CHSAA State Speech and Debate Tournament

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General information

This information is from a tournament in a past season!

This is a High School tournament in Colorado.

View manager contact information

Welcome to the registration site for the CHSAA Colorado Speech and Debate State Championship Tournament!

Many thanks to Rhonda Blanford-Green, Rashaan Davis, Sandra Williamson, and the Colorado High School Activities Association (CHSAA) for their continued support of speech and debate activities in the state of Colorado!

We are excited to invite you and your team to the 2022 CHSAA State Speech and Debate Tournament on March 18-19, 2022 at Cherokee Trail High School.  We are returning to in-person competition this year. On Friday, March 18, Registration/Team Check In will run from 7:30 - 8:20am, followed by a MANDATORY Coaches' Meeting at 8:30am and a MANDATORY Opening Assembly for Competitors at 8:45am. The preliminary schedule draft is posted on SpeechWire, but may be amended as we get entry numbers in from Regionals. A finalized schedule will be sent to coaches in advance of the tournament.

Please review the following information on the CHSAA website Speech & Debate Info page:

• State Tournament Information
• Tournament Events & Their Rules

LOCATION:
Cherokee Trail High School
25901 E Arapahoe Rd.
Aurora, CO 80016

Host Hotel - State Championship at CTHS

• Fairfield Inn & Suites, (Southlands) - Ask for the CHSAA State Speech & Debate Rate when booking. The rate is $109 until rooms are sold out.  303-928-7500

REGISTRATION DEADLINES:
The deadline for all registration materials to be submitted is Thursday, March 10th.   It is much better to get these in earlier in case there is an issue so there is time to address it.  Please do not wait until the last minute. Verify the information for qualifiers in SpeechWire including name spelling and piece information. If a student who qualified through the Regional Qualifying will not compete at the State Tournament, please notify your Regional Director (if you have not already done so). Be sure to enter good contact information and confirm your entries by selecting the small box at the very bottom of the “CHSAA Complete required info and confirm entries” tile.

CONGRESS:
As a participant school at the regional qualifying tournament, you are welcome to register up to two students to compete in the Colorado Student Congress, even if you have qualified no other competitors.  It is not required that these students competed at the regional meet. If a student qualifies for the State Tournament via the Regional Qualifying Tournament and chooses to go in Congressional Debate, please inform the regional director ASAP.  Registering for State in Congressional Debate does not prevent a student from accepting a spot in another event if it becomes available due to movement. Any student interested in serving as a Presiding Officer must indicate this on the State registration form. Students may indicate interest in serving as presiding officer for preliminary sessions only or for preliminary sessions and advancement rounds. Students must run for presiding officer during preliminary sessions in order to be eligible to serve as presiding officer in advancement rounds. The docket will be found under "Files to download" on SpeechWire once it has been set from legislation submissions.

JUDGE REQUIREMENT (NEW IN 2022):
Schools shall be responsible for providing 1 certified judge for every 5 event entries (or portion thereof) and 1 certified judge for every 2 debate entries (or portion thereof) for the CHSAA State Festival Tournament, Regional Qualifying, and the State Tournament. Judges must be entered no later than the registration deadline. 

