SpeechWire Tournament Services - Forensics Tournament Software

PUMPKIN PALOOZA
Varsity Speech/Debate Tournament
1 NOVEMBER 2025

___________________________________________________________________

IMPORTANT UPDATES (20 OCT 2025)

1. Adjusted schedule -- We needed to make IE Finals 1.5 hours due to having 6 contestants. We have adjusted the remaining debate rounds and awards back slightly.

2. We will still make an attempt to direct power Round 5 of debate. However, if people would prefer to just get home earlier, we can delay power based on Rds 1-3.

IMPORTANT UPDATES (14 OCT 2025)

1. DEBATE TOPICS - By a vote of interested coaches, it was decided to use the SEP/OCT LD/PF TOPICS at our tourney!

2. Entry Request Process is detailed below (apparently, I did not copy/[paste that from previous invites).

___________________________________________________________________

ENTRY PROCESS (Requests/Waitlists/Registration) --

Priority Deadline - THU, 23 Oct 2025.
Registration will not close until Friday afternoon/evening on 31 Oct 2025. You will be able to add, drop, and change entries at will up until around 3 pm on 31 October 2025. After that, you will no longer be able to ADD entries. You will still be able to drop and make changes for Saturday morning. It is better if YOU make the changes directly into SW instead of clogging up my email with all the changes. Plus, you then know exactly what you have and there is no confusion.

ALL ENTRIES ARE INITIALLY WAITLISTED!

We know this is not normal using SW. However, if you think about how we used to do registration way back in the day.... we would manually have to decide how many schools to accept and how many entries. In essence, all our entries were waitlisted until initial confirmation. So, we just use this practice with SW, and it works very well for us. So don't panic when you see that all of your initial entry requests have been thrown to the waitlist! It just means I have to approve them, as I normally would if you sent the request via email or paper. If you ever want to double check on some entries that remain on the waitlist, please just reach out! We do try to give every school all their entries, but sometimes that means getting some help in finding an extra judge or two. So, if you want some extra priority in getting all your entries (especially if you are wanting to bring a lot), go ahead and enter a judge or two on your entry request.

Drop Dates/Fees

Instead of making you financially obligated for entries at a specific cutoff date (many schools use the Monday or Tuesday before a tourney), we put that into SW and give you some additional flexbility. We know things happen. However, just like everyone else, we base hospitality, awards, rooms, etc., on an approximated total number of entries. Dropping at the last minute does cause inconveniences. Therefore, the following Drop Dates/Fees are in place. Please note that Drop Fees are NOT in addtional to entry fees. Instead, they replace the entry fee. So, if you drop an entry on 28 October, instead of paying $8 for that entry, you only owe me $4. A drop on Saturday morning is $10 (not $18).

Drops after 11:59 pm on 27 Oct = $4.

Drops after 11:59 pm on 30 Oct = $8 (same as the entry fee)

Drops after 11:59 pm on 31 Oct = $10

NOTE ABOUT ADDS - Added entry requests do NOT carry an extra fee. However, if you add an entry on 27 October, and then you need to drop it on 29 October (that actually happens quite a bit), then yes, you would pay the $4 for the drop.

___________________________________________________________________

TOURNAMENT SCHEDULE

NOTES:
IE competitors should be IN THEIR ROOMS READY WHEN THE ROUND BEGINS. Judges will start at the top of the list of codes and continue till finished. Any performer who, at no fault of the tourney, does not make it to their round with sufficient time to perform, will receive the last rank in that round.
Debate competitors more than 10 minutes late to a round, at no fault of the tourney, will forfeit that round.
Judges will not wait on competitors. They will leave the room when the round is scheduled to end.
Extempers should preference extemp. We will try to get them to draw first in each round if double entered, but they must notify the extemp draw coordinators ahead of time.
COMPETITORS SHOULD DOUBLE-CHECK SCHEDULES TO ENSURE THEY HAVE ARRIVED AT THE CORRECT ROOM FOR THEIR EVENTS.

SATURDAY, 1 NOVEMBER 2025
Please do not arrive before 7:00 AM. The building will not be open.

7:00-7:30 AM REGISTRATION (Room 2301 or right outside)
7:30 AM ROLL CALL FOR EXTEMP (entries not present will not draw Rd 1)
7:40 AM Draw - Extemp Rd 1
8:00-9:00 AM IE Round 1
9:10-10:10 AM IE Round 2
10:20-11:20 AM IE Round 3
11:30 AM-12:30 PM Debate Round 1
12:30-1:00 PM LUNCH BREAK
1:00-2:00 PM Debate Round 2
2:00-3:00 PM Debate Round 3
3:10 PM Draw - Extemp Finals
3:30-5:00 PM IE Round FINALS
5:10-6:10 PM Debate Round 4
5:40-6:10 PM DINNER BREAK
6:40-7:40 PM (or ASAP) Debate Round 5*
8:15 PM (or ASAP) AWARDS

* attempt will be made to direct power Rd 5

CONGRESS SCHEDULE
8:00-9:30 AM Prelim Session 1
9:45-11:15 AM Prelim Session 2
3:15-4:30 PM SUPERSESSION – (attempt to take top 12-16 competitors)

GENERAL TOURNAMENT NOTES:

HOSPITALITY is in the Lecture Hall. This is in the center of campus, in the PAC hallway. It’s 2305 on the map, if you can actually make sense of the map. 🙂

Tab is in 2301. Good luck finding it! It's a small room. We always welcome your visit to Tab Room, but we appreciate your willingness to give our students space/time to do their work.

