence is from this year, just the year if it is from a previous year), a list of author qualifications, the title of the source, the name of the publishing entity, a url to the text if applicable, and an indicator of who cut the evidence.

Generally speaking, I am pro disclosure since having time to read, think, and strategize tends to improve the quality of engagement from both sides exponentially, which in turn results in debates that are more educational for the participants and, incidentally, more enjoyable for me to judge. This is my default position; it doesn’t mean you can’t get me to vote against disclosure. I freely acknowledge the validity of objections regarding student safety and competitive equity.

Recording audio of your speeches, later transcribing and editing them, is a good habit to help you notice issues with clarity, efficiency, and explanation. It can also be a part of your block writing process. The final product might be super specific, but it does not take that much time to convert the specific speech to a generic block that you can use in future debates.

Prep time exists for a reason. You should not be typing or strategizing with your partner if there is not a timer running, be that yours or your opponents’. Stealing prep is cheating.

Take notes during feedback, preferably in a word or google doc. It’s a good habit to be in, as some judges don’t write much, memory is pretty faulty, and it helps create the impression that you care about improving and are actively listening to what judges are telling you. I would also suggest labeling and saving your flows.

Ask questions with redos and file updates in mind. I welcome all questions; however, understand that once the ballot is submitted I can do nothing to change it. Aggressive post-rounding of me or another judge on a panel is futile and immature. I would suggest that you choose to focus on growth and improvement rather than burning bridges with people.

Debate is a skill focused activity that necessitates a degree of technical mastery. As such, I tend towards tech over truth, but I think that paradigm is overly simplistic. In reality, truth is constitutive of tech, meaning that arguments more germain to my understanding of the world will inevitably require less work to get me on board with. I do my best to check my preconceptions at the door, but the idea of a truly tabula rasa judge is a farce.

While I prefer fast debates over slow debates, I enjoy debates I can understand even more. If you are not capable of spreading clearly, then don’t do it at all. Slow down for taglines and parts of cards you wish to emphasize. Raise your volume when something is important. If you are not doing speaking drills for at least 15 minutes every day, you are not working to improve or maintain what is, realistically, the easiest skill to practice. If you spread, be ready to honor a request for accommodation.

All arguments should make a claim, support that claim with evidence and/or reasoning, and explain the implication of that argument for the debate. They should be organized in a line by line fashion, meaning “they say . . . we say . . . that matters because . . .” or an equivalent organizational schema. Compare arguments/evidence and weigh as you go down each flow sheet. If the affirmative team introduces a position, the negative team sets the order for line by line on that flow. When the negative team introduces a position, the affirmative team sets the order for line by line on that flow. Any overview that summarizes an argument should be kept short, and should include weighing and judge instruction, especially as we get deeper into the debate. Get to the line by line and do the work of debating there. Affirmative teams should start on the case page (T first is an exception), and negative teams should start with the off case positions they are extending, then go to the case (unless presumption or an impact turn is what they go for in the 2NR). Neither side should jump around and go back to a page they have already moved on from.

Most errors get made because debaters don’t flow or are not proficient at flowing. This should be one of your most practiced skills, as you can’t do line by line effectively or make intelligent decisions if you don’t have an accurate record of what happened in each speech. Flow every single speech of every single debate you are in or that you observe in order to practice. I am generally of the opinion that it is better for competitors to flow on paper rather than on your laptop, but do what works best for you.

Housekeeping tasks should be done at the beginning of CX/speeches. This means that questions about independent reasons to affirm/negate, CP/alt status, etc. go first in CX, counterplans get kicked and no link arguments get conceded at the top of speeches.

Don’t just answer the previous speech, anticipate and shut down the arguments that will be in the next speech using lots of judge directed language. The 2NR should be focused on beating their best 2AR options, and the 2AR should be focused on narrating the debate back to me and beating the 2NRs ballot story. The earlier you can start the process of judge instruction, the better off you are.

Aff and Neg Case Debating Thoughts

Affirmative teams must identify a harm or set of harms that is being caused by some aspect of the status quo. They must also propose some method of addressing those harms. If you can’t articulate how you’ve met those two burdens clearly and succinctly, you probably lose on presumption. I don’t particularly care if you prefer policy/law, philosophy, or critical theory as the part of the library you research from, nor do I care if you read a plan or poetry. I do, however, think that the topic should have some effect on the research and writing you are doing when crafting your case. If every aspect of the aff is generic and not specific to the area of controversy that we voted to have debates over, I will likely be voting neg as you have clearly not thought hard about the way that your particular literature base engages the topic and topicality/FW answers will be bad. If you are not extending the case from the 1AC to the 2AR, you will likely lose (exception for going all in on theory, for which I have a pretty high threshold).

