The toolkit has two versions of e-ballot instructions. One is a generic
pdf, the other is a doc file, if people want to include their own wifi
information. As the VCA knows, I’m a perfectly strong proponent of e-balloting,
but I tend to see the flaws in the system. I know those flaws will go away, but
they haven’t yet. Lots of high schools don’t have the infrastructure to handle
a tournament, with hundreds of people not only logged in but streaming music
and videos and all sorts of things like that. Wifi will just get better over
time, and system admins will stop making general use more difficult than cracking the
Enigma encryptions, and we’ll be there, but we’re not there yet. At colleges,
where my reluctance is more noticeable, we’re closer, but we still need an army
of enforcers to get people to do simple things like starting rounds when the
rounds actually start, and not sitting around waiting an hour when a judge
doesn’t show up and stuff like that. Yes, e-ballots work, but not without
enforcers. Give me that enforcing army, and I’m on it like bedbugs on an
EconoLodge mattress.
Thanks to the non-school groups who have laid down the
gauntlet of endless shenanigans, plus the Right to Debate independents who show
up all alone just begging to be taken away in a gurney so their parents can sue
the crap out of you, tournament directors need to control who gets into their
tournaments and who doesn’t. Thank God the NSDA has issued membership guidelines
that can be applied to this. Anyhow, there is a document in the toolkit on
managing entries, which recommends a waitlist at almost every tournament, and
explains how best to run it. In addition to blocking bad actors, a director needs balanced divisions. If 60%
of the teams in a division are all from one school, that’s not a tournament,
that’s an intramural scrimmage that they could have stayed home and done for
free. All of that good stuff is in there, to make sure that it all ends up as a
good event for the paying customers.
One thing I haven’t written up, but which I’ll be discussing
in my presentation, is the use of limited judge obligations, which I (almost)
categorically oppose in high school tournaments. Limited judge obligations
boils down to fewer judges. If 100 judges show up at your tournament and they
are fully obligated, you have 100 judges to choose from in a pairing. If 100
judges show up at your tournament and they have half obligations, you have 50
judges to choose from in a pairing. It’s as simple as that. If you want great
MJP assignments, the more judges the better. If you limit the number of judges,
you weaken the MJP assignments. End of story. (My parenthetical "almost" up above
was in reference to tournaments that have more judges than they know what to do with; while
this is rare, it does happen, and obligations can be limited.) At the same time
as I believe in full obligations, I also believe in giving people a round or
two off. Everyone likes a break, so it’s a good idea to give it to them.
Anyhow, my guess is that this will be among the most controversial parts of my
presentation, as limited obligations are becoming the fashion, and everyone who
wants to play with the big kids thinks that they ought to do it. I probably can’t
stop them. But everyone in the debate universe needs to know that the less
judges are obligated, the worse preferences are going to get. The math is
unavoidable. Even I can do it.
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