Hi debaters,

I have three years of judging experience and have been very active in the speech and debate circuit this year. If I am judging you in public forum, please don't speak very quickly- I won't get everything you say if you spread. I am a flow judge and use it when making decisions in PF. Please don't speak over your opponents in crossfire in a rude or unreasonable way. When asking a question, please give your opponent an opportunity to answer.

During the debate, you should make your main arguments clear, and make it clear what you want me to vote off of. Weigh in summary and final focus, and if you want something to be a voting issue, put it in both summary and final focus. I am a fan of clear and smart frameworks.

Thank you and good luck! Enjoy the tournament.

ABOUT ME

I debated in PF for Poly Prep in Brooklyn NY. I was pretty good.

FLOW NITPICKS

The second rebuttal should respond to all offense on the flow. I prefer second speaking teams also respond to terminal defense/overviews, but defense won't count as dropped until after summary.

Turns not extended into summary become defense, unless your opponent extends through it. In that case, it's offense again.

I don't flow author names. Refer to the arguments.

I default neg on BOP positive statement resolutions.

Overviews.

For second speaker teams; if your overview could easily have been a contention, I already hate it. When flowing on my laptop, I will literally not have a place to flow it - nor will I make one. Second rebuttal case turns should either a) respond within the framework debate or b) signpost to relevant links in case.

First speaking teams; go nuts.

Advocacies, Plans and Fiat Power In PF.

"I grant teams the weakest fiat you can imagine" - Caspar Arbeeny. Inherency is always better than fiat. Conditional advocacies are bad. "We kick out" never removes a turn, but speech time to de-link yourself from a turn can.

If you have any qualms, questions or concerns about my preferences, please do not hesitate to inform me. There is no penalty for trying to change the way I view debate.

Coaching Experience

University of Alabama: Graduate Assistant (Individual Events) 2003

The Altamont School: Director of Forensics 2004-2008

Colorado College: Director of Forensics 2008-2011

University of Alabama: Alabama Debate Society Director 2016-present

Background

I competed as an individual events student in high school and college. As a professor of argumentation and rhetoric, I believe that individual events help students master delivery skills and debate helps students master argumentation and analytical advocacy. Thus, delivery skills will not factor into my decision. Even speaker points will be awarded based on clarity of argumentation, strategic decision making within the round, and the ability to contextualize evidence within the framework of the debate. I've been coaching debate for about 15 years on both the college and high school circuits. The best debate for me is heavy on the analysis. I want to hear how evidence interacts with the arguments you are making, and how it fits contextually. I can flow quickly, and will interject (once) with "clear" if I can't understand you. Even though I flow it, I am much more apt to decide on arguments that are explained to me, so don't fly through the analysis in an attempt to cover as much as possible.

Preferences

1. Evidence: Evidence must be accessible without delay during and after the round. If I call for evidence, I expect you to show me what you showed your opponents in round, with the card in context and the original source available. I will intervene if I determine the evidence is miscut, misreferenced, or misleading in the context of the round. This intervention typically means I disregard the evidence in my decision-making. It can have an effect on speaker points as well.

2. Overviews: There is a growing trend in Public Forum to run terminal defense and overarching turns as overviews in rebuttals. In most cases, this seems like lazy debating to me. I would much rather you put this on the flow where you want it to be, in response to your opponents specifics arguments. For me, this represents a depth of analysis that comes from listening to your opponent and making good strategic decisions as opposed to hoping their arguments fit your favorite blocks. It would be unwise to leverage these "mini-contentions" or large offensive overviews, particularly in second rebuttal, as voting issues in front of me. On the flip side, I will happily vote on well positioned turns that specifically address arguments on case.

3. Consistency: The summary and final focus are what makes Public Forum a uniquely educational debate form. Having to pick the most important arguments and address them in two minutes means highlighting the critical thinking necessary in advanced argumentation. Thus, I appreciate consistency in strategy from summary to final focus. Doing less extension and more weighing in final focus is always okay, but I do not want to vote on things in final focus that were not in summary.

4. Crossfire: I love to see debaters use crossfire strategically. No one wins debates in cross, and the best thing you can do is try to understand where your opponents are weak and strong. Being smart and civil will help your speaks.

5. Voting: In terms of defense, I'm sympathetic to the first speaking team, particularly if no indication is given in the second rebuttal as to what the second speaking team is going for in summary. Don't extend through ink, and don't extend cards if your opponents "drop" it but still answer the argument your are using it to make. In my favorite debates, teams weigh well and tell me how to evaluate offense and terminal defense in the context of the round. If I am left without this analysis, I will vote on the most offense within a net benefits paradigm. I enjoy impact analysis that evaluates magnitude, probability, and timeframe. Of these, probability is the most important. If left to my own devices, I will vote to save 20 people for sure over 20 million from an improbable (ie. with lots of defense) nuclear scenario.

6. Alternative Advocacies: Kritiks are valuable additions to debate education. If you want to run a K in PF, I am happy to listen to and evaluate it, but you must have strong links to the resolution, the activity, or your opponents' actions. While I will vote on a priori theory, I prefer you engage your opponents case within their framework if you wish them to engage in yours. In my experience, judges (myself included) tend to intervene for the sake of fairness in framework debates. But for me, unexpected argumentation is not unfair or abusive. It makes debate a worthwhile educational tool.

*I'm always happy to talk over my flow and RFD with debaters after I've turned in my ballot.*

Hey! I debated throughout high school, competing in both PF and LD, and did policy at Emory for a year. If there are any parts of this that need further clarification, feel free to email me before round (sabrinacallahan18@gmail.com) or ask me in person before the round starts. Enjoy!

General:

- Do not be blatantly offensive in round. Racism, sexism, ableism, etc. are unacceptable and are a bad norm for debate and life in general. This can cost you speaks or the round in general.

- Go with the style of debate that makes you most comfortable. At the end of the day, the debate round is yours and it is not within my jurisdiction to impose a certain style on anybody for the sake of one round. Regardless of what you choose to read, just focus on the flow because that’s what I’ll be doing as a judge. I’ll flow whatever you choose to read as long as I can understand what you’re saying. With that being said, make sure to slow down for tag lines and keep your spreading intelligible.

- Trigger warnings do matter.

- Doing a lot of weighing between arguments is always a plus.

- I haven’t read lit on this topic, so keep this in mind and don’t assume I’ll know what a specific card is or what certain topic related lingo means.

- While I recognize that debate is a game, make sure to keep this an educational space where positive norms prevail. This seems pretty obvious, but just be aware of the importance of being a decent person in (and out) round. For instance, if you’re a varsity going against a novice debating for the first time, don’t absolutely destroy them for your own pleasure.

- I’m trying to work on this, but I tend to not flow during CX, so if there’s anything super important that you want me to write down, emphasize this.

- Quality over quantity of arguments.

Frameworks:

- I used to not be a huge fan of framework debate, but increasingly this has changed and I tend to really pay attention to this element of the flow when making my decision, so make sure to keep the framework debate as clean as possible or else it makes it more ambiguous on my end to evaluate the round since it forces me to do some judge intervention in the sense that I then have to decide what mechanism to evaluate the round. I like to see framework clash from the beginning of the round, rather than just being thrown into the last 30 seconds of a rebuttal. Whether this applies to lay rounds or more technical rounds, establishing your framework from the beginning makes me more likely to vote for you.

Lay debate:

- People often shame lay debate, but I think it’s cool and is probably the type of debate that translates best into the real world. Don’t feel that you have to read anything besides this if you aren’t comfortable with it for the sake of impressing anybody in round. I’ll still flow the round as I would any other round, so things such as weighing, analytics, line by line, etcetera do matter. Also, no matter what you do, please don’t go new in the 2NR/2AR (please). I’ll just sit there awkwardly because I can’t evaluate anything.

