Chesapeake District Qualifier

for the 2019 National Tournament

Chesapeake District Newsletter #2 (12/23)

NATIONAL SPEECH & DEBATE ASSOCIATION / CHESAPEAKE DISTRICT NEWSLETTER #2

12/23/2018

Dear colleagues,

Happy holidays!  Registration is now OPEN for the Chesapeake District Tournament, which will take place as previously announced on February 24^th at Loyola Blakefield High School in Towson.  The tournament will feature speech, debate, and congress events. 

The District Tournament is the National Qualifying Tournament for the National Speech and Debate Association Championship, which will be held in Dallas this year in June.  If your school is not familiar with the National Speech and Debate Association and its offerings, I encourage you to visit https://www.speechanddebate.org/membership/.  I would be happy to answer any questions you might have. 

The District Tournament will be hosted on Tabroom.com once again this year.  The web site is http://chesapeake.tabroom.com.  The site contains the invitation (also attached to this message) and other important information about the schedule and procedures for the day.  Please read it carefully!!  Additional useful information about the district tournament is below:

ELIGIBILITY:  Note that in order to be eligible to participate in the District Tournament, schools must be registered members of the NSDA for 2018-19.  If your school is not registered yet with NSDA, there is still time!  Visit http://www.speechanddebate.org and click on “Join” under the membership tab if you are new to the NSDA, or click “Renew Membership” on the welcome page if you are returning.   

Individual students must also be members of the NSDA in order to be eligible to participate.  This means that a student must have at least 25 NSDA points (thus holding the Degree of Merit).  Students must also have an account on the NSDA web page, https://www.speechanddebate.org/wp-login.php.   If a student hasn’t created an account with the NSDA yet, they can go to that page and click on the “Register” link.  When a student registers with the NSDA, you will receive a notification in the points application that they would like to be added to your squad.  If you click on “approval requests” in the points application, you can officially add that student to your squad. 

HOW TO REGISTER:  To register for the tournament, visit the Tabroom web site at http://chesapeake.tabroom.com and click on the “Registration” tab.  If you do not have a Tabroom account, you will first need to create one by clicking on “Sign Up” at the top of the page.  If your enter your NSDA login name and password in the appropriate boxes, your students will be downloaded into the Tabroom site, and you will be able to start entering students into the tournament.  Please note … only students who have earned a minimum of 25 points and who have created an account with NSDA (see prior paragraph) will appear as eligible. 

ENTERING POINTS:  Your students earn points for every round of competition they participate in.  Now is the time to dust off those old ballots and enter in your students’ results from this season!  By getting your point totals up to date, you ensure that you can bring the most students possible to the District Tournament. The number of entries that your school can bring depends directly on the number of points and degrees that your students hold as of February 17^th.   If your school has ZERO degrees then you will not be able to enter ANY students at the District Tournament!

Also, the more degrees that students from the District earn this season, the more qualifiers the District can send to nationals next season, so by keeping your points up to date, you are helping the District as well as your team.

If you don’t have your students’ ballots from prior tournaments, most tournament software publishes tournament results online, so you can search www.joyoftournaments.com, www.speechwire.com, or www.tabroom.com for the results of the tournaments you attended.  Failing that, contact the tournament director of that particular tournament for help. 

For new coaches that need additional guidance with the points entry system, visit https://www.speechanddebate.org/faq/i-am-a-coach-with-permissions-how-do-i-enter-student-points/

AWARDS:   Several special awards will be presented at the District Tournament, including Student of the Year, Administrator of the Year, Communicator of the Year, Alumni of the Year, Volunteer of the Year, New Coach of the Year, and Coach of the Year.  For instructions on nominating individuals for these awards, review the tournament invitation.  Nominations are due February 17th.  Any nominations received after the deadline will be considered for 2020, if applicable.   

QUALIFICATIONS:  As long as there are sufficient entries (12 in one-person events, 10 in 2-person events), the top three students in each speech and debate event will earn a bid to attend the NSDA National Tournament in Dallas in June!  Otherwise, if there are a minimum of four entries, the top two will qualify.  For congress, senate will qualify the top two and each house chamber will qualify the top two. 

BIG QUESTIONS DEBATE QUALIFIER:  New this year, the Chesapeake District will also be hosting a Big Questions Debate District Tournament.  The tournament will take place on Saturday March 16^th at Loyola Blakefield, and the tournament champion will receive an invitation to compete at NSDA Nationals.  See the attached invitation for more details.

We look forward to some great competition and hope that you and your students will be able to join us!  As the tournament draws closer, we will be sending out additional updates.

Sincerely,

Charles Donovan, on behalf of the district committee

Monty Crawford

Gavin Mease

Steven Sprouse