Gonzaga University

Conway Classic

Speech and Debate Tournament

January 9-10, 2015

Dear Colleagues,

The Gonzaga University Debate Program cordially invites your team to attend the 66th Conway Classic hosted on our beautiful campus in Spokane, Washington.  The Classic is named in honor of Sister Margaret Mary Conway, former Director of Debate at Gonzaga University.   Sister Conway is the major reason why Gonzaga has remained a perennial competitor in collegiate policy debate and her commitment and dedication to forensics in the state of Washington served as a model for our entire community. It seemed only fitting that this tournament be named in her honor.

The Conway will be held Friday January 9th – Saturday January 10th. Our tournament will offer 6 preliminary rounds in Open, Junior, and Novice divisions in CX/Policy, Lincoln-Douglas, Public Forum and 3 rounds in Open and JV Student Congress. We also offer 3 preliminary rounds in an Open division of 9 individual events: humorous interpretation, extemporaneous speaking; oratory, interpretive reading; expository; impromptu; duo, ed comm, and dramatic interpretation.

We are pleased to announce that we will once again serve as a Tournament of Champions (TOC) Bid Qualifying Tournament in Policy debate at the Semifinals. All teams advancing to the semifinals in our Open division will earn a bid towards TOC qualification.

We will also present the top speaker in the Open Policy division with the Jessica Hockensmith Scholarship. This award is a full scholarship to attend the Gonzaga Debate Institute in the Summer of 2015. If the recipient is a graduating Senior the award will be donated to the school they represent.

We will be handling all entries through the Tabroom website so please visit http://www.tabroom.com/ to enter.

We look forward to seeing you for what promises to be an exceptional tournament. We hope that you have a happy holiday season and that your travels bring you safely to Spokane in January.

Sincerely,

Glen

Director, Gonzaga Debate

Andrew Myers

Assistant Director, Gonzaga Debate

Entry

Online entry will be through Tabroom.com. You will need to set up your schools account if you do not already have one.https://www.tabroom.com/index/tourn/index.mhtml?tourn_id=2998. Judges, coaches and competitors will have access to the GU network.  It is highly advised that if your students/judges are not familiar with tabroom and all of its online features (pairings, results, ballot pickup and turn in, etc) you give them a heads up and perhaps some training on how to access all these features.

Fees and Payment

$30 School Entry Fee

$40 per Policy Team

$30 per Public Forum Team

$25 per LD Entry

$25 per Congress Entry

$15 per IE slot

$60 uncovered judging fee per each uncovered LD and Public Forum entry

$100 uncovered judging fee per each uncovered policy entry

$10 uncovered judging fee per each uncovered IE slot

Please make all checks payable to Gonzaga Debate.

You can deliver the payment at registration on or mail in advance to:

Gonzaga Debate

AD Box 20

Gonzaga University

Spokane, Washington

99258

Hotel Information

We have arranged with Red Lion River Inn to extend special rate of $88 per night for teams attending our tournament.  Reservations can be made by calling 1-800-RED-LION (1-800-733-5466) Be sure and request the “Gonzaga university Conway Classic rate.” You can also book rooms online by following this link: https://reservations.redlion.com/ibe/details.aspx?hotelID=13747&langID=1&group=Gonz0108&hgID=280&dt1=5486&nights=2&rooms=1&adults=1&child1=0

Spokane’s Red Lion River Inn provides complimentary shuttle service to/from the Spokane International Airport.  There is a courtesy phone near baggage claim that rings directly to the hotel.

Other hotels in the area, close to campus, include:

Courtyard by Marriott               509-456-7000

Holiday Inn Express                  509-328-8505

Schedule

Friday, January 9th

Saturday, January 10th

Deadlines

All entries must be received by January 2nd.  Once we are full we will no longer accept entries but you can waitlist student. You are encouraged to enter early.

We will accept drops without payment until January 7th.  All drops the day of the tournament will be charged the entry fee.

Judging

·         Each judge you bring covers 2 CX teams, or four Lincoln Douglas or Public Forum entries, and six individual event slots.

·         We  have a limited pool of hired judging available. If you need judging from the tournament contact us at Frappier@gem.gonzaga.edu. First come first served.

·         Please be sure all conflicts and restrictions (such as schools that the critic cannot see.) Please also indicate the times that the judge will be available, and match it to the schedule to make sure they know when rounds will begin.

·         Debate judges are committed one round past the round their team was eliminated in. For example, if you clear no teams in debate, you are still obligated for the first elimination round. If your team loses in the quarters, your judges are still obligated for the semis, etc.

·         Judges will all need accounts on tabroom in order to access their online ballots. We’ll have old fashioned ballots for those who need them, but our hope is that most judges will take advantage of online balloting.

·          

Debate Rules

·         CX times are 8-3-5 with 8 minutes prep

·         Lincoln Douglas and PF will use the NFL  January/February topics

·         Congress will use the Spring 2015 WSFA legislation available on our tournament site at tabroom.com

·         Washington State case areas and argument restrictions do NOT apply since this is a 2nd semester tournament.

·         Novice eligibility for debate divisions will be determined as follows:  To be eligible for the novice division each debater on the team should be in their first year of debate. If you have to try to make an argument to justify a student being in novice they should likely be in JV.

·         Rounds one and two will be pre-set in all debate events. Rounds three through round six will be power matched accordingly.

·         We do not break brackets in elimination debates. If two teams from the same school are seeded in such a way that they meet in the elimination rounds no debate will occur.  One team will advance to the next out round based on coach decision. Coaches should come to the tabroom and let us know who to advance. If you don’t we will simply advance the higher seed.

Other questions about debate please email Frappier@gem.gonzaga.edu

Individual Events

·         We will offer an open division of humorous interpretation, extemporaneous speaking, oratory, interpretive reading, expository, impromp