Judging Competitive Debating - Part 2 - The process of judging

This is part of my series of introductory articles, which explain the basics of competitive debating and follows on from "Judging competitive debating - Part 1 - A general framework."

Note taking 

Not massively relevant, but I couldn't resist.
- Creative Commons, Photopin. 

The first thing to say is that while you are watching a debate you should take notes of what the speakers are saying so you can refer back to them later, and to make comments to yourself (e.g. “good structure”, “have they responded to previous speaker?”).

Notes should be concise and clear as possible as you’ll have to refer to them quickly during adjudication. You don’t need to write down literally everything a speaker says (and given how fast they often speak that may be impossible) but you should try to include the important points of analysis and engagement.

The standard way to do this is to take a sheet of A4 paper and fold it in half or quarters, with each speaker in the appropriate place. Multiple colours of pen can help for distinguishing speakers, comments and POIs, and it can be useful to highlight important bits. I tend to use blue and black for the different teams (so will write a blue POI in a black speech) and red pen for comments.

Recently I’ve started taking notes on a laptop because my handwriting is terrible and slow (dyspraxia yay). This is fairly unusual but seems to be becoming more common (and I think may be more common in the US). I’ve made templates for judging which I use, which divide the page in quarters, one plain and one in colour (if they are cut off on the side of the screen switch to "web view" rather than "print view"). I then add comments, POIs, etc using bold, italics and underlining.

However amazing your memory is you really need to take good notes, as you should be able to supply evidence for your conclusions during the discussion, without notes everything tends to blur together, and you will be more likely to confuse what particular speakers said.

You should hang on to your notes after a debate so that if speakers ask you for personal feedback between rounds, or at the social in the evening. Though as a general rule I’d say not to share your notes with speakers as they should contain your unfiltered opinions on a debate, and you may self censor if you think people will read them.


Judging discussion

After the debate has finished and all the speakers have been herded out the room, the judges will have about 15 minutes to discuss the debate, come to a call and assign speaker points. This discussion will be moderated and structured by the chair, generally the most experienced judge on the panel. Given that time is tight, and if judging runs over the whole tournament can be delayed (resulting in rage and violence from the conveners, and getting food/drink late) you should try and present your opinion of the debate in a clear and concise way and focus on relevant parts of the debate.

Attending a Debating Competition

This is a followup to my previous article "What do you need to bring to a debating competition?" and part of a series of introductory articles.

First you have to find the venue. This is most likely a large generic university building and should be listed on the facebook event. Google maps and a knowledge of astronomy may be helpful for this stage.

A generic university building

When you arrive you will be need to register. There will likely be a stressed looking person at the entrance or in the main hall with a laptop. This is simply a matter of telling them your individual and team names,  and various other details such as: 

• Second language status - Some competitions have separate tabs and/or finals for speakers for whom English isn't their first language, to take into account the extra level of difficulty this causes.
• Novice status - Similar to the above, generally defined as anyone in their first year of university debating who has not broken at any tournament. 
• Clashes - This is particularly important if you are judging but may also be important for teams. So you list institutions or people you would be uncomfortable judging or being judged by, or that someone might reasonably expect you to be biased about. (E.g. institutions you have attended, former or present romantic partners, people you have spoken with, etc.)
• Dietary requirements - If they are providing food (E.g. vegetarian, religious, allergies, etc.)
• Payment -  There is normally a "reg fee" that covers the cost of running the competition, any food provided, etc. Different institutions have different rules on whether they cover it, if they provide subsidies etc. so ask at yours and ensure you know in advance what the competition will cost you.  Reg fees are usually paid in cash although bank transfer and check can be options. If you need to be reimbursed from a University or Union, it is useful to ask for a receipt.