I am a former high school/college debate participant in policy and extemporaneous speaking. I also coached debate at the high school level back when evidence and speeches were on paper and I am currently an assistant high school coach.

Policy

Arguments should be balanced with evidence and logic. Speak clearly and road map for me. I prefer impacts or benefits to be quantifiable but I’m flexible if strong enough arguments are made.

Individual Events

Speech competitors will see a higher ranking if they are articulate and tell me why their topic is important. A strong conclusion is a must for a top ranking. Higher rankings for memorized speeches.

LD

I will judge the round based on persuasiveness of arguments. Strong connection of value to criterion is a must.

PF

Persuasiveness and ability to demonstrate an understanding of arguments is key. Please clash. Clarify voters.

I am a lay judge but I have judged before. I appreciate slow, logical debating with good warrant comparison. Please do not run theory or Ks and explain your arguments clearly in your summary and final focus and signpost clearly. Please define important acronyms that the average person would not know. And please be polite to each other and have fun!

VLD

I am a lay traditional judge - I understand the basics of traditional LD (value/criterion and contentions, and advantages) but I will not understand your spreading.

Please be tolerant and respectful. I will not tolerate any discriminatory/hate/disrespectful speech.

General notes: My job is to pick out a winner and a loser, a first place and a not-so-first place. Not everyone gets to win. You are all beautiful, worthwhile humans. If I, who am also a human, do not pick you as the winner, don't take it personally. Take my opinions with a grain of salt, see if my feedback has anything in common with what other judges have brought up, and move on. Fussing about your results with me will only justify my decision more; you have come to debate your opponents, not the judge. I wonder if the reason why so many coaches have a hard time finding volunteer judges could be because some students don't get these basic realities? HMMM... :)

Event-specific paradigms

Policy: Know that while I have a great deal of experience in judging this event as a debate coach, and while I respect the original premise on which Policy Debate was created, I am largely disappointed with the culture of Policy Debate, and hope that you'll do the courtesy of making it a healthy event for this round. Don't expect me to allow you to flash or email-chain any files with the other team, or with me. If you cannot coherently communicate your argument in the time that is allotted without lapsing into the epileptic fits of high-pitched squeaking and gasping that are so irresponsibly passed off as authentic debate, you may expect me to weigh your wanton abuse of the debate round into my decision. Fitting an overabundance of contentions into your constructive cases simply to set your opponent up later to be unable to sufficiently answer them all is not demonstrative of you being the better debater; it simply tells me that winning means more to you than authentic debate. Additionally, simply reading cards without contributing your own critical analysis does not convince me that you are the better debater, but only demonstrates you possess the linguistic skills of a parrot.

I promise you that it is possible to have a Policy Debate round where you can be intelligible to your judge and to your opponents. Speech rates in excess of 300 words per minute, while they may be the norm in Policy Debate as it currently stands, are beyond disappointing.

Hopefully I have by this point established that I am a judge who values substance over form. I will be judging the whole of your arguments, and while I will refrain from allowing my own personal biases or my own "rebuttals" from influencing the decision for the round, I will rely on the logical arguments provided to me throughout the round to decide the case. Do not think of your debate case as a series of bullets that, if your opponent misses one bullet (contention), that your entire case falls through. Think of your cases rather as structures of logical argumentation--where you craft the logic of your argument to be able to withstand any attack, whilst exploiting the architectural flaws in your opponents' case.

A note on theory or K cases, whether they be on the AFF or NEG: These are totally valid strategies for winning the round, if used non-abusively. Too often I have seen teams walk into the round knowing they will run a racist K when they know next to nothing about the background of their opponents or their opponents' case. If you decide to run a theory or K argument, expect a great deal of scrutiny on my part to ensure you are not abusing the educational value of the round.

Finally, you would be well advised to avoid ad hominem or any other violations of the NSDA Honor code. Failing to live up to these expectations in round will help me make a very easy case as to why you should lose. Do not be abusive in the construction of your case; avoid these and other inane imbecilities of sacrificing decorum to appear more "aggressive," and please just focus on the essence of the debate itself instead of purposefully trying to emotionally manipulate your opponents into making mistakes. I am here to judge a debate round, not witness a toddler's sandbox brawl.

Public Forum: This event was originally created by the NSDA in response to the complaints made that Policy and LD had both become corrupted with a nonsensical gamification that prioritized form over substance. Public Forum was created with the intent to avoid those problems. Therefore, expect me to have a very dim view on spewing. The only other place spewing is even slightly practical outside the speech and debate world is rattling off the warnings and disclaimers at the end of radio ads about cars or pills, or if you are planning on being an auctioneer. Seeing as there's a reasonable chance that is not a common career goal for PF debaters, don't expect me to judge you favorably if you ignore the warning to avoid spewing.

