State District Two:  State Qualifying Procedures

2011-2012 Season

Please Note the participation rule from the WSFA for the 2011-12 season: In order to be eligible to compete at the State Tournament in an event (Debate/Speech/Congress) your school MUST have competed at least twice in that event BY THE END OF DECEMBER and must notify the District chair of their competition after that first tournament. Failure to do so will result in that school being ineligible for the WSFA State Tournaments in March.

Welcome to District Two.  We look forward to an outstanding year culminating with success in March. Students can qualify for the state debate and IE tournaments in two ways.  They can qualify through their performances at meets throughout the year, or, when needed, they can qualify through the District Two State Qualifying Tournament at the end of February (site and date TBA).  The following are our state qualifying meets.

STATE QUALIFYING MEETS (IEs):

ALL OFFICIAL, WSFA-SANCTIONED MEETS ARE DISTRICT 2 QUALIFIERS AT THE FIRST % AWARD OR FIRST AWARDED BREAK, PROVIDED THAT THEY MEET THE NUMERICAL MINIMUMS BELOW.

STATE QUALIFYING MEETS (Debate):

Note:  To be a state qualifying meet, each must meet state minimums of 12 schools competing at the meet and 8 total entries in the event’s highest division.  Students only qualify at the highest division offered (senior, open, or champ).

WEEKLY UPDATES:   The District website www.emeraldcityspeech.org will be updated after each tournament.  If you have a qualifier, you have three weeks after the last day of the tournament to notify the chair via email. Late and last-minute qualification notifications are invalid.  Please say the student’s name, and exactly how he/she qualified.  (Example:  “Mary McGillicuddy has provisionally qualified for state in Oratory by finishing second at Federal Way.”)  

Email address: Joel Underwood (Seattle Academy): junderwood@seattleacademy.org

District Two has a specific number of allotted slots in each event for state.  There are three possibilities we could face at the end of our final regular season qualifying meet.  One is that we have the perfect number qualified, for which we would be sincerely thankful.  More likely, however, is that we will have qualified too many or too few for state.  In these situations, the District Two State Qualifying Meet will likely be necessary.

IE State Qualifying Meet Procedures: 

TOO MANY:  If there are too many qualifiers, we will first automatically award bids to any students who have qualified at more than one meet in order of the total number of bids received.  Among the remainder, we will have a meet to pare down to the allotted number of state competitors.  Potential qualifiers will be judged at least three times and speak at least twice.  Lowest rank (or ranks) get the qualifying spots.  Ties in IEs will be broken by considering speaker points, judges’ preference, and a playoff (in that order). 

NOT ENOUGH:  If there are not enough qualifiers, all students who have met state qualifying standards will automatically be admitted to state.  If needed, we will have a meet to fill the remaining slots. Potential qualifiers will be judged at least three times and speak at least twice.  Lowest rank (or ranks) get the qualifying spots.  Ties in IEs will be broken by considering speaker points, judges’ preference, and a playoff (in that order).  

Debate State Qualifying Meet Procedures:

TOO MANY:  If there are too many qualifiers, we will first automatically award bids to any students who have qualified at more than one meet in order of the total number of bids received.  Among the remainder, we will have a meet to pare down to the allotted number of state competitors, wherein slots will be filled on the final order of rank at that tournament. Ties will be broken as per the NFL manual.

NOT ENOUGH:  If there are not enough qualifiers, we may need competitive rounds to fill the remaining slots, wherein slots will be filled on the final order of rank at that tournament. Ties will be broken as per the NFL manual.

            Prerequisites to compete at the District Two State Qualifying Meet:

--Any student who has been a semifinalist or finalist at any meet in its highest division is eligible to compete in state quals.

--Any student who has competed in an event at three or more meets at the highest division is eligible to compete in state quals in that event.

Please note the WIAA rule that no school can have more than 2 State entries in any one form of WIAA-sanctioned debate (CX or LD) nor can they have  more than 3 entries total in both forms combined.

Congressional Debate Qualifying Procedures:

I. Allocation:
   WSFA/WIAA allocates a number of available slots for each year. 
   Additionally, no one school may qualify more than 4 students to the State Congress tournament (per WIAA state rules).

The following tournaments are District 2 Congress qualifiers (if they have Super Congress)

Whitman

WDC

Auburn-Riverside

UPS

Federal Way

Newport

Eastside Catholic

Note: In order to be a qualifying Congress, there must be at least 20 students total in the

highest chamber offered. Bids are only awarded out of the highest chamber offered (no bids awarded out of a “novice” designated chamber).
 

II. A series of team prerequisites must be satisfied before a qualifying slot may be awarded:
1) The team must have paid their 2011-12 WSFA Dues and be in good standing with the WIAA and WSFA.
2) The team must have attended (not just entered - attended) and participated in at least 2 WSFA sanctioned Congress contests before Dec 15, 2011.  To count as "attending and participating", at least one student from the school must attend all the prescribed sessions until eliminated from the tournament, or until the tournament concludes.  Different students may have attended the two different tournaments (it doesn't have to be the same student at both).  Only one student needs to enter each tournament to qualify.
3) The team needs to ensure that the Activities/Athletics Director at their school checks the box marked "Congress" on their activities participation form (NOTE: this box is separate from the boxes for Forensics or Debate - which should also be checked if the team participates in IE's or LD/CX respectively).

III. Once the team prerequisites are satisfied, individual team members may accept bids awarded according to the following rules:

a) Tournaments hosting Congressional Debate may only count toward state qualifying IF they hold a Final session (also called "Super Congress").  Congress tournaments that hold only Prelim sessions do not qualify.

b) Tournaments will be classified as "Large" or "Small" entry tournaments based on the number of Open Division entries in the preliminary sessions.  Even if a tournament chooses to collapse Open and Novice, only the students entered as Open Division will count toward the classification of a tournament.  For this season, Large entry is defined as any tournament with more than 30 entries.  Small entry is any tournament with 30 or fewer entries.

c) Students reaching the Finals (Super Congress) earn bid points according to the following schedule:
- For Large entry tournaments
   - 3 points for placing 1st, 2nd, or 3rd, OR for being awarded "Top Presiding Officer".
   - 2 points for placing 4th, 5th, or 6th.
   - 1 point for reaching the Super Congress
- For Small entry tournaments
   - 2 points for placing 1st, 2nd, or 3rd, OR for being awarded "Top Presiding Officer"
   - 1 point for placing 4th, 5th, or 6th.
- In one season, no student may collect more than 6 points in Large entry tournaments.
- In one season, no student may collect more than 6 points in Small entry tournaments.

d) The students participating in Congressional Debate during the 2011-12 season will be ranked based on the number of bid points accumulated during the year.  The students with the largest number of bid points will advance to State based on the number of slots and subject to the limit of 4 entries per school at the State Congressional Debate tournament.

e) In the event of a tie, the ranking will be set according to the following hierarchy:
   - First tie break:  Head-to-head record at tournaments during the season with the others tied.
   - Second tie break:  Total number of points earned during the season (irrespective of the caps for Large/Small entry tournaments)
   - Third tie break:  Number of PO awards earned during the season at all tournaments.
 

f) In the extremely rare event that the three tiebreakers are not sufficient to resolve the tie, the coaches of the students tied will arrange a suitable contest to determine who advances to State.  This could take the form of a speech
contest involving 3 minute floor speeches on the topics in the State packet, judged by a panel of neutral 3rd parties, or any other suitable method as agreed upon by the coaches involved  in the tie.


 

Please do not hesitate to contact Joel with any questions you may have.  Thank you, and have a great season.