• Judges must be available from the beginning of the tournament until one round beyond the last round in which competitors from their school compete 
  • ​If necessary, a judge commitment may be shared by one or more people; however, this will only count as one judge toward the number of judges required.
  • EXAMPLE: A speech judge is required to be available for Friday and Saturday rounds. Person A is only available for Friday rounds. Person B is available to judge Saturday rounds. Person A/B counts as one judge toward the judge requirement.
    • EXCEPTION: For a multi-day tournament, judges for any school whose competitors are eliminated following the first day of competition or who does not have competitors entered for the second day of competition will not be expected to return for the second day. If this changes the judge availability marked during registration, the judge must communicate the change in availability with the judges’ table. Failure to update judge availability may result in missed ballot fees.
• Each school must have judges to cover at least 75% of its judging requirement
  • Uncovered judge slots will cost an additional $50 each.
• Once the registration deadline has passed, the tournament director (or their designee) shall determine how many uncovered judge slots are available and an all call will go out to coaches to seek additional judges to fill the uncovered slots.
  • Each additional judge allows the school to subtract $25 from their tournament entry fee.
  • A school can use additional judges to bring their payment to $0; however, additional judges beyond this will not earn a credit (i.e. no money shall be paid to schools for providing additional judges)
• Judges will be paid by CHSAA at the current rate of judge pay ($9/round, $25 bonus for judging 3+ CX and/or waved debate rounds). In addition, the CHSAA structure for reimbursing for mileage and hotels shall be utilized.
  • Mileage and hotel reimbursement will be paid to the party who incurred the expense.
• Judges may not decline an assigned ballot for an event that they are registered to judge.
• Schools will be charged a missed ballot fee of $50 per ballot for ballots missed by judges from their school.
• At the conclusion of the tournament, coaches will be informed of missed ballot fees that will be assessed. Coaches will have 3 days to dispute fees via a google form. Disputed fees will be reviewed by a committee made up of the tournament director(s), judges table chair, speech activities chair and the CHSAA Associate Commissioner who oversees speech and debate.

JUDGE CERTIFICATION PROCESS
For the 2021-22 school year, the judge certification process will remain the same. For Regional Qualifying and the State Championship competitions, judges must pass the certification test and must judge at least one invitational prior to judging at the CHSAA meets. Coaches (head and assistant) are not required to go through the judge certification process since they are required to complete the coach certification process through CHSAA. Former competitors may waive the requirement to judge at an invitational; however, they must still pass the written test.

Please be actively recruiting judges and register those critics with your team’s registration. Remember, all critics must pass the CHSAA test found at https://forms.gle/qtKjFDXWc7DhjFfP8. 

OO/INFO MANUSCRIPTS:
You should find that copies of Original Orations and Informative speeches that you uploaded for your Regional meet have been transferred to the State Tournament.  The student qualified, of course, not the speech so you are welcome to upload a revised version if you choose to do so.  Be sure to include an updated cover sheet as well. If you run into issues, you may submit here: https://forms.gle/AzWZAvGTTxhE1d259 

EXTEMP TOPIC AREAS:
The order of topic areas for the tournament will be drawn at registration on Friday morning and announced for all competitors.

DEBATE RESOLUTIONS:

• CX Debate 2021-2022 Topic:
  • ​Resolved: The United States federal government should substantially increase its protection of water resources in the United States.
• Lincoln Douglas Debate March-April 2022 Topic:
  • Resolved: In a democracy, a free press ought to prioritize objectivity over advocacy.
• Public Forum Debate March 2022 Topic:
  • Resolved: In the United States, the benefits of increasing organic agriculture outweigh the harms.

PAYMENT:
Your payment, including any drop fees, MUST be received by the CHSAA office two weeks after state.
Example: State Tournament begins 3/18/22 – ALL payments are due to CHSAA no later than 4/1/22. All
payments received after 4/1/22 will be billed a late fee of $25.00.
DO NOT submit payments prior to the State Tournament. Print your invoice after the Monday after the state event which will reflect any changes, late fees, drop fees, judge fees, etc.

Stay tuned for further information--we will communicate additional information as we get closer to the tournament via email!

As always, please do not hesitate to reach out with any questions or concerns! We’re looking forward to seeing you at the 2022 CHSAA State Speech & Debate Tournament!

Ashley McCulloch, Director | amcculloch2@cherrycreekschools.org

Bill Brown, Co-Director (4A) | bbrown@wpsdk12.org 

Kevin Brich, Co-Director (5A) | kevin.brich@jeffco.k12.co.us 

Rashaan Davis, CHSAA Activities Commissioner | rdavis@chssa.org

Sandra Williamson, Executive Assistant to Rashaan Davis | swilliamson@chsaa.org 

Manager contact information

Ashley McCulloch
Email address: amcculloch2@cherrycreekschools.org
Phone number: 720-886-1283

Mailing address

Colorado High School Activities Association
14855 E. 2nd Avenue
Aurora , CO 80011