K’s:

- I’m a huge fan of these so I’m always down for these kinds of rounds. However, just saying that “capitalism, the patriarchy, etc” are bad is not enough to win the round. Have strong and specific links or else the K means nothing to me.

- Concrete alts have more value than ones that just advocate for a pure rejection of said issue, even though I recognize that some Ks make arguments as to why this is uniquely bad and I am open to them.

- Don’t just respond to a K by saying “perm” with no cards or analytics to support it. This does little for all parties involved in the round.

- Don’t assume that either myself or your opponent have read the literature you used. Explaining your arguments will always be a safer option than not.

- Have an ROB/ROJ that is as clear as you can possibly make it.

- Most important of all- be familiar with what you’re reading.

Theory/ Tricks:

- On the K vs theory debate, make sure your shells are calling out legitimate abuse and explain why this abuse impedes the pedagogical benefits of the K. A fair amount of weighing must be done here, or else the round just gets super messy on both ends. I don’t assume that one is higher than the other, but if theory is read specifically against a K, I will evaluate theory as an indict to the K if no weighing arguments are made.

- If you read a shell, make sure you have all parts of the shell and don’t assume that certain things are implied (ie. that education and fairness are voters) or else it’ll be highly likely that you’ll lose on it.

- Condo is a good norm

- Not a huge fan of reasonability, so it’ll take good justifications to get me to buy this argument.

- I’m more inclined to drop the arg than to drop the debater, though this is subject to change depending on the circumstance.

- Have specific interps (ex: “they must do x” instead of “they didn’t do x”) or else you don’t give your opponent a legitimate way to engage with the shell and you force them to spend time trying to dodge abuse, rather than just making it very clear what you interpret to be a good norm for debate. In the case that your opponent has a super blippy interp, I think it’s totally valid to call this out as abusive.

- I don’t read them myself, but I think tricks are cool so have at it if this is your thing. If you make me smile with your creativity, I’ll award you with higher speaks.

Topicality:

- I’m also a huge fan of this kind of debate, so feel free to go for this.

- Absent sources it makes it impossible for what you’re reading to have any validity.

- Assume I’ll evaluate the round through competing interps

Disclosure:

- I’m not the biggest fan of it, but I also don’t really care enough to be repulsed by it. However, I do think that debaters from big schools are the primary beneficiaries from this and will be more inclined to support arguments against it.

Speaks:

- I don’t have a formulaic way of assessing how many speaks I’ll give you, but unless you’re super rude in round or make a fatal mistake, I’m generous with speaks (average range of 28-29.5).

PF Paradigm:

- I spent most of high school doing PF, so I guess technically speaking this is the category I’m most familiar with, even though I haven’t sat through a PF round in a while. I’ll flow the round as I would any other round, except I’ll focus more on evidence since it’s a bigger component of PF than it is in other categories. However, I don’t want to sit through an hour of just four people screaming at each other about which card is more important. Focus on the strength of arguments and the warrants behind them.

Policy paradigm:

- To be completely honest, I’m new to policy and am not too familiar with all of the nuances of it. I’ll flow the round to the best of my abilities, but don’t assume that I will know all of your jargon, even though I think LD has somewhat exposed me to a lot of concepts in policy. Be organized and tell me how to evaluate the round. I’ll apply most of the ways from how I evaluate other rounds into policy, so if you have any specific questions don’t be afraid to ask before the round starts to avoid any confusion.

Cypress Bay High School

Wake Forest University

Baylor University

Good speaks for good debating, great speaks for being funny and/or just great debating.

I'll vote for anything, just turn up. What follows are my existing thoughts/biases on how to win in front of me in policy debates, please scroll to the bottom for LD and PF.

Email: robertofr99@gmail.com

CX Paradigm: NDT Updates 3/29/23

T: I don't hold strong enough opinions about topic wording and plans to stand by in a debate so judge direction on what SHOULD matter is critical. I don't judge many though and because of that I'd say I'm more likely to default to competing interpretations than not. It would have to be a pretty clear case for me to vote on reasonability. End of year thoughts: nothing is AI and everything is nature; T-subsets is mostly valid.

FW: You can go for it. Thoughts: Unlike other judges, I think to win you need to prove your model is strictly better than a model that includes the aff, which means you should probably be able to prove that a solely plan-based model would be better than the mixed status quo.

I default to thinking of these as debates about models and not about interpretations of the wording of the resolution. That means I prefer that the aff have a counter-interp, even if that counter-interp is totally unlimited. What matters is that both teams have a vision of what their model looks like. No counter-interp is also valid and often strategic so feel free to do that too.

I won't say whether fairness is an impact because that depends on what is said and won in any given debate, but what I will say is that proving that debate is a game does not, on its own, strongly imply that fairness is an intrinsic good. Fairness is also a sliding scale, so I expect nuance about the magnitude of the internal link between the violation or the counter-interp and the fairness impact.

I think that FW teams would benefit from incorporating some kind of uniqueness argument or warrant into their skills modules that substantiates why the skills we learn from plan-based debating are valuable in the current political moment. I often find that teams lose debates where they are winning their limits arguments by failing to justify the value of THIS fair game.

K: Do whatever, odds are I've read something you are reading or someone citing else citing the same people as your authors. That means jargon is fine as long as it's used meaningfully. Big words are meant to convey even bigger ideas in less time so using jargon precisely can really elevate the quality of your speech, but on the other hand, just stringing words together without much thought may really hurt your speech. Performance debate is great, all kinds of art can be evidence as long as I can see/hear/flow it (unless there's a reason I shouldn't I'm up for that too, but I won't stop flowing your opponents speeches during the debate even if you ask me to, that is up to them).

CP: I guess this is more about conditionality than anything, I'd rather not have to deal with more than 4 or 5 conditional advocacies or I might actually vote on condo. I think most counter-plans should have solvency advocates, I can't think of an example that wouldn't off the top of my head but I'm hesitant to say I wouldn't be convinced by ANY CP without one.

DAs: I think the spill-over DA is just a bad argument. If you win it you win it but I feel like I have to be upfront about thinking this argument is garbage.

LD Paradigm:

I'm down with anything, except for really outlandish tricks and some frivolous theory. You could still win "Topic auto-affirms/negates because of definitions" in front of me but my bar is as low as "even if that's true we should ignore it and debate a common understanding of the resolution for X, Y, Z reasons" for me to throw away those kinds of arguments. I have a very deep background in critical theory and philosophy so Phil, K debating, and Skep are all fine by me as long as you remember to explain why I should vote for you rather than just exposing on an argument and hoping that will translate to a win. I like evidence, but evidence can be poetry, music, art, memes, etc. as long as it's used to substantiate something and not just presented without argument.

PF Paradigm:

You should read my other paradigms to get an idea of what I think of different types of arguments, this section is mostly dedicated to what I think of PF norms.

I care about evidence more than most PF judges, I don't think you shouldn't be allowed to reference current events to make points but I think having evidence prepared is definitely more convincing than listing off things that I may or may not have heard of to prove a point. I will want to receive any evidence you use in the debate, so that I can evaluate the comparative quality of evidence when deciding things after the debate. I will prefer low quality delivery of high quality arguments over high quality delivery of low quality arguments.

I will not deduct speaker points for superficial things like profanity or dress, I care about rhetoric as a tool of persuasion and information exchange not as a show of pageantry. Be intentional about what you are saying and why are you are saying it, and I will reward you based on the persuasiveness of that delivery.

