PHILHISTORIAN

Dear Colleagues:
We cordially invite you and your team to attend The Philhistorian Invitational, held on the weekend of March 25th-26th, 2023. This tournament will be held on the NSDA Campus platform.

Started in 1863 the Philhistorian Debating Society is the oldest such group in California. Its past members included numerous judges, educators and politicians and at least one California governor. Originally a mock Congressional activity it morphed in later years into traditional Oxford style debate and helped found the Pacific Forensic League and the Northern California Forensic Association in the 1960's.

EVENTS AND DIVISIONS

HIGH SCHOOL

Debate
For high school debate students, we offer the following divisions: Lincoln-Douglas Debate and Public Forum Debate.
Speech
For high school speech students, we offer synchronous competition in all NSDA Main Speech Events (DI, HI, POI, Info, OO, Extemp) with the following exceptions: Extemp will be one division that will combine International and Domestic topics. We also offer a division of Declamation (also known as OI), and a division of Impromptu Speaking.

MIDDLE SCHOOL

Debate
For middle school debate students, we offer the following divisions: Lincoln-Douglas Debate, Public Forum Debate, and Congressional Debate.
Speech
For middle school students, we offer divisions of Middle School Spontaneous Argument (SPAR) and Middle School Impromptu.
Middle school students are also welcome to enter any of the high school speech divisions.

ELEMENTARY SCHOOL

For your youngest competitors, we have a division of Elementary Impromptu Speaking and a division of Elementary Spontaneous Argument (SPAR)
Elementary school students are also welcome to enter any of the middle school divisions.

LOGISTICS

LOCATION/PLATFORM

This competition will take place online on the NSDA Campus platform.
All competitors must be linked to a Tabroom.com account associated with their school in order to access their competition rooms.
All rounds will be single-flighted in order to reduce screen time for both competitors and judges.

TIME ZONE
Due to our school’s location in California, all times for the tournament will be on Pacific time.

DOUBLE ENTRY LIMITATIONS
STUDENT DOUBLE ENTRY

Students are able to enter in one Debate event and up to 2 Speech events with the following exceptions:
Students who enter Extemp can only do Extemp during the Speech pattern, but may still register for a Debate event.
Elementary school students can double enter in Elementary SPAR and Elementary Impromptu.

JUDGING INFORMATION
JUDGE QUALIFICATIONS AND EXPECTATIONS

All judges are required to have a linked Tabroom account. This is to ensure they have access to both their ballots and the competition rooms on the NSDA Campus platform.
Judges covering high school competitors must be over the age of 18 and have graduated from high school.
Judges for Middle School events may be current high school juniors or seniors with significant forensics experience.
Judges should have significant experience with digital forensics competitions. You are responsible for preparing your judges in the use of Tabroom.com and for what to expect in a digital forensics competition. As a result, there will be no day-of-tournament judge training. Rather we encourage the use of the following resources ahead of the tournament to become prepared:
We encourage all judges to review the NSDA Cultural Competency resources (www.speechanddebate.org/judge-training/) and take the course. If you have newer judges, we strongly recommend the Adjudicating Speech and Debate course available via the NSDA (www.speechanddebate.org/judge-training/).
Finally, we expect all judges to act in a manner that is inclusive, equitable, and offers constructive criticism to the competitors, regardless of their background or experience.
Missed rounds will incur fees as we have to replace those judges with hired judges or school judges beyond their commitment. Missed round fees will be $30 per ballot.

ELIMINATION ROUND OBLIGATIONS

All Debate judges are committed to judge one round beyond when the last student from GSA is eliminated from competition in that division.
This means that if you have 3 PF judges and one of your PF entries advances to the Quarterfinal round, ALL 3 judges are committed to judge the Semifinal round.
All judges are obligated through the first complete elimination round.
For example, if the tournament runs a partial octofinal debate all judges are obligated through the quarterfinal elimination round.
All Speech judges are committed to the Final round, and all Congress judges are committed through the Final round.

EVENT SPECIFIC INFORMATION

PUBLIC FORUM

Topics
We offer both the February NSDA and March NSDA topics in Public Forum debate for both Middle School and High School students. Please pay close attention to the name of the division you have selected when registering your entries.
Coinflip Process
Teams will flip for sides and for speaking order in all rounds. Coinflips will be conducted online via Tabroom.com. Flips will become live one minute after pairing release, and the winning team will have five minutes to choose a side or speaking order. If the time elapses, either team may choose.
Evidence Expectations
In Public Forum, evidence must be made available to view upon request from either an opponent or judge.