Case is the core of the debate. The role of the negative is to disprove A.) the truth claims of the 1AC and B.) the desirability of the plan text/broader 1AC scholarship. It is way harder to do B if you have neglected A by not making offensive and defensive arguments on case targeting different aspects of the aff. Don’t just spend time at the impact level. Don’t just make cross applications of off case positions. Read cards, contest link and internal link claims, contest claims of solvency, etc. You need to think about how these case cards interact with other off case positions. I’ve written a shocking number of aff ballots in debates where someone goes for a security K in the 2NR without extending carded link, internal link, or impact defense on case, and they end up losing the debate because the 2AR gets to wax poetic about how good and true their China reps are given the conceded empirics. If it interacts with the case page, you probably need to have case cards that help the argument make sense. There are no instances where the 1NC can afford to ignore the case page. There are a few instances where you can afford to not extend case in the 2NR, but those are few and far between.

Topicality Thoughts

I default to competing interpretations, as I think choices should have to be justified. Reasonability is an argument for the counter interpretation, not the specific aff, arguing that it is sufficiently predictable, limiting, etc. to mitigate the impacts of the shell, and that losing the round would be disproportionate punishment, even if there is some marginal benefit to the negative interpretation. Interpretations and counter interpretations should be topic specific rather than generic. They should intend to define and include/exclude a given aff or set of affs. T is fundamentally a question of limits; all other standards are secondary.

Framework Thoughts

I’m of the opinion that both sides should defend a model of debate that they believe to be desirable. The social structures and dynamics that define competitive debate are fair game for criticism; however, I think the fact that you’ve voluntarily chosen to come to a tournament probably concedes that there is some benefit to doing the activity as it is currently instantiated. Tell me what your vision of the activity is and why you think it’s worth it to show up to tournaments, not just why your opponents’ model is bad. Both sides should start with a caselist of affs that would be topical under their interpretation and the various possibilities for negative testing their interpretation would permit.

For T USFG vs K affs, a limits standard with a skills impact, switch side debate net better/read it on the negative solves their offense, and an example of a topical version of the aff is most persuasive to me. If you prefer to go for fairness, that’s fine, just be aware that I understand myself as an educator first and a referee second, which does implicate how I end up thinking about close debates.

For K frameworks vs policy affs, I am unsure why we are making this section of debate more confusing and self-serving than it needs to be. They want me to look at just the plan and its consequences, you want me to look at the 1AC holistically. Other questions are either secondary to this core controversy about the evaluative terms of the debate or are irrelevant altogether. KvK debates have a tendency to be less clean cut at the framework level, so just be sure you are being clear about the model you think is good and explain how the debates your model would value relate to the debates they think matter.

Kritik Thoughts

My favorite and least favorite debates I have ever judged have involved the K in a substantial way. Do with that information what you will.

You should have done a lot of reading on the thesis of your kritik so you actually know what you are talking about and can effectively apply the theory to the aff/topic you are critiquing. Over reliance on jargon isn’t a flex. Explain big concepts simply and use lots of examples to illustrate your link and alternative arguments. Links should be specific to the aff/topic you are criticizing. Illustrate the link by quoting your opponents and/or their evidence.

Performances should relate to arguments that appear later in the debate.

Disadvantage and Counterplan Thoughts

In an ideal world, disadvantages would be intrinsic to the action of the plan. Explain the link story and do impact comparison.

Case specific counterplans are better than generics. I lean aff on multi-actor fiat, consult, and condition. I lean neg on PICs. There is strategic utility to not including a solvency advocate, but literature should probably inform the ground for both sides. Presumption flips aff if the 2NR goes for a counterplan without making an argument about judge kick.

LD Thoughts

Everything mentioned above applies to LD. I'd prefer not to be subjected to tricks or frivolous theory debates. I am old, grumpy, and have little patience for shenanigans.

A philosophy framework should have a clearly articulated relationship to the relevant impacts for the round. I would suggest slowing down to ensure I don't miss key steps in your syllogism. I'm fine for one or two substantive tricks like skep triggers and paradoxes here, provided they make sense in the context of your framework.

I'm agnostic on 1AR theory and RVIs in the context of this event.

PF Thoughts

This event exists with the explicit purpose of preserving lay debate, so pretend that this is a short policy round, and I am a lay judge who knows how to flow. If you want to do "progressive debate" things, come to policy. We would love to have you.

Cards are good. Paraphrasing is bad. If we are sending out speech docs with carded evidence before speeches, I will be a happy camper and likely bump speaks.

"Flowing through ink" is not a thing. You have to attend to responses if you want to extend something. Additionally, defense is not "sticky". You have to extend it if you want me to consider it.

I understand PF to be advantage vs disadvantage debate, with the resolution functioning in place of the plan in policy debate.

