West Los Angeles District Qualifier

for the 2021 National Tournament

This year's national qualifying tournament will be held virtually from Saturday March 19 to Sunday March 20, 2022.  The tournament will be held using NSDA's Campus and tabroom.com.  We look forward to seeing you!

Important Announcements:

1.  The tournament was originally scheduled to be hosted at Brentwood School.  The District Committee decided, though, in an abundance of caution, to go to a virtual tournament.  This qualifier will be held entirely online using CAMPUS and TABROOM, with ZOOM as a backup.

2.  There are new tabulation rules for the tournament.  In 2021, the Board of Directors for the NSDA voted to make the previously pilot qualification rules the permanent set of rules governing district tournaments.  Thus, we no longer have the option to use the traditional up-down or California Plan systems.   Review the District Tournament Operations Manual to see the new procedures.  We will be using the default rules.  So, for speech, that means three preliminary rounds clearing into elimination rounds.  For debate, that means four preliminary rounds breaking to a single elimination bracket.  Alternate placement is determined by the preliminary round seeding method.

3.  The tournament will be run by the District Committee and coaches designated by that committee to assist.  If you have questions, feel free to contact the District Committee in advance of the tournament.  Bobby (rlebeda@dths.org), Leilani (lmchugh@fsha.org), Victor (victor@gotovictor.com), or Eleanor ( (enishioka@hartdistrict.org).  

4.  Like last year, every school that attends the district tournament may enter up to two non-qualifying students in supplemental events at the 2022 National Tournament.

5.  We are a level 3 district, which means 3 qualifiers in every event (provided a minimum of 10 entries in that event).  BQ is the exception.  This year, however, BQ qualifies 2.  Limit of 10 BQ entries per school, but BQ is run as a debate event.

6.  We permit double-entry, with the following rules:  (a) they must complete a single-entry letter of intent form before the tournament; (b) a person double-entered can still enter Congress; (c) no double entry in two debate events; BQ will be run with and as a debate event; (d) if a student qualifies in a partnership event, they must attend Nationals in the partnership event; (e) a student can only enter in one partnership event; (f) no double-entry in the two extemp events.

7.  In speech, we were running the tournament synchronously.  DUO will be split-screen pre-recorded.

8.  Our district also qualifies two teams of 5 students each to Worlds School Debate.  As like last year, one team will be invited based on performance at the district tournament; the other team will be selected based on application.  After the 10 students are selected, the teams may be reshuffled for competitive/convenience purposes.  Note:  a student must compete at the district tournament in order to be eligible for Worlds School competition.

9.  We are using the MARCH/APRIL topic for LD and the MARCH topic for PF.

10.  This year there is a NSDA Last-Chance qualifier.  Any student who does not qualify through the district tournament has a last chance to qualify.  It will be held online from May 5-7, 2022.  To be eligible, the SCHOOL must attend districts; the STUDENT does not need to have attended districts.

11.  NATIONALS This year will be in-person on June 12-17, 2022 in Louisville, KY!

TENTATIVE SCHEDULE FOR DISTRICTS

Saturday, March 19, 2022

8:00 AM     Registration

8:30 AM     Judge Orientation

9:00 AM     Debate Round 1 (LD, PF, Policy, BQ)

10:30 AM   Debate Round 2 (LD, PF, Policy, BQ)

12:00 PM   Speech Round 1 (extemp prep starts 30 min before)

1:30 PM     Debate Round 3

3:00 PM     Speech Round 2

4:30 PM     Debate Round 4

6:00 PM     Speech Round 3

Sunday, March 20, 2022

8:00 AM     Speech Round Elims 1

9:00 AM     Debate Round Elims 1

11:00 AM    Speech Round Elims 2; Debate Round Elims 2

12:30PM    Debate Round Elims 3

2:00 PM     Congress Round 1 (until 5:00 PM)

5:15 PM      Congress Round 2 (until 8:15 PM)

AWARDS around 1:30 pm

Fees:

50$ School Fee

10$ Solo events (LD, BQ, Congress, DI, HI, POI, USX, ISX, INFO)

15$ Dual Events (DUO, PF, Policy)

Missing judge fee 75$ (per entry)

Judges:
For speech, you will need 1 judge for every 5 entries.

For debate, you will need 1 judge for every 2 entries within that event.

Judges are entered into one pool and must be available to judge any event.  Thus, even if the judge is "covering" speech events, they still should plan on showing up at the start of Saturday to help judge debate.

Coaches make sure to enter your student’s point so there have the 25 NSDA points necessary to compete.