Please be respectful to your opponents, your partner, and me in debates, and that means being respectful of our time during prep and cross-examination. If people ask to see your evidence, don't make them waste prep time for you to send it to them, they should already have it.

If you have any specific questions about types of arguments in PF or norms, please feel free to ask me. As a general rule, if it exists in policy or LD I'm willing to vote for it but also willing to vote against it on the basis that these arguments are illegitimate in PF, you just have to actually win that.

Debate is a fun competitive research game. Ask questions if you have them.

I am currently a first year student at Emory. I have done four years of public forum and have attended several tournaments for both Policy and Congress. I have no issues with speed and am comfortable with most speaking styles.

I see debate as a game and feel that any effective argument can be presented within a debate round. I will vote for the team that performs better at the "game" and am not afraid of giving low point wins. In most cases, if it falls under the resolution, I will listen to any argument.

In Public Forum, I am probably the most strict when it comes to the resolution. I do not believe that teams should be running specific plans, and instead should have cases that are applicable to the entirety of the resolution. I will not immediately vote down a team for violating the resolution, only if it is thoroughly pointed out in round by the opponents. 

I would prefer that weighing begin in the rebuttal speeches, but am fine with it being presented in summary. If no weighing is done by either side, I am left with having to do it myself and making a decision off of that. I would also prefer that by the final two speeches, both sides reduce the debate to a few key arguments, rather than debating everything that was initially presented within the round.

Speaker points will determined by the quality of arguments, speaking style, and overall composure within the round. I have no key to a 30, but a joke every now and then never hurts.

Me

Previous debater at UGA and debated in HS at a small school in GA. 
If you have any other questions, email me at camhen.debate@gmail.com - I would like to be on the email chain. 

- I won't read evidence "inserted into the debate." Debate's a communication activity and it justifies highlighting large parts of other people's ev which you couldn't read in a speech because of time constraints. I also don't know why it isn't the same as inserting a 20 min 1AC into the debate. Just read their re-highlighted ev or make broad indicts about the context of the ev. I think this practice is unethical. 

TLDR : Plans or GTFO

Prep Time ends when the jump drive leaves your computer.

I am very much so tech > truth.

Please Don't:
Be Rude or aggressive towards me, your opponent or your partner
Perform or imitate a sex act of any kind

Talk about suicide

Get naked

Please Do:
Read a plan
Defend a course of action
Defend your consequences
Have a competitive methodology

Case Debate

I like specific case debate. Shows you put in the hard work it takes to research and defeat the aff. I will reward hard work if there is solid Internal link debating. I think case specific disads are also pretty good if well thought out and executed. I like impact turn debates. Cleanly executed ones will usually result in a neg ballot -- messy debates, however, will not.

Topicality

I enjoy T debates, but please give me comparing visions of the topic (case lists are important). I default to competing interpretations but can be convinced otherwise; please put some effort into your reasonability arguments. You are fighting an uphill battle if you're trying to go for T must be a QPQ. 

Theory

Slow down. If you want me to vote on it, you have to give me time to actually write down your arguments. I have a pretty high threshold for condo with 2 or fewer condo options. More than 2 conditional advocacies is probably abusive. 

DA

The link is really important to me. 

I love good politics debate. The 1NR should do solid evidence comparison.

K

Links should be specific and well explained (there's a trend here). Don't get lost in buzzwords - make actual arguments. The aff should probably get to weigh their aff, but if they shouldn't, explain to me why. 

Too many times I see debaters forget about case – it’s still there. 
If you’re aff against the K, don’t forget your aff.  I dislike rejection alts- realistically your aff is a DA to the alt, impact it.

Death is bad. Suffering is bad. 

CP

They're cool. The more germane to the aff/topic they are, the more I will like them. 

Process CP’s are probably bad. I think you need a solvency advocate (with rare exceptions). 

K affs

are fine- you have to have a plan. You should defend that plan. Affs who don't will prob lose to framework. A lot....

NonTraditional Teams
If not defending a plan is your thing, I'm not your judge. I think topical plans are good. I think the aff needs to read a topical plan and defend the action of that topical plan. I also think if you've made the good faith effort to engage, then you should be rewarded. These arguments make more sense on the negative but I am not compelled by arguments that claim: "you didn't talk about it, so you should lose."

James H. Herndon - FORMER Director of Debate - Barkley Forum @ Emory University

[prefer to be called Herndon - pronouns are he/him/his. Email is jamesherndon3]

2020 update:

I left the game because I wanted to spend more time with my family. Wow, did I get that #ThanksCovid My relationship with debate was not conducive to being the father, husband, and member of my community I wanted to be. But, virtual judging is easy enough. So, why not.

What else is different - I don’t do debate research anymore, I do a lot of economic/financial research now, I do a lot of tech/zoom/Webex presentations.

In my experience I find it easier to listen/follow along when I can see people’s faces (that’s not possible for everyone, so it’s not a judgement thing) but if it can be when speaking it may aid my comprehension.

————————

everything from Jan 2019
If I am judging you and you are freaking out about it, believe there is no way I would ever vote for you, or are just generally making assumptions about my world view, then I ask you to keep in mind that the following list are things I think I think. I have been wrong more often than I have been right. I will do my best to evaluate the debate neutrally. I view myself as an adjudicator first, and do my best to neutrally evaluate the arguments as defended in front of me. I will vote for anything

Though, like all educators I have biases, those follow.

These statements are things I believe to be true about my judging. They aren't rules. But, it is better to disclose:

1. Debate is a game. I view all theory arguments through this lens.
2. If I don’t understand it at the end of the round then I am not going to vote on it.
3. The Aff should have to defend a plan or advocacy statement that they can defend is topical.
4. Topic related critical literature should be debated.
5. I will deduct speaker points for rudeness.
6. I will reward good cross-x with speaker points.
7.. I tend to evaluate the strength of the link in tandem with uniqueness – neither exists in a vacuum.
8. Counterplans always switch presumption to the aff.
9. I will NOT kick counterplans for the negative. The 2nr is allowed to present me with a reason to vote for them, that is where the debating ended. If the neg says to kick the cp and the aff doesn’t answer it I will kick it. Absent that, I am not kicking arguments for one team. This applies to all speeches.
10. Dropped doesn’t mean you win. Dropped means that the other team has conceded that the premise of that argument is true. Your job is to explain the significance of that premise for the rest of the debate. This applys to everything.
11. literature shapes the topic. and what you get to do with it.
14. Telling me how to interpret your evidence versus their evidence is what speaker points are made of.
15. There is value to life.

16. I am not qualified to evaluate people in the round for or about things that happen outside of the round. Intentions are important & I give people the benefit of the doubt too often for my own good.

17. I feel like fiating the states + federal government might be a step too far. I haven't heard a great debate on this, but since this is for my biases, thought I'd include it. That being said, state fiat is probably okay if there are solvency cards for what you are doing.

18. limited condo is good. the neg's job is to disprove the aff or win a competitive policy option. That being said, if the aff can prove that conditionality was used in a way that undermined the value or competitive fairness of the debate, it is a voting issue.

19. topicality is under-utilized against policy teams and over-utilized vs K teams.

20. future fiat illegit.

Good luck.

Experience/Background: I coached at Columbus HS from 2013-2021, primarily Public Forum, and now coach at Carrollton HS (2021-present). I did not debate in high school or college, but I have been coaching and judging PF, a little LD, and IEs since 2013, both locally (Georgia) and on the national circuit, including TOC and NSDA Nationals. I spent several years (2017-2022) as a senior staff member with Summit Debate and previously led labs at Emory (2016-2019).

