COVID Plans

COVID Plans for the Edie Tournament 2021

Here is the narrative for our hopes and why we are doing this as a hybrid tournament by division NOT hybrid divisions. We have asked for the Marriott to give us all of their meeting rooms and suites. These include the Bi-level suites and the executive suites. The goal is to spread out the two teams to either side of the room, with a speaking location in the middle and the judges/coach observers in the back of the room. We feel we can increase the space and can handle a single flighted PF division in person. Additionally, we can spread out Congress in the Marriott ballrooms or large conference rooms. 

Our earlier survey indicated that there was about 30% desire for in-person opportunity, about 30% that can't attend in-person, and about 40% that didn't really know what they would be allowed to do. Because we are an invitational, we decided to try and provide at least a portion of the debate community with the experience of an in-person opportunity. We felt that the PF division was large enough that at 50% we could still run a fairly significant division. The other divisions either were smaller and going in-person would result in the division being too small.  Or, we felt that we didn't have enough larger rooms for multiple people.

We recognize this won't make everyone happy but we are trying to provide some opportunities for travel to those folks and teams that really are looking for this.

So, here is the plan.

1) We recommend vaccines and masks for all students, judges, coaches, and chaperones. We cannot mandate vaccines nor track this. We cannot develop a system for tracking this.  

2) We will allow one coach-observer from each team in the room.  We will also use NSDA level 2 for observers for the online divisions. We require that the judge and any coach-observers stay masked through the entire debate.

3) Students and masking:

--We will ask that the judge poll the students at the beginning of the round. If the students agree that the speaker can unmask while speaking, then the debate will proceed in that manner.
--If someone prefers a speaker remain masked, we will allow the speaker to take off their mask and switch to a face-shield to speak. So, speakers should bring face shields with them if they want to speak without a mask. 
--To summarize: at this time, we will allow someone in the room to veto speaking without a mask, but they cannot veto speaking with a face-shield. We will do all cross-fires with masks on.
--In Congress, the same situation, only the speaker at the front could potentially speak without a mask. We will work to create as much distance as possible between the speakers and the other students in the round. 

4) We ask that everyone wear a mask in other parts of the hotel and especially in the elevators. We will likely determine a cap on the number of people in the elevators.