Northwest Indiana District Speech Invitation

 

Dear Northwest Indiana Coaches, 

 

Your team is invited to attend the Northwest Indiana District Speech Competition to be held at Laporte High School Saturday March 7th, 2026. Address: 602 F St, La Porte, IN 46350. Note: All Times listed are central.

 

Registration: Entries due on Speechwire by Monday March 2nd by 8:00 p.m Central

 

Reminder: Your school account needs to be paid up to compete, so do not generate invoices you can't pay before the district tournament. Students must be members of the NSDA in order to compete (25 points and paid membership). 

 

Events: Humor, Drama, Duo, Info, OO, POI, IX, and USX. 

 

Qualifiers: As a Level 2 District, we will qualify the top two in each event. 

 

Judges: 1 judge per 3 entries or fraction thereof. First 2 judges can be associated with your school, all others must be neutral. Important Note 2026: Teams who do not meet their judging quota will be charged with a $50 fee per missing judge. This will cover the cost that the district must pay to hire the required neutrals to effectively run this tournament. 

 

Please make your judges aware of the tournament time commitment and that they are available for the extent of the tournament. 

 

Also, to qualify as a neutral judge, judges must not be able to recognize a competitor or be able to identify which team they are a part of because of inside knowledge of your team. In other words, it's not just that they are "unbiased" but they are able to judge without associating a competitor with a particular team/coach or do not have an affiliation that is associated with a particular team or coach. Coaches are expected to adhere to the NSDA code of honor when labeling judges as neutral/clean. 

 

Schedule: Extemp prep is scheduled to begin at 8 a.m. Central with all of round 1 starting at 8:30 a.m. Our hope is we can single-flight the tournament, meaning there will be 3-4 rounds, though we may need to flight if teams do not meet their quotas. If your team is able to provide extra judges, specifically neutral ones, that would be greatly appreciated.

 

Three prelims/ Semi-Final (only needed for those events with more than 14 entries)/ Finals.

 

Entry Fee: $5 per competitor (so Duo is $10). Checks payable to Northwest Indiana District. If they need to be mailed, they can be sent to c/o Jeremy Starkweather 56100 Bittersweet Rd, Mishawaka, IN 46545

 

We look forward to seeing you at the tournament and please email me with any questions!

 

-Jeremy Starkweather