Judging Preferences:

If you have specific questions about me as a judge that are not answered below (or need clarification), please feel free to ask them. Some general guidelines and answers to frequently asked questions are below:

1. Speed: I can flow a reasonably fast speed when I'm at the top of my game, but I am human. If it's late in the day/tournament, I am likely tired, and my capacity for speed drops accordingly. I will not be offended if you ask me about this before the round. For online rounds, I prefer that you speak at a more moderate speed. I will tell you "clear" if I need you to slow down. If I am flowing on paper, you should err on the slower side of speed than if I am flowing on my laptop.

2. Signposting and Roadmaps: Signposting is good. Please do it. It makes my job easier. Off-time roadmaps aren't really needed if you're just going "their case, our case", but do give a roadmap if there's a more complex structure to your speech.

3. Consistency of Arguments/Making Decisions: Anything you expect me to vote on should be in summary and final focus. Defense is not "sticky" -- meaning you cannot extend it from rebuttal to final focus. Please weigh. I love voters in summary, but I am fine if you do a line-by-line summary.

4. Prep (in-round and pre-round): Please pre-flow before you enter the round. Monitor your own prep time. If you and your opponents want to time each other to keep yourselves honest, go for it. Do not steal prep time - if you have called for a card and your opponents are looking for it, you should not be writing/prepping unless you are also running your prep time. (If a tournament has specific rules that state otherwise, I will defer to tournament policy.) On that note, have your evidence ready. It should not take you longer than 20-30 seconds to pull up a piece of evidence when asked. If you delay the round by taking forever to find a card, your speaker points will probably reflect it.

5. Overviews in second rebuttal: In general, I think a short observation or weighing mechanism is probably more okay than a full-fledged contention that you're trying to sneak in as an "overview". Tread lightly.

6. Frontlines: Second speaking team should answer turns and frontline in rebuttal. I don't need a 2-2 split, but I do think you need to address the speech that preceded yours.

7. Theory, Kritiks, and Progressive Arguments: I prefer not judging theory debates. Strongly prefer not judging theory debates. If you are checking back against a truly abusive practice, I will listen to and evaluate the argument. If you are using theory/Ks/etc. in a way intended to overwhelm/intimidate an opponent who has no idea what's going on, I am not going to respond well to that.

8. Crossfire: I do not flow crossfire. If it comes up in cross and you expect it to serve a role in my decision-making process, I expect you to bring it up in a later speech.

9. Speaker points: I basically never give 30s, so you should not expect them from me. My range is usually from 28-29.7.

I debated in PF at Nova High School for four years. I go with the flow. Please do not spread. I will only vote on impacts that are well warranted. Please weigh. Please collapse. Please.

Preflow before the tech check.

Judging philosophy specifics:

I am not familiar with theory so please do not read it unless an egregious violation has occurred in the round.

Frontlining is not an extension. It simply grants you the ability to cleanly extend. Make sure you go back and actually extend your arguments after frontlining.

2nd Rebuttal: Should respond to turns presented in 1st rebuttal.

1st Summary: Doesn't need to extend terminal defense that hasn't been responded to.

Final Focuses: Any offense gone for in FF must have been in summary.

Crossfires: I do not listen to them. If a concession is made, it must be brought up in a speech for me to consider it as something to vote on.

Have fun and be civil :). You can win the round while being nice. Rude debaters will have their speaker points dropped and offensive debaters will have that and lose the round.

If you have additional question feel free to ask me.

Hannah Koenraad

Debated for 3 years on Varsity team in high school. Earned several speaker awards. Debated nationally. Judged one middle school tournament. 

When judging public forum debates, the most important thing I look for is focus on summary and all main points of debate. If there is heavy clash on one point, it is very important to discuss this, but also very important to push your other offense aswell. I also look for consistency in arguments and not bringing up new arguments in the summary. Of course, I will measure my decision on the overall debate and who had the most effective arguments, but those things are very important to me while judging.

Jeffrey Miller

Current Coach -- Marist School (2011-present)
Lab Leader -- National Debate Forum (2015-present), Emory University (2016), Dartmouth College (2014-2015), University of Georgia (2012-2015)
Former Coach -- Fayette County (2006-2011), Wheeler (2008-2009)
Former Debater -- Fayette County (2002-2006)

jmill126@gmail.com and maristpublicforum@gmail.com for email chains, please (no google doc sharing and no locked google docs)

Last Updated -- 2/12/2012 for the 2022 Postseason (no major updates, just being more specific on items)

I am a high school teacher who believes in the power that speech and debate provides students. There is not another activity that provides the benefits that this activity does. I am involved in topic wording with the NSDA and argument development and strategy discussion with Marist, so you can expect I am coming into the room as an informed participant about the topic. As your judge, it is my job to give you the best experience possible in that round. I will work as hard in giving you that experience as I expect you are working to win the debate. I think online debate is amazing and would not be bothered if we never returned to in-person competitions again. For online debate to work, everyone should have their cameras on and be cordial with other understanding that there can be technical issues in a round.

What does a good debate look like?

In my opinion, a good debate features two well-researched teams who clash around a central thesis of the topic. Teams can demonstrate this through a variety of ways in a debate such as the use of evidence, smart questioning in cross examination and strategical thinking through the use of casing and rebuttals. In good debates, each speech answers the one that precedes it (with the second constructive being the exception in public forum). Good debates are fun for all those involved including the judge(s).

The best debates are typically smaller in nature as they can resolve key parts of the debate. The proliferation of large constructives have hindered many second halves as they decrease the amount of time students can interact with specific parts of arguments and even worse leaving judges to sort things out themselves and increasing intervention.

What role does theory play in good debates?

I've always said I prefer substance over theory. That being said, I do know theory has its place in debate rounds and I do have strong opinions on many violations. I will do my best to evaluate theory as pragmatically as possible by weighing the offense under each interpretation. For a crash course in my beliefs of theory - disclosure is good, open source is an unnecessary standard for high school public forum teams until a minimum standard of disclosure is established, paraphrasing is bad, round reports is frivolous, content warnings for graphic representations is required, content warnings over non-graphic representations is debatable.

All of this being said, I don't view myself as an autostrike for teams that don't disclose or paraphrase. However, I've judged enough this year to tell you if you are one of those teams and happen to debate someone with thoughts similar to mine, you should be prepared with answers.

How do "progressive" arguments work in good debates?

Like I said above, arguments work best when they are in the context of the critical thesis of the topic. Thus, if you are reading the same cards in your framing contention from the Septober topic that have zero connections to the current topic, I think you are starting a up-hill battle for yourselves. I have not been entirely persuaded with the "pre-fiat" implications I have seen this year - if those pre-fiat implications were contextualized with topic literature, that would be different.

My major gripe with progressive debates this year has been a lack of clash. Saying "structural violence comes first" doesn't automatically mean it does or that you win. These are debatable arguments, please debate them. I am also finding that sometimes the lack of clash isn't a problem of unprepared debaters, but rather there isn't enough time to resolve major issues in the literature. At a minimum, your evidence that is making progressive type claims in the debate should never be paraphrased and should be well warranted. I have found myself struggling to flow framing contentions that include four completely different arguments that should take 1.5 minutes to read that PF debaters are reading in 20-30 seconds (Read: your crisis politics cards should be more than one line).

How should evidence exchange work?

