National Speech and Debate Tournament

2023 — Phoenix/Mesa, AZ/US

Jose Rivera Paradigm

Policy
Policy Debate Judge Philosophy

Your experience with Policy Debate (check all that apply)

Coach of a team
Policy debater in high school
Frequently judge Policy Debate
Occasionally judge Policy Debate

How many Policy rounds have you judged this year?

11-20

Which best describes your approach to judging Policy Debate?

Stock issues
 

RATE OF DELIVERY

1/91 = slow and deliberate
9 = very rapid
 

QUANTITY OF ARGUMENTS

1/91 = a few well-developed arguments
9 = the more arguments the better
 

COMMUNICATION AND ISSUES

5/91 = communication skills most important
9 = resolving substantive issues most important
 

TOPICALITY: I am willing to vote on topicality:

5/91 = often
9 = rarely
 

COUNTERPLANS

5/91 = acceptable
9 = unacceptable
 

GENERIC DISADVANTAGES

5/91 = acceptable
9 = unacceptable
 

CONDITIONAL NEGATIVE POSITIONS

5/91 = acceptable
9 = unacceptable
 

DEBATE THEORY ARGUMENTS

8/91 = acceptable
9 = unacceptable
 

CRITIQUE (KRITIK) ARGUMENTS

5/91 = acceptable
9 = unacceptable
Additional remarks:

It is the responsibility of the debater to look at the paradigm before the start of each round and ask any clarifying questions. I will evaluate the round under the assumption it has been read regardless if you did it or not. I will not check to see if you read my paradigm, nor will I give warnings of any kind on anything related to my paradigm. If you don't abide by it you will reap what you sow I am tired of debaters ignoring it and myself in a debate round my patience has officially run out. 1. I hate spreading slow down if you want me to flow your arguments if it is not on my flow, it is not a part of the round. It doesn't matter how well it is explained or extended. At best depending on speech it will be a new argument or analytical argument and will be evaluated from then forth as such. I do want to be part of the email chain, my email is thehitman.310@gmail.com, note that just because I am part of the email chain does not mean I flow everything I read, I only flow what I hear so make sure I can hear your arguments. Beware I will be following along to make sure no one is cutting cards and I will call out teams for cutting cards so be sure to do things correctly. I will drop cards before the team and continued cutting will result in me stopping the round and contacting tab. Additionally, I will not yell clear, and I will not give time signals except to inform you your time is up. I find doing this splits my attention in a way that is unfair to the debater, and often distracts debaters when called out. You will have my undivided attention. 2. I hate theory and have only voted on it once (current as of 4/12/22). In particular, I do not like disclosure theory and think it's a bogus argument, as I come from a time when there was no debate wiki as a result, I am highly biased against this argument and don't advise running it in my round. Also, regardless of the argument, I prefer they be related to the topic. I am just as interested in the topic as I expect debaters to be. On that note, I am willing to listen to just about anything as long as they are well articulated and explained(See 3). I have heard some pretty wild arguments so anything new will be fun to hear. Know in order for me to vote on an argument, there needs to be an impact on it and I need to know how we arrive at the impact. But I want to know more than A + B = C, I need to know the story of how we arrive at your impact and why they matter. I will not simply vote on a dropped argument unless there is no other way to vote and I need to make a decision, I consider this Judge intervention and I hate doing this. You as a debater should be telling me how to vote I will have to deduct speaker points if I have to do any work for you. Keep this in mind during your rebuttals. 3. At the beginning of each round, I am a blank slate, think of me like a 6 or 7-year-old. Explain arguments to me as such. I only evaluate things said in a round, my own personal knowledge and opinion will not affect me. For example, if someone in a round says the sky is purple reads evidence the sky is purple and it goes uncontested then the sky is purple. I believe this is important because I consider anything else judges intervention which I am highly opposed to and again will result in a speaker point deduction. That being said I default to a standard policy-making framework at the beginning of each round unless I am told otherwise. 4. Be aware I do keep track of Speech times, and Prep, and go solely by my timer. My timer counts down and will only stop when you say stop prep. Once you say "Stop prep" I expect you to be ready to send the file, I do not want to hear I need to copy arguments to a file to send as a part of an email chain. I will run prep for that. It should not take long to send a prepared file through the email chain and I will wait until all participants receive the file before allowing the next speech to start but do not think you can abuse this I will restart prep if it takes an abnormal amount of time. Also extremely important to note I will not stop my timer for any reason once a speech has started for any reason outside of extreme circumstances and technical difficulties do not count. If you choose to stop your timer to resolve your issue before resuming know that my time has not stopped and your speech time is being consumed. Also, aside from using your phone as a timer, I expect all debaters to not be on their phones during the round (this includes in between speeches and during prep) I think it is disrespectful to debate as an activity and to your opponent(s) and will deduct speaker points for it. Keeping that in mind note I will not evaluate any argument read off a phone, especially if you have a laptop in the round. 5. In JV and VCX Cross-X is closed, period. NCX I will only allow it if you ask. If you don't it is closed. If you decided to have open CX anyway I will deduct speaker points. 5. Last but not least be respectful to me and to each other, and I would appreciate a good show of sportsmanship at the beginning and end of each round. Any disrespect of any kind will result in a speaker point deduction on a per-incident basis. Continued disrespect will result in notifying tournament staff and lower-than-average speaker points. Although I do not expect it will go that far. E-Debate: A. Cameras must be on at all times, I will not flow teams with cameras off. Do not be surprised if you lose because I did not flow it you have been warned. I will not be lenient with this as I have been in the past. B. Prep time will be run until speeches are received in the email chain. DO NOT assume you control the time as mentioned above I am keeping time and will go by my timer. I WILL start the speech timer if you end prep AND THEN send the speech. I have zero tolerance for this as teams consistently abuse this to steal prep. You should know how to send an email it should not take long to send one. If you are having genuine technical issues let me know as the tournament has Tech Time I can run that timer instead, otherwise I will run speech time. DO NOT make light of this I am tired of being ignored as if I am not a part of a debate round. C. Make sure I'm ready this should be common sense but for some reason, I have to mention it. If you start a speech before I am ready, I will miss some arguments on my flow and I will be highly annoyed. Your speaker points will reflect this and you may lose the round as a result if it was a key argument I did not flow. D. Also spreading on camera is a really bad idea and I highly advise against it from a technical perspective and my general disdain for spreading. E-Debates are tricky enough with varying devices, internet speeds and audio equipment affecting the quality of the stream, spreading in my experience is extremely disadvantageous, do so at your own risk. E. REMINDER, I Control speech and prep timers, and speeches DO NOT stop because you are reading the wrong speech or can't find where you are at on a document, once the timer has started it stays running until speech time is over. I do not know why I have to mention this but recent judging experiences have told me it must be mentioned.

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