Ward,+Kevin

I'm affiliated with Cathedral Prep, located in Erie, PA. I debated at that high school for four years, from 2007-2011. As a fair warning I'm a first year out of high school and have a small amount of experience compared to other coaches and college debaters. Currently I'm an assistant coach for Cathedral Prep. I travel with them to about 4-5 tournaments a year.

In general as long as you explain your arguments in a comprehensible manner, I'll be okay with them. I won't let any personal biases prevent me from signing my ballot for you as long as you actually win the arguments you're going for. That essentially means that you can read whatever you want in front of me.

Specifically,

Topicality Is okay, I don't have any preference in terms of competing interps and reasonability. As long as you provide well thought out arguments I'll buy it. You need to go a little more in depth than the generic one line every 2AC block in the country has for reasonability if you want me to actually vote on it.

Theory I tend to think most arguments are perfectly legitimate unless the team gives me a good reason to why they aren't, I try to remove as much personal bias as possible so that the debate is a clean slate and the debaters set the guidelines for what is and isn't abusive. If the negative chooses to do something extremely abusive I won't punish them for it unless the affirmative wins the theory debate. Also establish some sort of interpretation as a clear guideline for the debate; for example if the negative reads three condo counterplans and your interpretation is that they should only get two, you better have a well thought argument out for why that avoids your offense.

Kritiks I'm familiar with most common kritiks, but lack knowledge in the super post-modern sections. If you plan on going for Lacan in front of me you're going to have to explain it fairly well. Establish a CLEAR framework for how your kritik operates. Explain how it interacts with the world of the affirmative.

Counterplans In my book any counterplan is legit until proven guilty (see theory). Solvency advocates are always a plus but not necessary. I'll listen to any ridiculous counterplan you can come up with, but just be ready to defend it theoretically.

Disads Read them if you can. Better if they're case specific, but I have nothing against generics. I get excited for really tricky impact debates. Just make sure you do some impact calc so I don't have to at the end of the round.

As a final note, even though I do try to remove as much personal bias as possible from judging, I can't help the fact that it's just more interesting for me to hear a really good in depth DA/case debate than it is to listen to a K debate. I also really really love impact turns for some reason (the more ridiculous the better).