LINCOLN-DOUGLAS

Topics
For middle school students, we offer both the Jan/Feb NSDA and Mar/Apr NSDA topics in Lincoln-Douglas debate.
For high school students, we offer the Mar/Apr NSDA topic.
Please pay close attention to the name of the division you have selected when registering your entries.
Coinflip Process
Teams will flip for sides in elimination rounds. Coinflips will be conducted online via Tabroom.com. Flips will become live one minute after pairing release, and the winning entry will have five minutes to choose a side. If the time elapses, either entry may choose.
Evidence Expectations
In Lincoln-Douglas, evidence must be made available to view upon request from either an opponent or judge.
Argument Restrictions
The tournament does not take a position on what types of arguments can be advanced by debaters on either side.

EXTEMP

Extemp prep will start 30 minutes before the extemp round begins.

IMPROMPTU

Topic Distribution
Impromptu topics will be emailed to judges 15 minutes before a round is scheduled to begin.

SPONTANEOUS ARGUMENT (SPAR)

Side Assignments
Spar will be paneled similar to a Speech event with sections of 6 competitors per room.
Odd numbered competitors will be Pro and Even numbered competitors will be Con.
Topic / Resolution Process
Judges will receive topics via email 15 minutes before a round is scheduled to begin. Each competitor will debate one other competitor about one topic. Each pair will be given 3 topics/resolutions by the judge.
The Pro will strike one resolution and then the Con will strike one of the two remaining topics, leaving the pair with one final topic for debate.
Vocabulary and Definitions
Please keep in mind that our competitors are young. Judges may provide definitions of words in the topics.
Format and Procedure
After topic selection, a pair of competitors will have two minutes to prepare their arguments before speaking will commence,
The Pro speaker will give a two-minute constructive speech in favor of the resolution; immediately after that speech, the Con speaker will give a two-minute constructive speech.
Following the constructives, there will be a four-minute open crossfire.
The debaters should question each other, and should be prepared to take at least a few questions from the audience of other competitors. The competitors should ask these questions (i.e. not the judge). Any other SPAR competitors listed to speak in that round are permitted to ask crossfire questions (judges and other spectators are not permitted to ask questions).
Two rebuttal speeches of the Pro followed by the Con complete the round.
There is no preparation time during the debate.
Time LimitsPrep Time 2 minutes
Pro Constructive 2 minutes
Con Constructive 2 minutes
Open Crossfire 4 minutes
Pro Rebuttal 2 minutes
Con Rebuttal 2 minutes
Scoring / Ranking
At the end of the debate, judges will rank the speakers from 1 to 6.
SPAR competitors should be judged on the basis of overall wit, persuasion and quality argument construction.
Procedure for Imbalanced Sections
If there are an odd number of competitors (5), Competitor 1 will debate again on the opposite side against Competitor 5. Please disregard the second performance from Competitor 1 in selecting your rankings, but please include comments and feedback for the second debate.
Example 6 person round:
Competitor 1 will debate Competitor 2. Competitor 1 will be Pro
Competitor 3 will debate Competitor 4. Competitor 3 will be Pro
Competitor 5 will debate Competitor 6. Competitor 5 will be Pro
Example 5 person round:
Competitor 1 will debate Competitor 2. Competitor 1 will be Pro
Competitor 3 will debate Competitor 4. Competitor 3 will be Pro
Competitor 5 will debate Competitor 1. Competitor 5 will be Pro

EQUITY AND DISPUTES
If, at any time during the tournament, there is a concern regarding equity or a dispute regarding a tournament procedure, we are requiring the individuals to fill out a google form so they can be contacted by the Ombudsperson and Equity Officer. The equity form will be located on our tournament tabroom page. The decisions of the Equity Officer / Ombudsperson are final.

PHILHISTORIAN MIDDLE SCHOOL AND HIGH SCHOOL CHAMPIONSHIP

25-26 March 2023 for Debate
26 March 2023 for Speech

Information

Entry Price

Schedule - PST

Drop Fee

Contact Info

Registration Form

STUDENTS IN THE MS/HS COMPETITIVE CLASS ONLY
Scroll below for educational/elementary students

STUDENTS IN THE EDUCATIONAL CLASS ONLY
Scroll up for MS/HS competitive class students
Scroll down for weekend elementary class students

STUDENTS IN THE WEEKEND ELEMENTARY CLASS ONLY
Scroll up for MS/HS competitive or educational class students

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