Evidence exchange in public forum is broken. At the beginning of COVID, I found myself thinking cases sent after the speech in order to protect flowing. However, my view on this has shifted. A lot of debates I found myself judging last season had evidence delays after case. At this point, constructives should be sent immediately prior to speeches. (If you paraphrase, you should send your narrative version with the cut cards in order). At this stage in the game, I don't think rebuttal evidence should be emailed before but I imagine that view will shift with time as well. When you send evidence to the email chain, I prefer a cut card with a proper citation and highlighting to indicate what was read. Cards with no formatting or just links are as a good as analytics.

For what its worth, whenever I return to in-person tournaments, I do expect email chains to continue.

What effects speaker points?

I am trying to increase my baseline for points as I've found I'm typically below average. Instead of starting at a 28, I will try to start at a 28.5 for debaters and move accordingly. Argument selection, strategy choices and smart crossfires are the best way to earn more points with me. You're probably not going to get a 30 but have a good debate with smart strategy choices, and you should get a 29+.

This only applies to tournaments that use a 0.1 metric -- tournaments that are using half points are bad.

1. Weigh. Please.

2. Anything you really want me to vote on (warrants, impacts, turns, weighing) should be in both summary and final focus.

3. Don't be rude in cross!

4. I'm a big fan of song references, specifically from early 2010s pop songs.

I did PF in high school and I am now a senior in college, do with that information what you will. Please add mirandahopenutt@gmail.com and maristpublicforum@gmail.com to the email chain. This should be started in the tech time. Please include at least the cases and call the email chain something like "Grapevine Round 1 - Marist VL vs Marist HN."

The basics:

- I hate paraphrasing, please cut cards. I think it's bad for the activity, 9/10 times is misrepresentation, and high schoolers are less informed than the academics they are citing. I won't drop you for paraphrasing, but please make it abundantly clear where you pulled your argument from the text. (If it is clear, you could have saved yourself and everyone else a whole lot of time by just reading the card in the first place)

- I will vote on the most cleanly extended and well weighed argument in the round.

- Respond to first rebuttal in second rebuttal please (your speaker points will reflect whether you did). I will not evaluate new defense in second summary on offense dropped by the second rebuttal.

- Make sure your extensions of arguments are extensions of the entire argument. Saying "extend the Jones '12 turn" in summary is not sufficient for you to go for that turn in final focus, for example.

- I will evaluate theory, k's, etc., but I prefer debates on the topic. This is simply because I feel that I am much better at judging debates on the topic. So, if you choose to read these arguments go for it, but understand that I need you to explain exactly how they should influence my ballot.

I did PF for three years at Columbus High School and am now a junior at Emory University. Im probably not very different than any standard flow judge. For specifics:

1. I try to vote on whatever offense is cleanest in the round, whether it be dropped turns or something from case. This basically just means that the easiest way to get my ballot is collapsing and weighing as early as possible.

2. I like consistency between summary and final focus, so if you plan on going heavily for something in ff, structure the summary accordingly. I'm not against 1st speaking teams extending defense from rebuttal to final assuming that it's explained well in rebuttal, but I still prefer to hear it in summary.

3. I'm not receptive to long offensive overviews in rebuttal that are basically new contentions and am very unlikely to vote on them. Second rebuttal should also address offense from 1st rebuttal - defense can be responded to in summary, but like responding earlier is still probably better

4. I don't care about speed, go as fast as you want as long as you're clear. I don't flow author names typically, so please don't extend just names.

5. for speaks: big fan of being funny and signposting. dont steal prep.

6. preflow before round!!!

I debated at Columbus High (GA) and competed on the PF national circuit for two-ish years with some success.

General: I was a very technical debater for public forum and believe that when done well, technical debates are the most interesting to watch/judge. While I appreciate good line by line debating, I understand that not all schools have the resources to teach line by line debating so please do not force yourself to be technical or “flow” because I am judging. A good voter based summary/final focus can be just as effective as line by line if you’re clear and make smart analysis.

Speed: I was on the faster end of national circuit debate, but it has been a while since I have actually debated. If you're comfortable going fast, do it but do not sacrifice clarity. Don't spread either, but I can understand relatively quick speeds. Speed is in no way a requirement. In general, the faster you speak, the less I will be able to flow. However, I do consider myself to have a pretty good speed threshold. If you want to know how fast I can handle, you can request in round that I say “clear” if you begin going to fast for me. Also, I will say “clear” if I cannot understand you twice, the third time I will just stop flowing. *If you are going fast to a point where flowing becomes difficult your opponent reserves full rights to ask for a speech doc to prevent them from missing arguments*

Rebuttal: I don’t need frontlining in either rebuttal but it could be strategic - I leave that decision to you. I want to see case cross applications, at least some generated offense, and terminalized defense. Overviews are not required but can be useful - be strategic here. I will listen to extended disads in rebuttal, but the threshold for responding to these goes down (especially if you read one as the second speaking team). Also, evidence comparison goes a long way here. Reasons to prefer evidence will make my job and yours a lot easier.

Summary: You don’t have to weigh for me here, but doing so will really help for multiple reasons (i.e. making sure I know weighing is occurring, better speaker points, etc.). Extensions need warrants, and all offense is required to be in summary. I believe in sticky defense for first summary. Being a first speaker, my biggest pet peeve is extending through ink — you need to frontline any offense you go for or I defer to their defense and don't evaluate the offense (turns become defense if not extended as offense and weighed and frontlined). If both teams extend through ink, my decision will be less standardized and you don’t want that. Second speaking teams need to extend defense in second summary for me to evaluate it better in final focus. I try to number responses if rebuttals are clear - if that makes front lining easier, feel free to use the number of the responses. I need an impact extension at the very least for me to consider it in final focus.

Final Focus: You MUST weigh here for me to vote for you. If neither team weighs, I again defer to a less standardized decision process that you want to avoid. If one team gives bad weighing, I prefer that over no weighing. The better your analysis, the more likely I am to vote for you. However, weighing an impact without a link doesn’t work for me - you need to win the link to the impact to weigh it. I need extensions in summary; I think final focuses are summaries with less front lining and more weighing.

Theory: I think most theory arguments are just reasons to drop the argument, not the debater so unless you give reasons to drop the debater, I won’t. I am also not well acquainted with most theory arguments, but I understand the general mechanisms and know at least basic jargon. Make sure I can understand the argument if you want me to vote for it. That said, I am not in any way biased against theory if run well and understandably.

Topicality: This is very important to me. I don’t want to vote for not topical arguments. That said, saying an argument is not topical is not enough - give me reasons why.

K: I am not super good at Ks in the traditional policy and LD sense. If your argument is understandable and well-defended, I have no problem voting for them. Just make them have impacts and good strategies.

Arguments: I am a fan of unique/fun arguments and love to see them. Have a good time in your debates, I'll listen to any argument that is not offensive (i.e. racist, homophobic, or sexist). So if you decide to say cannibalism will prevent human extinction, I will listen.

Evidence: I do not want to be an interventionist judge. That means I will not call for evidence and use it to make a decision, unless a team tells me to. If there is general disagreement on evidence, but I am not told explicitly to read it, I will either defer it to the team that better defends their interp of the evidence or not evaluate it (if neither team defends their interp well). I might ask to see it after making a decision just to give both teams a better understanding of how one judge perceives the evidence, and I might call evidence after making a decision that I don’t believe is true. BUT, if no one calls out a team on evidence, I will not drop the other team for it. If a team calls out another for blatantly lying or misrepresenting evidence (i.e. not reading a “not” in an important line), I will look at the evidence after round. The team that is wrong about the evidence (accusers or defendants) will immediately be dropped and given 25s for speaker points.