Topicality doesn't make a ton of sense in PF considering that the aff doesn't default to speaking first and the negative isn't tasked with upholding the resolution. Just do the thing traditional debaters used to do and define your terms at the top of your first constructive speech to parametrize the debate.

Counterplans are allowed at TFA sanctioned tournaments. They are banned only at NSDA sanctioned tournaments.

If you are considering reading a kritik in front of me, you don't have enough time to do the requisite amount of explanation and contextualization for me to feel like you have a shot at winning. Come to policy and read all the Ks you want.

WSD Thoughts

This event suffers from inconsistency of argument from speech to speech. Introduce your arguments in you first speech, and start answering your opponents' arguments as soon as you are able. Arguments and answers must then be extended in each successive speech in which you'd like for it to be up for consideration.

Congress Thoughts

After a few speeches of floor debate and cross examination on a given bill, you should not be reading speeches word for word. Clash with arguments presented by people on the other side of the issue and extend arguments made by representatives you agree with.

Katelynn Shadman Colleyville Heritage High School 5 rounds

Last changed on Sun April 14, 2024 at 5:34 PM CDT

please put me on the email chain: kateshadman@gmail.com

^^please send docs, don't dump an entire speech into the body of the email

Colleyville Heritage HS (TX) '20: 4 years PF (tfa and nat circuit)

University of Oklahoma '24: 4(ish) years policy

pronouns: she/her/hers

tl;dr (pf)

do whatever you want, i vote on the flow. your barrier to speed is your opponent (if they can’t handle it don’t do it). please warrant and weigh your arg and terminalize your impacts — if you do this you will most likely win. 2nd rebuttal should frontline, if they don’t defense is sticky in 1st summary. if it’s in final it needs to be in summary. have good evidence ethics.

come in pre flowed and send the email chain at the start time

for roadmaps: just tell me which piece of paper to have on top

tl;dr (cx)

my only cx experience is in college, so I'm not as with it as the other college policy debaters

I don't care what you read, I'll listen to pretty much anything. write my ballot for me, I love judge instruction (especially on the K, implicate it to the round plss). I'm biased for a good policy round but don't get me wrong, I love a good K (most familiar with set col, security, and cap). pls label each piece of paper in the 1NC. regardless of the argument, make sure to extend the link (really hard to vote on anything in the 2AR/NR if it's missing) and implicate your args.

come in pre flowed and send the email chain at the start time

for roadmaps: just tell me which piece of paper to have on top

welcome to my paradigm:

*before your speech, pls just tell me what piece of paper to start on and I'll follow you from there (cx: just give me the order of the sheets of paper)

Warrant, Weigh, Win- it's that simple.

- it needs to be on the flow, I need clean extensions and weighing if you want me to vote on it

(please weigh. please, please, please weigh)

- for it to be an extension, I need claim, warrant, and impact

- tell me why/how you're winning and why your argument matters (write my ballot for me)

- terminalize impacts

- please come in pre-flowed and prepared to debate (i want to start the round asap)

- speech doc/email chain should be sent at the start time of the round (or earlier, just not later)

- signpost, I want to write down all of your wonderful arguments (in the right places)

- speed: i don't care how fast you go, know your opponent (if they can't handle the speed -- don't go fast, if they don't have experience flowing off speech docs, this isn't the round for them to learn), if you're going to go sicko mode, give me a doc, otherwise, I flow on paper if I'm not writing stuff down, slow down

pf specific:

- quality > quantity

- tech > truth

- default util

- I don't like calling for ev. you should be doing the ev analysis yourselves, ie. compare the ev between speeches then say it in the speech (I won't vote on it if it's not on the flow)

rebuttal:

- 1st rebuttal shouldn't be doing case extensions (unless it's an ov, fw, or weighing you want flowed on your case), i already got the args from case, it's just repetitive

- 2nd rebuttal: pls frontline offense

summary:

- if 2nd rebuttal frontlines, defense is not sticky

- if 2nd rebuttal doesn't frontline, defense is sticky

- please weigh (pls, pls, pls)

final focus:

- final focus should mirror the summary (if it's not in the summary it shouldn't be in final) (weighing should also be the same)

- PLEASE DON'T GO FOR EVERYTHING, collapse and narrow down the debate

crossfire:

- start whenever y'all are ready, don't wait on me

progressive args (pf)

I would rather not but, do whatever you want, but, it's extremely hard to do the work you need to do within the pf time constraints and the bar doesn't lower just because it's pf. if you are going to do something funky, one of the biggest mistakes I see is not implicating the K (or whatever) to the round, make sure you do work on page comparison otherwise, it's really hard to see how the argument is relevant to the round. tell me how to evaluate the arg in the context of the round.

