Nats 23 Edits (for Policy)

• Once you start stacking offs, it's super important that you have enough command of your evidence to refer to cards by author name or another specific identifier (ie "the impact card in the X Disad). I can't keep track of where "the card that talks about Russia and China" is.
• I'll only vote on T if you justified the credibility of your interpretation. Your interp evidence can't just be a situation where a word or phrase was used in a different context because then there's no actual reason to vote for it (except for blatant topicality violations).
• This is a reiteration from my original paradigm, but statements like "our first advantage solves for the impacts in the DA" mean nothing to me unless you tell me why. Just a little lip service is enough, but I can't put that connection together myself because I would have to come to my own conclusions about the relationships between the evidence, which is a form of judge intervention.

Hello! I am a former LDer turned high school Coach turned Professor of public speaking. I'm more than a couple years out from my high school years at this point, but I've stayed active in the community. I competed on the local, state, and national circuit, and especially enjoyed the more technical debates because it was much easier to strategize and predict what the judge's decision would ultimately be based on the events of the round.

As a debate judge, I also take this more technical approach. Simply being a strong orator is not enough if you are not saying anything of substance and interacting with your opponent's case. I make my judgments based on what was said in the round. Nothing more, nothing less. I listen for argument interaction, explicit signposting and extensions, weighing of impacts, and so on. No ships passing in the night! Extending a conceded argument means nothing if you don't tell me why it matters. You have to tell me why your impact outweighs your opponent's, not just that it does. I might be able to make those assumptions on my own, but it holds no weight in the round unless you say it out loud! Give me voting issues. In a good debate, your final rebuttal speech should essentially write my decision for me.

I've heard all kinds of arguments and styles, I've used all kinds of arguments and styles, and I'm open to all kinds of arguments and styles (within a reasonable standard of human decency). As long as you can support and clearly state your main idea, I should be able to understand your goal in your speech/case.

For LD in particular, remember that it is a values-based debate. Nothing makes me more sad than a total disconnect between the framework and the contentions, followed by a complete abandonment of the values debate once the rebuttals begin. The values set the framing for the rest of the debate, and a strong grasp of the philosophical aspect of the debate will really make you stand out in my book. This doesn't apply to debates based on a framework of net benefits.

When time runs out, finish your sentence. My ONLY pet peeve as a judge is students calling out "that's time!" when their opponent runs out of time for their speech. I know the speech times, so do you, so does your opponent, and so do the other judges. Please be courteous and let them just wrap up their last sentence.

Don't give much weight to what my face looks like. As someone with ADHD, "active listening" looks much different for me. Rather than looking at you while nodding and smiling, I will likely be focused mainly on taking notes on my flow. It is really important to me that I judge a round fairly, and so I put most of my energy toward keeping track of what is said in round. I get distracted easily when I look you directly in the face (because faces move a lot!), so if you see me staring at the ground or at the wall behind you with a blank expression, don't be alarmed! I'm just listening very intently.

My infatuation with the speech and debate community is eternal, and I love to see students get better, grow, improve, and become more confident. Also, one of my best/worst traits is a need to be as thorough as possible. This means you will likely see tons of feedback/comments from me suggesting ways to improve. This is NOT an indicator of poor performance, even if there are many more comments on areas of improvement than on what you did well. I just try to use my experience in my position as a judge to be as helpful and thorough as I possibly can. However, a lot of the feedback I give is largely based on my personal speech/debate style and my coaching style, and so feel free to accept or reject these comments as they apply to you.

I'm happy you're here, and I'm happy to be here too! Feel free to ask any other questions you may have

I'm very simple. I debated in the NFL to a quad ruby in LD/HI 20+ years ago. I like clear and concise information that pushes arguments along. I don't need to be told the same thing twice.

I have a lifetime experience of debating in real life settings. As a research scientist for 40 years, I had numerous debates with my colleagues at the lab and during national and international meetings on the validity of data, on the rigor of conclusions, on the logical controversies of the studies. These debates were very intelligent and based on literature citation and solid evidence. On the other side, I was also involved in the real politics of the late Soviet Union before I came to USA. A year before the Soviet Union disintegrated I have been elected to the local council running against a communist contender. Political arguments during council meetings were extremely heated and required a snap judgment. With this experience I consider myself to be qualified to judge Lincoln-Douglas debates.

In my judging I place more value on the actual arguments presented by both sides, but also note if responses are incomplete or out of line with questions asked. On the other hand, I consider the overall delivery style to be very important as well. I know very well that if the speech is too fast and monotonous, it may work in the formal environment of the student competition, but will fail in real life. This works against the main aim of the Speech and Debate club, namely, to prepare students for the real life.

I haven't judge any of the policy debates yet.

I've judged LD and PFD earlier and had been a debater myself in a different format.

I'm open to the various formats and delivery of speeches. Content matters more to me, the speaker has to maintain dignity about other speaker, any type of Abuse to any person, religion or culture is absolutely unacceptable.

I understand lay the most but larp is also fine.

I prefer speech delivery at a rate which has words clear to understand. Fast pace is ok, as long as words are clear.