Speaker Points:

30- You were perfect

29.5+- Great strategy, fantastic strategic decisions, great weighing

29+- Good Strategy, probably made some good responses, solid weighing

28.5+- Decent Strategy, making good arguments, okay weighing

28.0- Some strategy, arguments were made, no weighing

27.0- Lack of Strategy, conceded some parts of case, no weighing

26.0- no strategic decisions, conceded major parts of case, no weighing

Under 25 is reserved for doing something offensive, being mean, unethical evidence, or not using full speech times.

My last paradigm was way overdue for a rehaul. Here are some things:

1. I'm an Emory student majoring in philosophy and biology. I love transhumanism.

2. I hate theory and will almost never vote on it unless it is actual abuse. I have seen rounds where someone runs theory because the aff didn't say resolved, but when asked in cross fire clarified. Don't run theory in front of my unless necessary.

3. Have a value structure.

4. On balance, I prefer traditional debate + speed. However, I understand for the most part this isn't always the case.

5. Impact yourself.

6. If I say clear more than once, I will probably dock speaker points. Also, if something isn't on my flow, I won't vote for it even if you said it.

7. Don't argue with me about my decision. Ask questions, clarifications, but know that my decision is final and can't be changed.

Finally, I understand this isn't really a paradigm, moreso a preference list. Ask me questions if you can intuit the answer from this. :)

Marist, Atlanta, GA (2015-2019, 2020-Present)
Pace Academy, Atlanta GA (2019-2020)
Stratford Academy, Macon GA (2008-2015)
Michigan State University (2004-2008)

Pronouns- She/Her

Please use email chains. Please add me- abby.schirmer@gmail.com.

Short version- You need to read and defend a plan in front of me. I value clarity (in both a strategic and vocal sense) and strategy. A good strategic aff or neg strat will always win out over something haphazardly put together. Impact your arguments, impact them against your opponents arguments (This is just as true with a critical strategy as it is with a DA, CP, Case Strategy). I like to read evidence during the debate. I usually make decisions pretty quickly. Typically I can see the nexus question of the debate clearly by the 2nr/2ar and when (if) its resolved, its resolved. Don't take it personally.

Long Version:
Case Debate- I like specific case debate. Shows you put in the hard work it takes to research and defeat the aff. I will reward hard work if there is solid Internal link debating. I think case specific disads are also pretty good if well thought out and executed. I like impact turn debates. Cleanly executed ones will usually result in a neg ballot -- messy debates, however, will not.

Disads- Defense and offense should be present, especially in a link turn/impact turn debate. You will only win an impact turn debate if you first have defense against their original disad impacts. I'm willing to vote on defense (at least assign a relatively low probability to a DA in the presence of compelling aff defense). Defense wins championships. Impact calc is important. I think this is a debate that should start early (2ac) and shouldn't end until the debate is over. I don't think the U necessarily controls the direction of the link, but can be persuaded it does if told and explained why that true.

K's- Im better for the K now than i have been in years past. That being said, Im better for security/international relations/neolib based ks than i am for race, gender, psycho, baudrillard etc . I tend to find specific Ks (ie specific to the aff's mechanism/advantages etc) the most appealing. If you're going for a K-- 1) please don't expect me to know weird or specific ultra critical jargon... b/c i probably wont. 2) Cheat- I vote on K tricks all the time (aff don't make me do this). 3) Make the link debate as specific as possible and pull examples straight from the aff's evidence and the debate in general 4) I totally geek out for well explained historical examples that prove your link/impact args. I think getting to weigh the aff is a god given right. Role of the ballot should be a question that gets debated out. What does the ballot mean with in your framework. These debates should NOT be happening in the 2NR/2AR-- they should start as early as possible. I think debates about competing methods are fine. I think floating pics are also fine (unless told otherwise). I think epistemology debates are interesting. K debates need some discussion of an impact-- i do not know what it means to say..."the ZERO POINT OF THE Holocaust." I think having an external impact is also good - turning the case alone, or making their impacts inevitable isn't enough. There also needs to be some articulation of what the alternative does... voting neg doesn't mean that your links go away. I will vote on the perm if its articulated well and if its a reason why plan plus alt would overcome any of the link questions. Link defense needs to accompany these debates.

K affs are fine- you have to have a plan. You should defend that plan. Affs who don't will prob lose to framework. A alot.... and with that we come to:

NonTraditional Teams-
If not defending a plan is your thing, I'm not your judge. I think topical plans are good. I think the aff needs to read a topical plan and defend the action of that topical plan. I don't think using the USFG is an endorsement of its racist, sexist, homophobic or ableist ways. I think affs who debate this way tend to leave zero ground for the negative to engage which defeats the entire point of the activity. I am persuaded by T/Framework in these scenarios. I also think if you've made the good faith effort to engage, then you should be rewarded. These arguments make a little more sense on the negative but I am not compelled by arguments that claim: "you didn't talk about it, so you should lose."

CPs- Defending the SQ is a bold strat. Multiple conditional (or dispo/uncondish) CPs are also fine. Condo is probably good, but i can be persuaded otherwise. Consult away- its arbitrary to hate them in light of the fact that everything else is fine. I lean neg on CP theory. Aff's make sure you perm the CP (and all its planks). Im willing to judge kick the CP for you. If i determine that the CP is not competitive, or that its a worse option - the CP will go away and you'll be left with whatever is left (NBs or Solvency turns etc). This is only true if the AFF says nothing to the contrary. (ie. The aff has to tell me NOT to kick the CP - and win that issue in the debate). I WILL NOT VOTE ON NO NEG FIAT. That argument makes me mad. Of course the neg gets fiat. Don't be absurd.

T- I default to offense/defense type framework, but can be persuaded otherwise. Impact your reasons why I should vote neg. You need to have unique offense on T. K's of T are stupid. I think the aff has to run a topical aff, and K-ing that logic is ridiculous. T isn't racist. RVIs are never ever compelling.... ever.

Theory- I tend to lean neg on theory. Condo- Good. More than two then the aff might have a case to make as to why its bad - i've voted aff on Condo, I've voted neg on condo. Its a debate to be had. Any other theory argument I think is categorically a reason to reject the argument and not the team. I can't figure out a reason why if the aff wins international fiat is bad that means the neg loses - i just think that means the CP goes away.

Remember!!! All of this is just a guide for how you chose your args in round. I will vote on most args if they are argued well and have some sort of an impact. Evidence comparison is also good in my book-- its not done enough and i think its one of the most valuable ways to create an ethos of control with in the debate. Perception is everything, especially if you control the spin of the debate. I will read evidence if i need to-- don't volunteer it and don't give me more than i ask for. I love fun debates, i like people who are nice, i like people who are funny... i will reward you with good points if you are both. Be nice to your partner and your opponents. No need to be a jerk for no reason

I coach at Plano West Senior High School in Texas: LD, Public Forum, Congressional Debate and extemp (and some policy debate).
I have been coaching since 1999.

I can handle speed, if you are clear; if you aren't being clear, I will let you know.

My highest priority is impacts in the round. Having said that, I expect clear warrants that substantiate the impacts.

I like big picture debate, but I will vote on specific arguments if they become a priority in the round.

I'm pretty straightforward. I want debaters to tell me HOW to adjudicate a round, and then tell me WHY, based on the arguments they are winning and the method of adjudication. The HOW part would be something like a standard, or burdens. The WHY part would include the warrants and impacts/link story for the arguments being extended. I am not at all particular about HOW you go about accomplishing those two tasks, but without covering those components, don't expect a W. I need a clear framework, so I like it when some time is spent laying the groundwork at the top of the case. If you don't give me a framework, I will formulate my own.
I'm not a big fan of theory, but if a true abuse exists, I will vote on it. Keep in mind that if your opponent has a unique argument for which you are not prepared, that means you are not prepared, not that abuse exists in the round. I do not expect case disclosure and will not consider arguments that it should exist.

