Announcements:

Schedule here.

Unfortunately, JV & Novice have been cancelled.

Payment link is now live (see info below). 

District 7 Qualifying Tournament Information

NDT Rules

A copy of the NDT Standing Rules can be found here. 

Multiple rules have been revised – please see the highlighting in the rules doc for changes.

There is also an email to the D7 Google Group - NDT Rules Changes – Jan 10, 2021 that has a summary doc.

D7 Rules

The rules governing the District 7 Qualifier tournament are posted on the D7 Tabroom website – they are the D7 Rules Revised January 2021.  Multiple changes made in relation to online debate/season, though some things implicitly rely on NDT procedures (e.g., Tech time, decision time).

Tournament Dates

Thursday, February 18 – District meeting & registration – 6 pm, Zoom – Link will be distributed that week.

Friday, February 19 – Sunday, February 21, 2021. Rounds 1-8. The platform will be Classrooms.Cloud. Schedule here.

Deadlines

Deadline for entry: Friday, February 12. Please complete entry at Tabroom.com. In the process, please check your individual team’s “bid sheets” on Tabroom to verify their accuracy. Contact person for entries/eligibility: Adrienne Brovero, adri.debate@gmail.com.

Your entry must be accompanied by sufficient judging to be considered complete.

Deadline for judge waivers: Friday, February 12. For more information on judging qualifications and waivers, please see Rules Section II.D. Contact person for judging: Danielle Verney-O’Gorman, danielle.verney@gmail.com.

Ranking deadline: Saturday, February 13. For more information on ranking process, please see Rules Section II.H. Contact person for rankings: Mikaela Malsin, mikaela.malsin@gmail.com.

Format

Tournament format: 8 rounds:

Rounds 1-4 preset rounds

Round 5 high-high

Round 6, high-low

Rounds 7 & 8, high-low

Teams may hit a prior opponent (on the opposite side) in round 8.

In accordance with Rules Section II.G, debates shall use the format specified by the standing rules of tournament procedure for the National Debate Tournament.

Entries

Please see D7 Rules Section II for eligibility criteria.

Reminder: Third teams can compete. If you would like a 3rd team to be eligible to qualify for the NDT through the 2nd round at-large process, you need to enter that team in the tournament. If you have already qualified two teams for the NDT, you may not enter additional teams to compete, but any additional team(s) needs to be ranked in the District ranking, as per Rules Section II.B.

Swing Team Entry

If you have a team that you would like to be eligible to be a swing team (if one is necessary), please send the Chair an email identifying that team, and enter the team on Tabroom.com as well. This will speed up our ability to select a swing team in the event one is needed. Please see Rules Section II M regarding selection procedures for the swing team. Contact person for swing team: Nick Ryan, nryan2wc@gmail.com.

Judging Obligations

Judging obligation per team competing: 8 rounds.

Also, judges obligated and not used in District rounds will concurrently be part of the judging pool for the JV/novice tournament.

Your entry must be accompanied by sufficient judging to be considered complete, and all judges must have a judging philosophy on Tabroom.

As a reminder, recent revisions to the rules have altered judging obligation expectations. In particular:

Commitments:

Judge commitments: All eligible judges are obligated for a minimum of 3 debates in rounds 1-6. All judges are obligated to be available to judge in rounds 7 & 8 unless otherwise granted dispensation by the district committee. Requests for dispensation should be made at the point of entry prior to the tournament, except in extraordinary circumstances. Information regarding those constraints will be provided to participants for preference purposes. (Section II.K.4)

This means if you have a judge who is unavailable for rounds 7 & 8 (due to travel or work, e.g.), you need to provide notice of that in your entry on Tabroom.com, and via email to Danielle (danielle.verney@gmail.com). To clarify, all judges are functionally obligated for a minimum of 5 rounds (three rounds in 1-6, and 2 rounds in 7 & 8).

District Workers:

District workers: Individuals in attendance at the district tournament who provide significant coaching to, or argument production for, any team participating in the district tournament and who meet the judge eligibility requirement are required to enter the judging pool.   If they do not meet the minimum judge requirement, the district committee may, at their discretion, place the individual in the judging pool or require them to provide a significant equivalent contribution to the tournament. (Section II.K.6)

Fees

$60 per team. 

Fees will be locked in on Monday, February 15th.

Fees are expected to be paid by Friday, February 19th.

Fees must be paid by credit card, echeck or a mailed check to the University of Mary Washington. Credit card payments have an additional 2.75% processing fee.

The payment portal will open the week of the tournament here: https://cas.umw.edu/debate/tournaments-at-umw/. This link will also have information about how to obtain paperwork if you need an invoice or something else to process your payment.

District 7 JV/Novice Championship Information

Tournament Dates

Friday, February 19 – Sunday, February 21, 2021. The platform will be Classrooms.Cloud. Schedule here.

Deadlines

Deadline for entry: Friday, February 12.

Format

Tournament format: 5 preliminary rounds, with an appropriate number of elimination rounds, not to exceed quarters (due to scheduling).

Entries

Entries will be accepted in the novice and junior varsity division. Hybrids are eligible to clear.  The divisions will be collapsed if the size of the tournament requires such (it often does).  There will be five preliminary rounds of debate competition on the 2020-2021 CEDA resolution and an appropriate number of elimination rounds, not to exceed quarters.

Judging Obligations

Judging obligation for 1 team = 3 rounds, 2 teams = 5 rounds

Your entry must be accompanied by sufficient judging in order to be considered complete, and all judges must have a judging philosophy on Tabroom.

Fees

$60 per team. 

Fees will be locked in on Monday, February 15th.

Fees are expected to be paid by Friday, February 19th.

Fees must be paid by credit card, echeck or a mailed check to the University of Mary Washington. Credit card payments have an additional 2.75% processing fee.

Payment portal will open the week of the tournament here. This link will also have information about how to obtain paperwork if you need an invoice or something else to process your payment.

Caselist and Scouting for the JV/Novice Division

Participating teams and schools are expected to contribute to the Wiki Caselist (here) as a precondition for entry and should provide their most recent affirmative and negative information by February 12, 2021 (at the latest). This should include an outline of the arguments sufficient for novice comprehension, as well as full citations.  Teams and schools are expected to cooperate with registered participants requesting scouting information.

Both Tournament Divisions

Audio and Video Recording

All rounds (defined as the speeches of the participants) are open to registered tournament participants and may be electronically recorded for private educational use by tournament participants (registered coaches, debaters and helpers, and UMW tournament staff) only. Public distribution of such recordings is expressly prohibited unless prior written consent of all people on the recording is obtained and unless prior written consent of the University of Mary Washington is obtained. Private sharing for educational use is permitted. Classrooms.cloud will be recording debates.

Conduct

All participants debate at the invitation of the University of Mary Washington according to its tournament rules as well as any rules of their sponsoring institutions. We abide by all rules and norms of the American Forensics Association, and the governing organizations for the divisions (NDT and ADA).