Middle School Divisions
This year, we are excited to offer several events specifically for our middle school students! These include Declamation, Interpretation, Oratory, Congress, Lincoln-Douglas Debate, and Public Forum Debate. While the running of these events will ultimately depend upon interest and numbers from registration, we hope to offer all of these events for our youngest members of the league. If divisions have to be collapsed, every attempt will be made to keep middle school students competing against other middle school or novice high school students. Please ensure that you complete registration correctly, signing up high school students for high school events and middle school students for middle school events. If there are any questions, please contact me directly at kburke@rtnj.org.
Food:
We will be offering an option to pre-order lunches. Coaches will be able to complete this order during registration. More information will come out closer to the event. Packaged snacks will be sold and food will be provided for judges.
Water Bottles:
This year, we will not be selling disposable bottles of water. In an effort by the league to be more green, we will instead be selling reusable bottles. These bottles will have the league’s logo on them, and we will be offering the exciting opportunity for students to purchase stickers marking the Randolph Fall Classic to decorate their new bottles with. There are a multitude of water fountains and bubblers located around the schools for students to refill reusable bottles with.
Parliamentary Debate:
In this event, teams of 2 students compete in a more parliamentary-style debate. To find out more, please check out the NYPDL’s informational literature on the event either online or in our provided materials. This style uses impromptu motions only, meaning that no outside preparation is allowed or required. Teams will be given 15 minutes to prep. Because of the ease of understanding of this event, we will be using the PF judge pool for this event, though other judges may be asked to help out if necessary.
All Public Forum judges are eligible to judge Parliamentary Debate, therefore, please train your judges accordingly.
World Schools Debate:
World Schools Debate is a unique and dynamic form of debate, unlike any other practiced in the United States. This combined “prepared” topics with “impromptu” topics, encouraging debaters to focus on specific issues rather than debate theory or procedural arguments. This highly interactive style of debate allows debaters to engage each other, even during speeches. We will be allowing schools to enter three-person teams (rather than the traditional five) in this new event. For more information, please visit the NSDA website located here, or copy and paste this link in your browser: https://www.speechanddebate.org/how-to-judge-world-schools-debate/.
E-Ballots for All Events:
We will continue our use of e-ballots this year. Once again, we need you, the coaches and moderators, to ensure clear communication to your judges about this. Please ask ALL judges, both speech and debate, to ensure that they have access to a device that they can complete their ballots on, as well as any necessary equipment (i.e., chargers). We recommend using a laptop or computer, rather than a phone or iPad. E-ballots are incredibly easy and intuitive – they have been used to great effect at many local and national tournaments. We will again train any new judges on the process the morning-of. We would again like to stress that all events will be using e-ballots this year.