"progressive args don't belong in pf" isn't a response (unless you have a beautifully curated block on this arg), you need some legitimate ink on the flow

again, I would rather not judge progressive rounds in pf, if you want to, you run the risk of losing the ballot a lot easier than if you debated traditionally

evidence:

don't do anything stupid and don't take forever to pull up evidence, evidence should be cut properly and cited with a working link, if your opponents are doing something bad/sketch with ev make it a voting issue--I am very likely to vote on it (if it's legit)

personal thing about ev- evidence shouldn't be paraphrased when it's introduced into the round, you should be reading from cards, obviously this gets lost in the back half of the round (which is fine)-- if you are going to paraphrase make sure you have the cut cards available and that you are representing them correctly

Sarah Sherwood Hire 6 rounds

Last changed on Tue January 2, 2024 at 7:56 AM PDT

UPDATED 6/1/2022 NSDA Nationals Congress Update

I have been competing and judging in speech and debate for the past 16 years now. I did Parli and Public Forum in High School, and Parli, LD and Speech in College. I have judged all forms of High School Debate. Feel free to ask me more in depth questions in round if you don't understand a part of my philosophy.

Congress

Given that my background is in debate I tend to bring my debate biases into Congress. While I understand that this event is a mix of argumentation and stylistic speaking I don't think pretty speeches are enough to get you a high rank in the round. Overall I tend to judge Congress rounds based off of argument construction, style of delivery, clash with opponents, quality of evidence, and overall participation in the round. I tend to prefer arguments backed by cited sources and that are well reasoned. I do not prefer arguments that are mainly based in emotional appeals, purely rhetoric speeches usually get ranked low and typically earn you a 9. Be mindful of the speech you are giving. I think that sponsorship speeches should help lay the foundation for the round, I should hear your speech and have a full grasp of the bill, what it does, why it's important, and how it will fix the problems that exist in the squo. For clash speeches they should actually clash, show me that you paid attention to the round, and have good responses to your opponents. Crystallizations should be well organized and should be where you draw my conclusions for the round, I shouldn't be left with any doubts or questions.

POs will be ranked in the round based off of their efficiency in running and controlling the round. I expect to POs to be firm and well organized. Don't be afraid of cutting off speakers or being firm on time limits for questioning.

Public Forum

I know how to flow and will flow.
- This means I require a road map.
- I need you to sign post and tell me which contention you are on. Use author/source names.
I will vote on Ks. But this means that your K needs to have framework and an alt and solvency. If you run a K my threshold for voting on it is going to be high. I don't feel like there is enough time in PF to read a good K but I am more than willing to be open to it and be proven wrong. For anyone who hits a K in front of me 'Ks are cheating' is basically an auto loss in front of me.
I will vote on theory. But this doesn't mean that I will vote for all theory. Theory in debate is supposed to move this activity forwards. Which means that theory about evidence will need to prove that there is actual abuse occurring in order for me to evaluate it. I think there should be theory in Public Forum because this event is still trying to figure itself out but I do not believe that all theory is good theory. And theory that is playing 'gotcha' is not good theory. Having good faith is arbitrary but I think that the arguments made in round will determine it. Feel free to ask questions.
Be strategic and make good life choices.
Impact calc is the best way to my ballot.
I will vote on case turns.
I will call for cards if it comes down to it.

Policy Debate

I tend to vote more for truth over tech. That being said, nothing makes me happier than being able to vote on T. I love hearing a good K. Spread fast if you want but at a certain point I will miss something if you are going top speed because I flow on paper, I do know how to flow I'm just not as fast as those on a laptop. Feel free to ask me any questions before round.

LD Debate

Fair warning it has been a few years since I have judged high level LD. Ask me questions if I'm judging you.

Framework
You do not win rounds if you win framework. You win that I judge the round via your framework. When it comes to framework I'm a bit odd and a bit old school. I function under the idea that Aff has the right to define the round. And if Neg wants to me to evaluate the round via their framework then they need to prove some sort of abuse.

Joshua StPeter Sequoyah High School 3 rounds

Last changed on Sun May 19, 2024 at 9:00 AM EDT

Call me "jsp" or "Josh"

joshuasp.debate@gmail.com

<3 ATL

Recent Coaching/Debating Affiliations:

Coaching: Ivy Bridge Academy, Thomas Kelly College Prep

Debating: Western Kentucky University (2024-present), Georgia State University (2021-2024), Sequoyah High School (2017-2021)

Bottom line: I am a 3rd year out debater doing policy, I did 4 years of LD in high school and I have been coaching PF at Ivy Bridge Academy. I can follow jargon from across those 3 events. Whatever you are doing will likely not be new to me in all honesty. Some people call me a tabula rasa judge even though I think the phrase tabula rasa is a conservative debate dogwhistle (I spend a lot of my time thinking about why we do what we do in debate, I think this makes me decent at judging method debates).

