Invite

Hi everyone,

We’re going to try something completely new this year - a prepared Speech scrimmage for novice (or novice-ish) students that will run concurrently to Congress rounds at Magnolia Qualifiers on Dec 6 at Forest Hill High School. Please read the details below, let me know any questions you have, and sign up students on tabroom here.

What events:

We’ll accept entries in any prepared speech events: Prose, Poetry, HI, DI, Declamation, Duo, Duet, Oratory, Informative, POI, Expository. We will not hold Impromptu, Extemp, or Storytelling.

Depending on entry numbers, we may combine some of those events into a single event at the tournament, but the students entered would still follow the rules of whatever event they were signed up for. (For example, if Expos and Info were combined, students could follow the Info rules or the Expos rules. Whichever one they prepared for.)

No entry fees!

Who this is for:

The target student population for signing up are those who have fewer than 25 NSDA points and thus are not eligible to compete in Congress.

In addition, however, teams that have already filled all of their Congress slots may enter students into the Speech scrimmage who have fewer than 150 NSDA points but are not entered in Congress.

A student who is not technically a novice (competed last year) but has fewer than 150 NSDA points would be welcome to compete.

We would also welcome students with 150 or more points as judges. This could include students who are entered in Congress, since some of them will be free for part of the day Saturday and students who are not entered in Congress at all. Please only sign up students you actually trust to take judging seriously and provide helpful feedback.

Why we’re doing this:

The idea is to provide a low-pressure, low-stakes opportunity for students who haven’t been able to compete much (or at all) this year before they jump into full-blown invitational tournaments in the spring semester.

This will help them earn some NSDA competition points (and thus help towards getting eligible for Magnolia qualifiers in the spring) and help those who haven’t competed yet get familiar with the competition experience.

The focus will be on prepared speech events to try to help with the procrastination trap that so many students fall into with those events in particular (and also to keep the logistics of the tournament as simple as possible). Ideally, what they compete in on Dec 6 will be what they plan to compete in at St. Andrew’s, MSU, and/or JCFL/BCFL in January-February. This scrimmage should serve as a warm-up for those tournaments.

Entry limits - initially, I’m going to limit it to two events per student and an overall cap of 50 entries. Depending on interest, I may open up past those limits, but anything over 50 entries means we actually have to pay tabroom fees, and I’m trying to keep this cost-free for everyone.

Logistics - We’ll run 3 rounds, no flights, no elims. Tentatively, those rounds will be at 9:30am, 12:00pm, and 2:30pm. I’m not really planning on awards, but maybe we’ll have some certificates. Keeping it as simple as possible. The goal is the points and practice, not necessarily the competition per se.

Please let me know what questions or feedback you have - this is very much new and experimental! You can sign up students to compete here, and you can also sign up students to judge, even if you don’t have scrimmage entries. (Perfect for Varsity students in the Jackson-metro area who aren’t competing in Congress but want to earn some service points for judging!)