MYDT Judges Training:

Review presentation here

Tips for Judges

Things to Remember When Judging:

* Leave Your Opinions At The Door! The only facts known in the debate are what the teams bring forth. It is not the job of a 13 year old to change a judge’s lifelong belief.

* Don’t Fill In For Speakers. Judges should not “fill in” what they believe a speaker was going to say, should have said, or probably meant. What speakers say is what the speakers said, and that’s all there is.

* Proposition Teams May Reasonably “Shrink” A Topic. But defining a topic is restricted to defining words in the topic within reasonable limits, such as a “child” being defined as between the ages of 8 and 16, rather than a “child” being defined as a juvenile cactus clinging to the nether regions of the Arabian peninsula.

* Take Thorough Notes On Your Flowsheet. This will help you decide the debate and set a good example for the students.

Assigning Speaker Points

You will have to assign points to all students in the debate. These points are a measure of individual performance in the debate. We suggest you use the following scale:

30: Almost no one should get a 30. A perfect score should happen every few years with a really brilliant speech.

28-29: Brilliant.

26-27: Strong, well above average.

25: Above average

23-24: Modest success as a debater

Points below 23 should be reserved for people who are both unsuccessful as debaters and are also obnoxious and mean-spirited.

Points should never drop below a 20, even if a debater was particularly bad. Lower points frequently exclude a debate team from elimination rounds, so if you give points below 20, you are saying that a debater has no chance of rehabilitation in any other debates.