In any debate round, I aim to take a wholistic approach to the overall logical strength of both sides. Don't count on being able to abuse the round by fitting in seven different contentions into your case and then expect me to reward you for not having the other team be able to sufficiently answer each of your contentions. And the logical strength of your argument is not served by simply reading cards. I expect critical analysis and discussion of your evidence. And while your case should be backed up by evidence, not every compelling argument need be made with a card. If one of your cards can be cleanly refuted with responsible logic, I will dismiss that card, regardless of the authority of the source. The logical fallacy of ad auctoritate is not a viable approach to a true victory in the debate.

Finally, you would be well advised to avoid ad hominem or any other violations of the NSDA Honor code. Failing to live up to these expectations in round will help me make a very easy case as to why you should lose. Do not be abusive in the construction of your case; avoid these and other inane imbecilities of sacrificing decorum to appear more "aggressive," and please just focus on the essence of the debate itself instead of purposefully trying to emotionally manipulate your opponents into making mistakes. I am here to judge a debate round, not witness a toddler's sandbox brawl.

Lincoln-Douglas: This event was instituted by the NSDA in response to complaints that Policy Debate had devolved from its original purpose of a healthy debate where the logical substance of both arguments would clash together in a serious discussion of significant issues. Lincoln-Douglas, unfortunately, has not been immune to the corrupting effects of the cancerous influence of the meta-game of Policy Debate, and I expect the debaters I judge to responsibly debate without manifesting the immoral foibles typical of Policy Debate. In other words, don't spew.

If you choose to present a case that varies from the traditional argumentation format of Lincoln-Douglas, you are free to do so inasmuch your "creativity" is not abusive to the educational value of the round and do not put your opponents in a position where they could not have reasonably anticipated to be able to have to counter every outlandish argument their opponents could make.

I place high value on the logical substance of both sides of the debate. While evidence-based cases are an obvious necessity, your opponents' rebuttals need not always have a "card" to counter one of your own, inasmuch as the opponent in question is able to point out any serious logical flaws that may be present in the card you present. Remember to defend the strength of your value and criterion.

Finally, you would be well advised to avoid ad hominem or any other violations of the NSDA Honor code. Failing to live up to these expectations in round will help me make a very easy case as to why you should lose. Do not be abusive in the construction of your case; avoid these and other inane imbecilities of sacrificing decorum to appear more "aggressive," and please just focus on the essence of the debate itself instead of purposefully trying to emotionally manipulate your opponents into making mistakes. I am here to judge a debate round, not witness a toddler's sandbox brawl.

Congress: Chairs, please be sure to be fair in whom you allow to speak and when, and follow priority. Speakers, I will judge you based on the logical strength of your argumentation, your ability to successfully address attacks against your argumentation, and your speaking performance (construction of the speech, audience engagement, etc).

Finally, you would be well advised to avoid ad hominem or any other violations of the NSDA Honor code. Failing to live up to these expectations in round will help me make a very easy case as to why you should lose. Do not be abusive in the construction of your speeches; avoid these and other inane imbecilities of sacrificing decorum to appear more "aggressive," and please just focus on the essence of the discussion of the house itself instead of purposefully trying to emotionally manipulate your opponents into making mistakes. I am here to judge a speech/debate round, not witness a toddler's sandbox brawl.

Impromptu, OO :I will judge you according to these three criteria:

1) Relevance. Did you address a subject in a way that I can easily see why I or the audience should care about what you are talking about?

2) Uniqueness. Was what you said in your performance something I have probably heard 20 times about already? Or was it a sob story that (while admittedly it may be sad and tragic, and you have my condolences) was calculated to exclude other students who haven't had their "sob story" happen yet?

3) Call to change. How successfully do you persuade the audience that we should live or think or feel differently about something in supporting the main thesis of your speech?

Extemp: I will judge according to these three criteria:

1) Topicality. Did you answer the prompt you chose completely and fully?

2) Evidence. Was your speech evidence-based as opposed to "Here's some generic facts I can tease out abut this issue?" Was your evidence cited?

3) Analysis. Did you make an effort to add your own unique insight and commentary on the topic, and was this commentary/analysis logical?

Interp Events: I will judge you according to these criteria:

1) Characterization. To what degree can I believe that you are your characters, and not a teenage student from a team other than my own whom I hardly know?

2) Emotive Technique. Strong acting choices, incorporation of the narrative arc, believable and text-based emotive variety.

3) Vocal Technique. Are the voices for the different characters separate and distinct, quality of diction/enunciation, and appropriate vocal variety.