Tolstedt,+Andrew

** Experience: ** Policy debater in high school; judge policy debate from 2007-present ** Paradigm **** : ** Whatever is on the flow is how I evaluate the round. Tell me whatsup. Tell me what matters. Tell me stories and control the landscape of the round and explain to me using concise terms how and why you win the round and what the world of the round looks like. At the end of the round make sure I know what I'm voting for. Narrate your position and the round to me. ** Topicality: ** I like T on the neg. There should be abuse in round and a strong standards debate that involves relating the violation, definition, and standards story all together. Reading 20 points on each standard from a block without explaining how it functions in the round gives you no offense on the flow. Explain why I should vote. ** Advantages/Disadvantages: ** Strong link stories are a must. Evaluate the impact scenarios of the round as a whole, **tell me what outweighs and what kind of scale we are using**. Disads are the meat of a debate round. Politics DAs need a reasonable link argument for me. Your evidence has to be pretty good on politics. Generic links can get shot down easy. I like good clash between the stories each team provides. ** Kritiks: ** I will vote for a kritik that you make me understand. If you are reading nonsense and don't understand your authors (or at the very least how what your authors are saying functions in the context of a debate round) you will have a hard time getting my ballot. I have a degree in philosophy and am committed to the world of thought. I know most of the postmodern social theorists who are popular and make sense in a debate round (Foucault, Agamben, Derrida, etc.) Authors like this with practical policy implications belong in the world of debate, while authors like Sartre and Kierkegaard have no function in a debate round. Don't try to bullshit me by using jargon. Clarify what terms mean. Don't be floaty with your language and assume everyone knows what you mean. If there is an alt, explain what the alt is and what my ballot means and most importantly why my ballot means that. I have a slight bias against "reject the aff" alts. You can do better than that. Make sure you explain how the alt solves for the kritik impacts. ** Critical Affs: ** The same as kritiks. You have to have a clear framework and I have to know from the 1AC what my ballot means. As long as you are explaining things clearly I can handle any type of mindset you want to put me in. ** Counterplans: ** I don't like generic PICS. A good counterplan debate with a net benefit and solid solvency claims is great. ** Debate Theory: ** I'll usually default to reasonability over competing interpretations, this is an intuition pump for me. Debate theory should be good analytical arguments. Slow down on theory args. They are difficult to flow. I prefer 5 slow, strong points on theory to 30 fast ones. Avoid just using debate jargon like "competing interps bad because it kills education" and "breadth over depth". You've got to get to the deeper questions at hand if you want any offense on theory, or else I just stop listening. Abuse will get you points here. ** Delivery style: ** Be loud. Differentiate between tags, author and year, and the body of the card. There should be a clear rhythm in your delivery. Overviews should be slower. Line by lines should be precise. I like to hear “Off the 2ac number one, they say X, this is why they're wrong, etc”. Tell me what matters most on the flow, where and why you are winning on the line by line, why the link stories are important, why the impacts matter. Be polite in round. Strength and kindness can happen together. If you get vicious enough for me to have to speak up you are in trouble. This game is about mind, not power and submission. Respect your partner too. Don't step on cross x. ** Paperless Debate: ** I don't time the flash. But this is a privilege not a right. As soon as you tell me to stop prep, your partner's gotta shut their machine and put their pen down while you use your flash drive to get the speech to your opponent. Don't try to sneak prep. ** Jargon: ** Don't assume that I know every disad and goofy K that's being run and the names you call them. Especially on theory points there are tons of abbreviations that not everyone knows.
 * School Affiliation: ** None

I like a good strategical debate, but I also like clash on individual warrants of cards and the stories the evidence tells. Good clash on the flow and good clash on card vs. card. Good link debates and impact stories. Tell stories. Don't be afraid to call for cards if they are mis-tagged or if you want me to compare the scenarios in the evidence, but you have to tell me in round where to look and what I should be considering in the evidence.

** Explain what matters. ** ** Explain why it matters. ** ** Tell me how your team does what matters better than the other team. ** ** Tell me this in the manner of what happens when I sign the ballot. ** ** Debate is a story. Frameworks and links and impacts and are plot points. **