I want to see clash from the negative.

I fundamentally believe that the resolution is a proposition of truth and that if a truth claim is made, the burden falls on the person proving it true. Having said that, I'm totally open to other articulated strategies.

-Flow Judge

-I mostly weigh what is in the final focus, and because of this, tell me what to weigh in the debate in your speech.

-I'll allow a brief amount of defense for the first speaking team, but if it’s in the final focus, it must be in the summary.

-Try to have clean Cross Xs: don't interrupt your opponent too much and try not to get too muddled, or spend the whole time on one question (unless it's crucial to the debate)

-Don’t steal prep

I competed in PF for all 4 years.

The round is in your hands; I will vote for any arg and any style, just convince me. I prefer to vote for the work you put on the flow, not necessarily the best args. I vote for the best debaters. That being said, I'm skeptical of teams using theory in PF.

Defense is sticky. Any evidence/arg in Final Focus must be in a previous speech (not just CX).

Use prep time whenever you're talking with your partner, writing on your flow, typing, or looking at evidence outside speeches.

Talking fast (when necessary) is fine, but I won't be able to flow full-on spreading.

Be nice and have fun :)

Post-Emory thoughts:

Honestly, I think debate is in a relatively good space overall. It's usually this time of year that I find myself pessimistic on a few different tracks, but this year I'm incredibly optimistic. But still, a few thoughts as we're moving into championship season:

1. Concepts of fiat need a revisiting in PF. No one believes it to be real, and the call back for it to be illusory as an answer to offensive arguments is not adequate. The distinguishment between "pre" and "post" fiat is relatively unneeded and undeveloped, most of this is being mistaken for a debate about topicality really. In fact, the pre/post debate is rooted in a weird space that policy resolved or at least moved past in the 90s. If non topical offense is your game, why not explore some wikis of prominent college teams that are making these arguments?
2. I cannot stress this enough, the space of post modern argumentation is confusing for me. I can more easily dissect these arguments when constructives are longer than four minutes, but in PF I especially do not have the ability to ascertain as to what the specific advocacy is or why it's good in a competitive setting. I am an idiot and the most I can really talk about my college metaphysics course is a dumb rhyme about Spinoza and Descartes(literally if you are well read on your subject, this should be ample warning as to what I can work through). That being said, criticisms focused on structures of power or the state specifically I can understand and don't need hand holding. Just not anything to do with the French(French speakers like Fanon do not count).
3. Deep below any feelings I have about specific schools of thought or even behavior in round, I do know that debate as an activity is good. That does not mean I am full force just deciding ballots on ceding the political, but rather I need to hear why alternative methods to approaching the competitive event have distinct advantages. There is a huge gulf between somehow creating a more inclusive space and burning that same space to the ground that no team in PF has even begun to explain how to cross or even conceptually begun to explain why it can be overcome.
4. RVIs != offense on a theory shell. No RVIs being unanswered does not mean the opponent cannot go for turns or a comparative debate on the interp vs the counter interp
5. A competing interpretation does not conceptually create another shell.
6. Teams need to signpost better, I will not read from docs and I truly believe that the practice is making everyone worse at line-by-line debate.

For WKU -

The last policy rounds I was in was around 2015 for context. I do err neg on most theory positions though agent counterplans do phase me. Other than that, the big division when it comes to other arguments I don't really have much of a stance on.

Affs at the end of the day I do believe need to show some semblance of change/beneficial action

Debate is good as a whole

Individual actions I don't think I have jurisdiction to act as judge over.

Who am I?

Assistant Director of Debate, The Blake School MN - 2014 to present

Co-Director, Public Forum Boot Camp(Check our website here) MN - 2021 to present

Assistant Debate Coach, Blaine High School - 2013 to 2014

This year marks my 14th in the activity, which is wild. I end up spending a lot of my time these days thinking not just about how arguments work, but also considering what I want the activity to look like. Personally, I believe that circuit Public Forum is in a transition period much the same that other events have experienced and the position that both judges and coaches play is more important than ever. That being said, I do think both groups need to remember that their years in high school are over now and that their role in the activity, both in and out of round, is as an educator first. If this is anyway controversial to you, I’d kindly ask you to re-examine why you are here.

Yes, this activity is a game, but your behavior and the way in which you participate in it have effects that will outlast your time in it. You should not only treat the people in this activity with the same levels of respect that you would want for yourself, but you should also consider the ways through which you’ve chosen in-round strategies, articulation of those strategies, and how the ways in which you conduct yourself out of round can be thought of as positive or negative. Just because something is easy and might result in competitive success does not make it right.

Prior to the round

Please add my personal email christian.vasquez212@gmail.com and blakedocs@googlegroups.com to the chain. The second one is for organizational purposes and allows me to be able to conduct redos with students and talk about rounds after they happen.

The start time listed on ballots/schedules is when a round should begin, not that everyone should arrive there. I will do my best to arrive prior to that, and I assume competitors will too. Even if I am not there for it, you should feel free to complete the flip and send out an email chain.

The first speaking team should initiate the chain, with the subject line reading some version of “Tournament Name, Round Number - 1st Speaking Team(Aff or Neg) vs 2nd Speaking Team(Aff or neg)” I do not care what you wear(as long as it’s appropriate for school) or if you stand or sit. I have zero qualms about music being played, poetry being read, or non-typical arguments being made.

Non-negotiables

I will be personally timing rounds since plenty of varsity level debaters no longer know how clocks work. There is no grace period, there are no concluding thoughts. When the timer goes off, your speech or question/answer is over. Beyond that, there are a few things I will no longer budge on:

1. You must read from cut cards the first time evidence is introduced into a round. The experiment with paraphrasing in a debate event was an interesting one, but the activity has shown itself to be unable to self-police what is and what is not academically dishonest representations of evidence. Comparisons to the work researchers and professors do in their professional life I think is laughable. Some of the shoddy evidence work I’ve seen be passed off in this activity would have you fired in those contexts, whereas here it will probably get you in late elimination rounds.

2. The inability to produce a piece of evidence when asked for it will end the round immediately. Taking more than thirty seconds to produce the evidence is unacceptable as that shows me you didn’t read from it to begin with.

3. Arguments that are racist, sexist, transphobic, etc. will end the round immediately in an L and as few speaker points as Tab allows me to give out.

4. Questions about what was and wasn’t read in round that are not claims of clipping are signs of a skill issue and won’t hold up rounds. If you want to ask questions outside of cross, run your own prep. A team saying “cut card here” or whatever to mark the docs they’ve sent you is your sign to do so. If you feel personally slighted by the idea that you should flow better and waste less time in the round, please reconsider your approach to preparing for competitions that require you to do so.

5. Defense is not “sticky.” If you want something to count in the round, it needs to be included in your team’s prior speech. The idea that a first speaking team can go “Ah, hah! You forgot about our trap card” in the final focus after not extending it in summary is ridiculous and makes a joke out of the event.

Negotiables

These are not set in stone, and have changed over time. Running contrary to me on these positions isn’t a big issue and I can be persuaded in the context of the round.

Tech vs truth

To me, the activity has weirdly defined what “technical” debate is in a way that I believe undermines the value of the activity. Arguments being true if dropped is only as valid as the original construction of the argument. Am I opposed to big stick impacts? Absolutely not, I think they’re worth engaging in and worth making policy decisions around. But, for example, if you cannot answer questions regarding what is the motivation for conflict, who would originally engage in the escalation ladder, or how the decision to launch a nuclear weapon is conducted, your argument was not valid to begin with. Asking me to close my eyes and just check the box after essentially saying “yadda yadda, nuclear winter” is as ridiculous as doing the opposite after hearing “MAD checks” with no explanation.

