Region VI Speech and Debate Tournament

February 23-24, 2018

West High School

Coaches,

Details about the region tournament are at the bottom of this document and are copied directly from the Region VI handbook. There are some changes that are intended to bring the tournament in line with what's expected for state and those have been indicated with strikethrough. 

Congress

Session 1

All from from http://www.utahdebatecoaches.org/Students/congress-legislation

A Bill to Reclassify Electronic Cigarettes

A Bill to Alter the American Antiquities Act

A Resolution to Reduce Piracy

A Resolution to Abolish the Lobbyist System

A Bill to Remove Race and Ethnicity Questions

Session 2

All from January 2018 NSDA Docket

A Bill to Tax the NCAA

A Bill to House America

The Student Athlete Medical Act

A Bill to Identify CTE Before It’s Too Late

A Resolution to Recognize Catalonia

The tentative schedule is as follows, and the schedule will be established at the February 22nd pairing meeting:

Friday will begin with the extemp draw at 3:30. All speech rounds will start at 4:00. There will be 3-4 rounds of speech.

Saturday will begin at 8:00 AM. All participants should be present by 7:30 AM to ensure a punctual start. There will be 3-4 rounds in policy and 4-5 rounds in LD and PF.

Also, regarding congress judges: Finding judges for this event is difficult because all schools compete in the same chamber together. Therefore, all schools with congress participants must bring a judge who can evaluate the round without any conflicts. This should be someone who is not familiar with any of the competitors. 

Information from the Region VI handbook begins here:

1) Region Format:

a. Number of Contestants:

b. Policy Debate Four Teams

c. Lincoln-Douglas Four Contestants

d. Public Forum Four Teams

e. U.S. Extemp. Three Contestants

f. Original Oratory Three Contestants

g. Impromptu Three Contestants

h. Congress Three Four Contestants

i. Foreign Extemp Three Contestants

All events will count toward the region trophies. There will be no Interps at region unless they become state events. There will be one region trophy awarded at the Region Debate Tournament.

Speech/Forensic Events: Oratory, Impromptu, National Extemp., Foreign Extemp.,

Debate Events: Policy, Lincoln Douglas, Public Forum, Congress.

Double Entry of competitors is allowed, as long as they only participate in one event per day. Events held on Friday will be Oratory, Impromptu, Foreign Extemp., and National Extemp. Events held on Saturday will be Policy, Lincoln Douglas, Public Forum, and Congress.

In line with the procedure of the National Speech and Debate Association, a student who is double-entered and qualifies outright in both events, will forfeit the slot he or she will not fill at State to the next contestant in line, providing that contestant has a winning record (50% or better). On the Region Tournament registration form, double-entered students will be required to declare the event in which they would like to advance at State and the event in which they will forfeit their slot, should they qualify in both events.

2) Judges Requirements:

a. Schools must bring one qualified judge per two debate entries, one qualified judge per five IE entries, and one Congress judge for any Congress entries. Schools that do not fulfill their judging requirement will have entries dropped from competition.

b. The qualified judges for Congress rounds will be confirmed by coaches at the Region Pairing meeting.

3) Region Meet Parings:

a. All schools competing at region have to attend the Pairings Meeting for Region. All schools must send a coach or a coach designee to pairings. They will not be allowed to participate in the region meet if not represented. Region Pairing Meeting will be held @ West High School on February 23 22nd, 2018

4) Debate Parings:

a. The intent is to have each school meet every school in the Region, if that can’t happen, the pairings will be made within reason.

b. Individual teams must not meet the same team more than once.

c. Recommended: 3-4 rounds in policy, 4-5 in LD and Public Forum.

5) Individual Event Pairings:

a. Random selecting shall be done in each event.

b. 3-4 rounds of competition will take place.

c. Where possible schools should not compete against members of their own school’s team.

d. Congress Pairings:

Congress sessions will last 3 hours total. Legislation will be chosen by the region representation to establish the docket which will be published to all schools. The tournament will use the UDCA Orders of the Day.

6) Medals: Each medal will say the event name and “Superior” and will be given to the top six finishers in each event. The following number of medals will be needed:

Public Forum – l0 medals

LD – 5 medals

Policy – 10 medals

National Extemp – 5 medals

Foreign Extemp. – 5 medals

Oratory – 5 medals

Impromptu – 5

medals

Congress – 5 medals

10 blank Superior medals in case of ties.

7) General Guidelines:

a. In speech and debate competition, each individual is limited to ten meets per year, excluding region, state and national competitions.

b. Region will pay for judges at the Region Meet; $35 for each judge who judges for Friday, and $50 for each judge who judges for Saturday (as per new UHSAA guidelines).

c. March/April LD topic and March PF topic will be used for the Region Meet.

d. In the event a student misses a round, his/her points will still count toward sweepstakes.

e. Please refer to “General Policies” in the Region VI Handbook for all other Region VI Rules, and the UHSAA Handbook for all UHSAA Rules.

f. Sweepstakes points will be calculated as follows:

1. The top 1⁄4 of contestants will be given superior (5 points).

2. The next 1⁄4 of contestants will be given excellent (3 points).

3. The next 1⁄4 of contestants will be given good (1 point).

4. The bottom 1⁄4 of contestants will score no sweepstakes points.

Overall rank in speech and congress will be determined by:

1. Overall Rank

2. Reciprocal Rankings

8) Ties will not be broken; each quartile will be chosen by marking the number which least skews all brackets.

9) The top 50% of schools in total sweepstakes points will qualify their entire team for the state tournament.

10) All students qualifying in the top ten of their event (with a winning record in debate events) will qualify individually outright.