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Quick Prefs: (LD)

1- K, Plan, DA's

2 - Theory, Pomo

3 - Phil/CP's

4- Tricks

Strike- Out of round violations, frivolous arguments

---

Translation for PF Debaters: this means I am a "tech judge". Speed is fine and prog is cool. Just don't be a jerk, be a sensible person.

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I have given myself 5 things to say about how I evaluate debates, no more, no less:

1. I need pen time, i flow on paper and by ear

2. I will not vote for arguments that had no warrant/signaling. Such as ur fiat K's that ngl was not even in the block

3. It must have been in your final speech for me to vote for you on it (including extending case vs T)

4. I evaluate impact level first usually unless told otherwise (whether its education or nuke war, etc)

5. My ballot will likely be determined off who i have to do the least work for, i do not usually vote on presumption

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Evidence shenanigans:

this is the only stuff that will change how I vote directly, everything else is flexible.

Put me on the email chain, i do like to read evidence because no one compares the evidence themselves. I prefer ev to be send before speeches and in cut cards. Your speaks are capped below 29.5 if there is no doc and below 28 if when you send evidence there is not evidence in cut card format. Paraphrasing is fine if you have cut cards to go along with it AND you send them out BEFORE. I make exceptions to this if you are part of a small program which has no way knowing how to cut cards and this is in novice.

If you send your case as a google doc, copying perms needs to be on. This is because I need to create a stable copy of your evidence, anything that you can edit without sending a new doc risks being problematic (ie changing highlighting mid round or adding ev and claiming to have read it). Strike me if how I deal with ev ethics is a problem.

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More Ranting

Every form of debate is full of brain rot and I genuinely care about voting for people who are capable of thinking of why they do the norms they partake, not only does it make you a better debater but also a better person. Idc what it is or how it got there, just get to the finish line. Any arg is a voting issue if made to be that way. I only vote on complete arguments. Stock args are very strategic in front of me because I am not better for random arguments but for good arguments you can defend well. The frontlines and weighing wins you the round, not the constructive.

---

Speaker Points

Be clear, pen time gets speaker points.

Cross-examination/Crossfire heavily influences speaks. Do you use it

Strategic collapses that make my life easier are appreciated

Clear signalling/signposting helps

Andy Stubbs Westlake 6 rounds

Last changed on Thu January 4, 2024 at 5:25 PM EDT

Email chain: andrew.ryan.stubbs@gmail.com

Policy:

I did policy debate in high school and coach policy debate in the Houston Urban Debate League.

Debate how and what you want to debate. With that being said, you have to defend your type of debate if it ends up competing with a different model of debate. It's easier for me to resolve those types of debate if there's nuance or deeper warranting than just "policy debate is entirely bad and turns us into elitist bots" or "K debate is useless... just go to the library and read the philosophy section".

Explicit judge direction is very helpful. I do my best to use what's told to me in the round as the lens to resolve the end of the round.

The better the evidence, the better for everyone. Good evidence comparison will help me resolve disputes easier. Extensions, comparisons, and evidence interaction are only as good as what they're drawing from-- what is highlighted and read. Good cards for counterplans, specific links on disads, solvency advocates... love them.

I like K debates, but my lit base for them is probably not nearly as wide as y'all. Reading great evidence that's explanatory helps and also a deeper overview or more time explaining while extending are good bets.

For theory debates and the standards on topicality, really anything that's heavy on analytics, slow down a bit, warrant out the arguments, and flag what's interacting with what. For theory, I'll default to competing interps, but reasonability with a clear brightline/threshold is something I'm willing to vote on.

The less fully realized an argument hits the flow originally, the more leeway I'm willing to give the later speeches.

PF:

I'm going to vote for the team with the least mitigated link chain into the best weighed impact.

Progressive arguments and speed are fine (differentiate tags and author). I need to know which offense is prioritized and that's not work I can do; it needs to be done by the debaters. I'm receptive to arguments about debate norms and how the way we debate shapes the activity in a positive or negative way.

My three major things are: 1. Warranting is very important. I'm not going to give much weight to an unwarranted claim, especially if there's defense on it. That goes for arguments, frameworks, etc. 2. If it's not on the flow, it can't go on the ballot. I won't do the work extending or impacting your arguments for you. 3. It's not enough to win your argument. I need to know why you winning that argument matters in the bigger context of the round.

Worlds:

Worlds rounds are clash-centered debates on the most reasonable interpretation of the motion.