Teams I think are being rewarded far too often for reading too many contentions in the constructive that are missing internal links. I am more than just sympathetic to the idea that calling this out amounts to terminal defense at this point. If they haven’t formed a coherent argument to begin with, teams shouldn’t be able to masquerade like they have one.

There isn’t a magical number of contentions that is either good or bad to determine whether this is an issue or not. The benefit of being a faster team is the ability to actually get more full arguments out in the round, but that isn’t an advantage if you’re essentially reading two sentences of a card and calling it good.

Theory

In PF debate only, I default to a position of reasonability. I think the theory debates in this activity, as they’ve been happening, are terribly uninteresting and are mostly binary choices.

Is disclosure good? Yes

Is paraphrasing bad? Yes

Distinctions beyond these I don’t think are particularly valuable. Going for cheapshots on specifics I think is an okay starting position for me to say this is a waste of time and not worth voting for. That being said, I feel like a lot of teams do mis-disclose in PF by just throwing up huge unedited blocks of texts in their open source section. Proper disclosure includes the tags that are in case and at least the first and last three words of a card that you’ve read. To say you open source disclose requires highlighting of the words you have actually read in round.

That being said, answers that amount to whining aren’t great. Teams that have PF theory read against them frequently respond in ways that mostly sound like they’re confused/aghast that someone would question their integrity as debaters and at the end of the day that’s not an argument. Teams should do more to articulate what specific calls to do x y or z actually do for the activity, rather than worrying about what they’re feeling. If your coach requires you to do policy “x” then they should give you reasons to defend policy “x.” If you’re consistently losing to arguments about what norms in the activity should look like, that’s a talk you should have with your coach/program advisor about accepting them or creating better answers.

IVIs

These are hands down the worst thing that PF debate has come up with. If something in round arises to the issue of student safety, then I hope(and maybe this is misplaced) that a judge would intervene prior to a debater saying “do something.” If something is just a dumb argument, or a dumb way to have an argument be developed, then it’s either a theory issue or a competitor needs to get better at making an argument against it.

The idea that these one-off sentences somehow protect students or make the activity more aware of issues is insane. Most things I’ve heard called an IVI are misconstruing what a student has said, are a rules violation that need to be determined by tab, or are just an incomplete argument.

Kritiks

Overall, I’m sympathetic to these arguments made in any event, but I think that the PF version of them so far has left me underwhelmed. I am much better for things like cap, security, fem IR, afro-pess and the like than I am for anything coming from a pomo tradition/understanding. Survival strategies focused on identity issues that require voting one way or the other depending on a student’s identification/orientation I think are bad for debate as a competitive activity.

Kritiks should require some sort of link to either the resolution(since PF doesn’t have plans really), or something the aff has done argumentatively or with their rhetoric. The nonexistence of a link means a team has decided to rant for their speech time, and not included a reason why I should care.

Rejection alternatives are okay(Zizek and others were common when I was in debate for context) but teams reliant on “discourse” and other vague notions should probably strike me. If I do not know what voting for a team does, I am uncomfortable to do so and will actively seek out ways to avoid it.

Educational Background:

Georgia State University (2004-2007) - English Major in Literary Studies; Speech Minor

Augusta University (2010-2011) - Masters in Arts in Teaching

Georgia State University (2015-2016) - Postbaccalaureate work in Philosophy

Revelant Career Experience:

English Teacher/Debate Coach (2011-2015) Grovetown High School

LD Debate Coach (2015-2018) Marist School

English Teacher/Debate Coach (2018-2022) Northview High School

English Teacher/Debate Coach (2022-present) Lassiter High School

Public Forum

Argue well. Don’t be rude. I’ll flow your debate, so make the arguments you need to make.

Policy

I haven't judged a lot of policy debates. I'm more comfortable with a little slower speed since I don't hear a lot of debates on the topic. I'm ok with most any time of argumentation, but I'm less likely to vote on theory arguments than K or Case arguments. Add me to your email chains.

Lincoln Douglas

I appreciate well warranted and strong arguments. Keep those fallacies out of my rounds.

If the negative fails to give me a warranted reason to weigh her value/value criterion above the one offered by the affirmative in the first negative speech, I will adopt the affirmative's FW. Likewise, if the negative offers a warranted reason that goes unaddressed in the AR1, I will adopt the negative FW.

I appreciate when debaters provide voters during the final speeches.

Debaters would probably describe me as leaning "traditional", but I am working to be more comfortable with progressive arguments. However, I'll vote, and have voted, on many types of arguments (Plans, Counterplans, Ks, Aff Ks, and theory if there is legitimate abuse). However, the more progressive the argument and the further away from the topic, the more in depth and slower your explanation needs to be. Don't make any assumptions about what I'm supposed to know.

Debates that don't do any weighing are hard to judge. Be clear about what you think should be on my ballot if you're winning the round.

Speed

If you feel it absolutely necessary to spread, I will do my best to keep up with the caveat that you are responsible for what I miss. I appreciate folks that value delivery. Take that as you will. If you're going to go fast, you can email me your case.

Disclosure

I try to disclose and answer questions if at all possible.

Cross Examination/Crossfire

I'm not a fan of "gotcha" debate. The goal in crossfire shouldn't get your opponent to agree to some tricky idea and then make that the reason that you are winning debates. Crossfire isn't binding. Debaters have the right to clean-up a misstatement made in crossfire/cross ex in their speeches.

Virtual Debate

The expectation is that your cameras remain on for the entirety of the time you are speaking in the debate round. My camera will be on as well. Please add me to the chain.

Axioms

“That which is asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence.” — Christopher Hitchens

”There are three ways to ultimate success: The first way is to be kind. The second way is to be kind. The third way to be kind.” — Mr. Rogers

Contact: jonwaters7@gmail.com

I debated PF all through high school, coached all through college, and am now coaching at Walt Whitman High School in Maryland. My role in the round is to interpret the world you aim to create, and to that end you should tell me explicitly what it is you are trying to do. I stick to the flow as well as I can.

common question answers:

1. Anything that needs to be on the ballot, needs to be in Final Focus, and anything in final needs to be in summary.

2. The first speaking team should be predicting the offense in first summary that needs to be responded to, and putting defense on it then. This ALSO means that the second speaking team has to frontline in the rebuttal. Any arguments/defense that are not in the First Summary are dropped, and any arguments that are not frontlined in the second rebuttal are dropped.

3. Summary to Final Focus consistency is key, especially in terms of the relevance of arguments, if something is going to be a huge deal, it should be so in both speeches. You're better off using your new 3 minute summary to make your link and impact extensions cleaner than you are packing it full of args.

4. I will call for cards that I think are important, and I will throw them out if they are bad or misrepresented, regardless of if they are challenged in the round. sometimes when two arguments are clashing with little to no analysis, this is the only way to settle it.

As a note, I am pretty hard on evidence, especially as sharing docs is becoming more popular. If you are making an argument, and the evidence is explicitly making a different argument, I won't be able to flow your arg.

Speed is fine, but spreading isn't. I'll evaluate critical arguments if they have a solid link, but they have to link to the topic y'all, so they basically have to be a critical disad.

I evaluate theory if it's needed, but I'm really skeptical of how often that is.

Feel free to ask for anything else you need to know.

You should pre-flow before the start time of the round, that will help your speaks!