Invite

Hello everyone,

I am pleased to invite you and your teams to the Dog of War Big Questions Invitational. This event is a FREE online tournament that will offer first class competition, high quality judging, and physical awards. Registration is open now and it will close on Tuesday, March 10th at 11:55 PM Central. 

This tournament is perfect if you have students that are doing big questions for their NSDA District qualifier that would like to get some practice, for students in a debate class that have worked on BQ, or for students that have some experience in other formats and would like to try BQ.

*This will be an open division, so any student that is in high school may enter. 8^th grade students may enter if their high school includes grades 8-12.

*All entries will follow the NSDA guidelines for BQ in the Unified Manual. This means 1 person per entry.

*The resolution is: “Resolved: Moral systems rooted in theism are preferable to non-theistic moral systems.”

*This is a free tournament. The tournament staff asks that when making entries, do not use placeholders.

*Clubs and independent entries are welcome to enter.

*Every school, club, or indy entry must have an adult contact. Student-run programs need to find an adult contact to be their representative if the tournament needs to reach out. The tournament staff reserves the right to remove student-run entries.

*Each school, club, or independent entry is allowed up to 6 teams. You may place more teams on the waitlist, and these will be admitted as our entry and school numbers allow.

*All entries will be waitlisted until the judging obligation is met. The judging obligation is 1 judge for every 2 teams. For example: 4 entries will need 2 judges while 5 entries will need 3.

*The judge must be an adult that is familiar with big questions debate and who is not a high school student. There is an introductory handout explaining BQ debate located on the right-hand side of this page. The tournament does not have any judges available to hire.

*All judges should be familiar with the Tabroom system and the use of the online ballot. It is the obligation of the school, club, or adult in charge to inform the judges of how to use the system.

*All judges and students must be linked on Tabroom.

*As there are no fees, judges that miss rounds may have their students removed from the tournament or their students may become ineligible for awards. We don’t want to have to do this, but as a free tournament, we still need an enforcement mechanism.

*This tournament will use a Zoom link provided through Tabroom. This link will not be shared with students, judges, or coaches via email.

*No spectators will be allowed in the Zoom rooms. Anyone that is not a judge, coach, or student will be removed from the Zoom by one of the admin. Do not share the link. 

*All students, judges, and coaches should test their equipement for Zoom compatibility. I know it's 2026, so you could probably get on Zoom with a smart watch, but to be safe, make sure your Zoom is updated and that your device works with Zoom on your network.

*Awards (real medals and trophies) will be given to each elim participant and the top 5 speakers. The speaker award count may go up based on our entry numbers.

The Schedule

We will offer a 4 prelim rounds with an appropriate number of elim rounds (not to exceed the top 8 teams.) We will break 2-2 record entries, but based on a max of 8 teams clearing, not all 2-2’s may break.

All times are in the Central time zone.

Round 1: 9:00 AM – 10:00 AM
Round 2: 10:15 AM – 11:15 AM

Lunch: 11:15 AM – 12:15 PM

Round 3: 12:15 PM – 1:15 PM
Round 4: 1:30 PM – 2:30 PM

Elim 1: 3:00 PM - 4:00 PM
Elim 2: 4:30 PM – 5:30 PM
Elim 3: 5:30 PM – 6:30 PM

More information on how to access the Zoom site for the students, judges, and coaches will be sent once the tournament's registration closes.  

Please sent me an email at jessemeyer@gmail.com if you have any questions. My staff and I hope to see you on March 14^th.

Jesse Meyer
CEO of Dog of War Debate, Co-Tab Director

Joe Rankin
Co-Tab Director

Stevan Jechura
Event advisor and tab advisor