Style: Clearly present your arguments in an easily understandable way; try not to read cases or arguments word for word from your paper

Content: The more fully realized the argument, the better. Things like giving analysis/incentives for why the actors in your argument behave like you say they do, providing lots of warranting explaining the "why" behind your claims, and providing a diverse, global set of examples will make it much easier for me to vote on your argument.

Strategy: Things that I look for in the strategy part of the round are: is the team consistent down the bench in terms of their path to winning the round, did the team put forward a reasonable interpretation of the motion, did the team correctly identify where the most clash was happening in the round.

Remember to do the comparative. It's not enough that your world is good; it needs to be better than the other team's world.

Asya Taylor Westwood 6 rounds

Last changed on Fri January 26, 2024 at 9:00 AM CDT

wake 24 | law magnet 20

call me asya, like asia.

pls add me to the chain - asyadebates@gmail.com

be fun/funny/interesting, unless you’re not, then don’t be.

i’d rather watch debates i’m normally in (clash, k debates). i’d also rather be doing things that aren’t judging debates so don’t feel like it’s adapt or die if you wanna do plan things, just know i need more handholding on argument interaction.

defend what you say, hold people responsible for what they say. i’m not here to resolve your personal beef with someone, but i do find myself responsible for making sure this space is maximally safe.

“with high risk comes high reward, etc, etc” -- you win more the more you’re willing to try things you wouldn’t go for, and you can persuade me of most things (not ethnic genocide good, never ethnic genocide good).

i flow, but sometimes not very fast or well. if i’m judging you, assume that i’m in the camp of people who are literally writing down what you’re saying and not always the argument you’re making. i don’t suck at debate, i just have short term memory loss and don’t want to literally miss arguments you’re making.

i can’t flow when people are atrociously unclear, which is like saying “i can’t flow when the debaters are completely silent” because you are effectively saying nothing. i get being nervous though so i try as much as possible to not punish debaters for stuttering or anything else that people traditionally suggest makes someone a "bad speaker"

i’m unclear on why people try to resolve debates in their paradigm - if i could resolve a debate on my own, then i would ask you to send speech docs for the 1ac/1nc and get back to you in thirty.

argument specifics:

-convincing me fairness matters as anything more than an internal link will be difficult.

-if debated equally, i tend to err aff on framework.

-default offense-defense, technical concessions matter - unless someone says they don’t or another frame of evaluation

-won’t judge kick unless told to

-unless the negative is crushing framework, at best i default to weighing the non-idealized version of the plan in most aff v k debates (i.e. i’m unlikely to ‘moot’ the aff)

-don’t really follow docs to be honest, if i’m sus about clipping i certainly will (will dock speaks, won’t drop team unless the other team suggests it)

ask me questions about my paradigm, wake debate/the rks, or my rfd. disagreeing with me is fine, insulting me is not.

LD STUFF:

I evaluate debate like a policy debater that reads k's and read 'larp' or more traditional arguments in high school. I value really good thought out strategies over obfuscating the debate. Debate should be about substantive issues so it's easier to get me to reject the argument and not the team for theory.

please don't ask me for your speaks (uncomfortable), please set up an email chain (not fileshare)

if you need help preffing me, nate kruger gave me this guide:

k - 1

larp - 1

theory (topicality) - 1

phil - 4

tricks/theory - 5

Andrew Thong Bergen County Academies 3 rounds

Last changed on Sun January 28, 2024 at 5:51 AM EDT

hi! i debated pf in hs. toc '19! i was a former co-director for nova debate camp and go to uva now. i also coach ardrey kell VM and oakton ML. add me to the email chain: iamandrewthong@gmail.com

tl;dr, i'm a typical flow judge. i'm tab and tech>truth, debate however you want (as long as it does not harm others). for more specific stuff, read below

most important thing:

so many of my RFDs have started with "i default on the weighing". weighing is NOT a conditional you should do if you just so happen to have enough time in summary - i will often default to teams if they're the only ones who have made weighing. strength of link weighing counts only when links are 100% conceded, clarity of impact doesn't.

other less important stuff:

online debate: unless you're sending speech docs, please just make a shared google doc and paste cards there. i get it, you want to steal prep while waiting. but really, it's delaying tournaments and i get bored while waiting :( (you don't have to though, esp in outrounds - but i will be happier if you do)

also, if you're debating from the same computer, it's cool, just lmk in the chat or turn your camera on before the round so i know, because i usually start the round when i see 4 ppl in the room

speed is ok. i think it's fun. i actually like blippy disads (as long as they have warrants). but don't do it in such a way that it makes the debate inaccessible - drop a doc if your opponents ask or if someone says "clear".

whenever you extend something, you have to extend the warrant above all else.

defense is not sticky, but my threshold for completely new frontlines in second summary is super high. turns must be frontlined in second rebuttal.