Ballots will be sorted and kept for you in 2202, which is on the opposite side of Tab.

Extemp Draws are in the South Gym.

There will be a Concession Stand. We plan on taking cash and hopefully cashapp/card.

SUPER IMPORTANT NOTES FOR COACHES AND STUDENTS

Please make sure you have the correct names entered in SpeechWire. We will publish names on schedules, and we will announce names at Awards. If you are worried we might butcher someone’s name, please get with me or the Tab Coordinator (Evie Latman), so that we can work through pronunciations.

IF you have CONGRESS, please note that prelim sessions are a full 1.5 hours. This is good practice for Districts. Who wants to be PO? Someone who can manage a chamber session for a full 1.5 hours! I like a good, clean, respectful congress.

IF you have EXTEMP, please make sure you and your students understand that round times are only one hour. It is imperative that extempers draw on time and perform on time. If we have an issue, we’ll work on it. If the student is a no-show, we can’t help that.

FOR COMPETITORS - DURING THE TOURNAMENT:

Competitors should not enter rooms until the adult judge is there. This is standard practice.

DO NOT TOUCH/WRITE ON THE SMARTBOARDS. Please direct students to use a whiteboard space to sign-in to the round. I know this is standard practice, but it’s always a good reminder to not mess with expensive equipment.

DO NOT TOUCH/USE TEACHER DESK AREAS, INCLUDING THE TEACHER’S CHAIR! THIS IS FOR COMPETITORS AS WELL AS JUDGES.

Students should not roam the halls or “get lost” on our campus. If not directly involved in a competition, students should remain in the cafeteria, the learning stairs, or one of the large open spaces. Just have them be conscientious of the fact that the large open areas have classrooms attached to them, and those classrooms are being used for competition. Please have your students not lounge in the library. It’s an open space, and one we are not planning on using.

ARRIVAL INFORMATION:

Drop off at the Main Office doors and/or Cafeteria Doors on the west side of campus. These will be the only sets of exterior doors open during the tourney.

The building will not open until around 7:00 am. If you get here earlier than that, you may have to wait to get in.

SPECIFIC EVENTS PROCEDURES

Extemp Procedures
Draw will start by 7:40 AM on Saturday morning.
Students should prefer extemp over another event, if double-entered.
We will not move draws for students who miss their draw (no-show when called). Your time is your time. Use it how you wish.

Congress Information
We will use the OCTOBER 2025 NSDA Congress Docket for our tourney.
The chamber will elect a PO. Or, in the absence of interest in a PO, I can randomly assign a PO based on allocation into chambers.
Students will decide the Agenda for each session.
Prelim Sessions are 1.5 hours for a reason. PO’s should engage their chambers in active discussion, so there will be no reason to end early.
If there are competitors who have not given a speech by the end of Prelim Session 1, the PO should do everything possible to positively involve those individuals during Prelim Session 2.
Our judges will be instructed to immediately shut down all attempts to suspend the rules or otherwise modify the chamber or procedures that do not satisfy the intent of Congressional Debate as defined by the NSDA.
If students have questions about anything during the session, they should be willing to ask questions! Points of Order and Clarification exist for a reason. Use Point of Personal Privilege to be allowed to leave the chamber session for any reason.

Prose/Poetry
Students may choose to perform EITHER a Prose piece OR a Poetry program. It must be the same piece/genre the entire tournament.
MSHSAA rules are followed for this event: 8 minutes maximum time limit.

Storytelling
MSHSAA guidelines are followed for this event: 8 minutes maximum time limit.
Students must be in the chair the entire time of the performance except for the introduction.

LD/PF Debate
***We will be using the SEP/OCT 2025 Topics/Resolutions. All other NSDA/MSHSAA rules apply.

AWARDS AND FUN STUFF

IE Preliminary Rounds are all randomly preset. If there’s a way to power-match the third prelim round, I would love to be able to do it. But I’m not sure if it’s possible.

Advancing to Finals - IE’s
Ranks, Reciprocals, Quality Points
Head-to-Head match?
Chocolate Cake

Congress - advancement to finals uses the above, but within the set Prelim Chamber.

Placing in IE’s (including Congress)
We plan to award the TOP 6 in each IE.
Ranks, Judge’s Preference
There shouldn’t be a need for anything else, but Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups will suffice.

Debate Power-Matching
Rounds 1 and 2 are preset randomly.
Round 3 is delay powered against Round 1.
Round 4 is direct powered against Rounds 1-3.
Round 5 is delay powered against Rounds 1-3. Attempt to direct power Rd 5?

Placing in Debate
We plan to award the TOP 8 in each Debate Event.
W/L Record, Opp Loss, Opposition Record
Speaker Points (not to be confused with speaker ranks)
If needed…
Opp-Opp Record
Opp-Opp Speaker Points
Snickers, especially the ice cream variation.

SWEEPSTAKES
Top THREE schools will be awarded.
How does a school earn sweeps points? (TENTATIVE - depends on SW???)
Top 20 entries are counted
Top 2 entries in any event are counted.
Win a Debate, or Rank 1-2 in IE Prelims = 5 points
Get Ranked 1-4 in Congress Prelims, 5 points.
Placements: 1st place = 15 points, then downward from there.

If you have questions or want all the specifics, I can try to print or just show you the situational sweepstakes points allotments.