The Polar Bear Open will be held online Friday, November 19 and Saturday, November 20. We are excited to virtually host you!

Events offered:

Speech events will be Friday only. Dramatic Interp, Humorous Interp, Program Oral Interp, Informative, Original Oratory, Mixed Extemp, and Spontaneous Speaking will be offered. One judge per 5 entries is owed. Spontaneous Speaking is similar to Impromptu where students will be give options of prompts to speak on in the room. Students may use up to 3 minutes of preparation time and a maximum of 5 minutes of speaking time. Using less prep does not give you more speaking time. 

Congressional Debate will be Saturday only. One judge per 8 entries is owed. Please email legislation to lauren.burdt@speechanddebate.org by Friday, November 5. 

Debate will begin on Friday and conclude on Saturday. Lincoln-Douglas, Public Forum, and Policy Debate will be offered. One judge per 2 entries is owed so we can single-flight rounds. The Nov/Dec topics will be used for PF and LD.

Entries and judges are due 11/17 at 8:00 p.m. CT.

Payment: 

Solo events are $15 each, and partner events are $30 each. Please make checks payable to North High School. Mail checks to North High School, Attn: Jocelynn Klos, at 501 Holcomb Ave, Des Moines, IA 50313. 

Hired judges are available for a cost. We have a limited ability to hire judges; hires are not approved until you receive notice from Tabroom that the tournament director has approved your hire request.

Technology: 

All students and judges will need linked Tabroom.com accounts to participate. All events will be held live on NSDA Campus. If your students are competing from school or workplace wifi, it is IMPERATIVE that you reach out to the space's IT department and share this website to ensure that your students will have the ability to access rooms. Most schools do not have port 10000 UDP open by default, which means your students will not be able to compete unless the IT department can make this adjustment before the tournament!

Have your students log in to Tabroom.com and join the "Test Competition Room" on the right side of their page. It is important that they test using the Competition Room (not the utility/practice room). Have students join with other students on your roster, as all students on your roster will be directed to the same space to test that they can hear/see each other. This will let them confirm they are all set up to compete!

Share these video tutorials about using NSDA Campus with your students and judges: Instructions for Competing On Campus and Instructions for Judging on Campus

Schedule can be found online here.

Tournament procedures can be found online here.