new implications off of previous responses are okay (in fact, i think they're strategic), but they must be made in summary (unless responding to something new in final). you still need to have concise warranting for the new implication, just as you would for any other response.

i don't listen during cross - if they make a concession, point it out in the next speech.

weighing is important, but comparative and meta weighing are even more important. you can win 100% of your link uncontested but i'd still drop you if you never weigh at all and the opps have like 1% of their link with pre-req weighing into your case. don't just say stuff like "we outweigh because our impact card has x and theirs has y and x>y", but go the next step and directly compare why your magnitude is more important than their timeframe, why your prereq comes before their prereq, etc. if there is no weighing done, i will intervene.

i encourage post-round questions, i'm actually happy to spend like however long you want me to just answering questions regarding my decision. just don't be rude about it.

progressive arguments:

i will evaluate progressive arguments (Ks, theory, etc).

no friv theory, no tricks

i default to reasonability, RVIs, and DtD *if not told otherwise* - before you start e-mailing me death threats, this is just so teams can't read random new shells in summary unless they're going to spend the time reading warrants for CI and no RVIs - i prefer theory debates to start in constructive/rebuttal, and i'll be sympathetic to teams that have to make new responses to a completely new shell in summary or final focus

i'm less versed on Ks than i am theory. i can probably follow you on the stock Ks (cap, sec, etc), but if you're going to run high level Ks (performance, afropess, etc), i'll still evaluate them, but i advise you run them with caution, since i might not be able to get everything down 100%. it's probably best to make these types of Ks accessible to both me and your opponents (you should honestly just explain everything like i'm a lay judge, and try to stay away from more abstract phil stuff like epistemology/ontology/etc).

if you have any more questions, feel free to ask or e-mail me before the round!

Minhhy Truong The Kinkaid School 6 rounds

Last changed on Sun April 21, 2024 at 12:39 PM EDT

Note: I've been off the circuit for quite some time so be mindful. Not familiar with current topic literature.

Flay <------------------*Me*------------------------------------------->Ultra Elite Tech Judge

*I'm somewhere in between Flay and Tech prob

General

E-mail chain: minhhyt@gmail.com

With that being said I am most comfortable with trad/stock/policy arguments.

DA’s - not much to say here other than case-specific stuff is always great.

CP: CP needs to be very clear and obvious, for example, net benefits need to be explicitly extended, explained, and repeated.

Theory: go slow, make sure to clearly articulate why I should vote off of any theory arguments. Winning all parts is needed. If the abuse is not really clear and you're doing something sketchy, I'll be annoyed. I have very limited experience with Theory so if you don’t dumb it down to ELI5 levels i’ll be lost :( Run at your own risk (of me not understanding). On a personal level, I actually do enjoy evaluating theory arguments and want to get better at judging them but alas, my experience is limited. I'm open to arguments about how the way we debate impacts the activity.

K- Not familiar with K literature so take time to explain. If you talk in a bunch of jargon that I don’t understand I will not evaluate it. Run at your own risk. GO SLOW. If you don’t go slow, and I mean slower than you think slow means, I will inevitably vote “wrong” cause I’ll be lost.

If you are still absolutely keen on engaging in a prog debate despite the caution, I will of course still consider evaluating the arguments given. However, please do the following and don't be annoyed if I give a, in your opinion, "wrong" RFD. If that worries you, please strike me.

1. You MUST make sequencing arguments and emphasize them (ie. opponent conceded RoB so evaluate X argument first, theory comes prior to K because X, fairness is important so let me weigh case or else entire AC is mooted). If this is 1 point in a list of 15, that's not what I mean. Specifically, call out the argument. I need to know the "hierarchy" of which level of the debate I should be evaluating first.

2. Absolutely go slow. You don't need to slow down to a conversational level, but please slow down significantly. If you read off a file with 15 different points in 20 seconds, I'm not going to absorb anything. I will not absorb file dumps, you must pick and choose which arguments to prioritize and slow down. Especially slow down when you are collapsing to round-winning points.

3. Do not go in with the assumption that you can blitz through a pre-prepared shell or file and that I will automatically understand everything. You have to dumb things down for me. This is especially true for dense K literature or complex theory args. What do I mean by this? Use more everyday language and if throughout your entire speech, you never look up and try to explain things to me from the top of your head, you're probably doing things wrong and I will absorb nothing. If you choose to blitz through a file dump, at the very very least summarize at the end and highlight your best points.

4. If any of this confuses you just clarify before round.

____________________

Other notes:

Speed is fine but as always, slow down when appropriate such as during tags, theory, analytics. Especially take time if what you’re saying is crucial to winning the round. If you’re going to rapid-fire through analytics pls include it in the speech doc because I’m a poor typer.

Assuming the debate doesn't devolve into condo good/bad, you cannot kick out of an argument by simply saying the magic words "kick" and then it disappears. This is mostly true if your opponent has read a turn that generates offense for them. Be specific about your kick. For example, if your opponent reads multiple turns and includes terminal defense, then concede the terminal defense as a way to kick out of the arg to avoid evaluating any of the turns as offense for your opponent. Of course, different situations require different kicking strats but you should get my point. At the very least you can just argue that your cleaner pieces of offense outweigh any of the turns from your kicked argument. TLDR answer any offense.

Impacts should definitely be framed so I want comparison and impact calc. I need to know how timeframe, probability, and magnitude all compare w/each other.

Overall, I really like case debates but that doesn’t mean I won’t evaluate other stuff.

Again, because of my limited experience evaluating progressive args, don't assume I'm at all familiar with any K literature, common Theory args, etc...

Open CX is okay with me.

Tech > Truth most of the time

No Tricks

ON prep time, flashing/email chain doesn’t count as prep but don’t make it ridiculously long.

PF Specific Notes

I don't have experience with super progressive arguments so run them at your own risk. I will always prefer traditional arguments. If you do decide to engage in K debates etc..., refer to my points in the general section. I am capable but not the best at judging more common theory arguments (ie. disclosure), evidence violations, and problematic author indicts, and am terrible at judging non-T Ks, High Theory, tricks, among others.

Make sure to properly weigh. If you just say, I am winning on timeframe, magnitude, scope, etc... without actually explaining anything, that is not weighing and I will be annoyed. Also meta-weigh when necessary. If both teams claim that they're winning on time-frame and don't do anything further to breakout of the gridlock it's a wash. Make sure to collapse when necessary. Smart collapsing will win you the round.

For final focus please provide clear voters and weigh your impacts. Whatever you bring up during final focus should have been extended cleanly throughout the round. The more you outline for me why you are winning, the easier it is for me to vote for you. Judge instruction is critical in this speech.I will be hesitant to vote for any 1-liner arguments that are dropped on the flow unless you spend the time to properly contextualize and implicate why that argument matters for the ballot.

Open CX/ Flex Prep is fine.

If you don't signpost properly I can't flow your argument and thus I can't vote on it.

All aspects of the performance should have a purpose, whether that be body movement or the use of various rhetorical devices. In the same way, just as things can be underdone so too can things be overdone. For me, I prefer if speeches do not feel over-performative or dramatized. Though this may change depending on the event, I generally like to see more natural gestures. In all, I really want to be drawn in as a part of the audience rather than spoken at. Your speech should be able to immerse me into the topic. Part of doing that is making sure to have a clear organization (distinct points, thesis statement) and always staying on topic. As a side note, my biggest pet peeve is if you talk in a completely monotone voice for the entire presentation, so be mindful of that.

Minfen Wang East Ridge High School 6 rounds

Audrey Wilson Hire 3 rounds

Last changed on Fri March 12, 2021 at 3:00 PM EDT

1. As a judge, It is a priority of mine to not let bias and predisposed opinions of topics to influence how I judge a competitor. I do not want to award winners just because I agreed with their side beforehand. Fairness comes from a clean slate beforehand and a newfound opinion after the round. I value the the time and effort you put in to debate such challenging topics so I try my best to be someone that really trusts and listens to what you say.
2. I value respect over anything. Respect the judge of course, but also respect your opponent. Losing a round is not worth an attitude of disrespect. I have seen too many rounds recently where people talked over the other and it got ugly. I do not like that. Also remember, this is something that should be considered fun. Enjoy yourselves.
3. it is often thought of to take debate as way more serious than it should be. Humor, puns, and side jokes are ideal. I get bored if it’s all talk and no games. Give a joke or two. Even if other jokes do not like this, it makes it more lively for me.
4. paint me a picture. As a future lawyer, I need to see a picture and a concrete image of your plan and ideas rather than having to try to imagine something in my mind. That makes me get lost in the “what if’s” and “could be‘s.
5. Imagine yourself as a policy maker or politician rather than debate competitor. Convince me that you know how to get the job done and that you know what you are talking about. It is more convincing than talking like a student trying to win a debate competition.
6. Refer to me as “judge”. I am nice, you can make conversation with me. I love meeting competitors and hearing about what they do because it is something that I used to do.
7. pace of speaking is a huge part of how I judge. If you talk too fast, I get lost. A little goes a long way when you keep your pace under control.
8. Snark is okay, don’t be a jerk, please.

9. Know and understand your evidence. Become an expert of it.
10. Prove to me that there ARE flaws and that you CAN fix them.

Yun Xia Sharon 3 rounds

Jing Jing Xiao VDA - Vancouver Debate Academy 3 rounds

Srinivas Yeruva Westborough High School 6 rounds

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