Prete,+Elizabeth

I debated for three years for Niles West high school and one year at Michigan State University – so the bulk of my debate experience has been very policy-oriented. I’ve judged a decent amount of rounds on the surveillance topic this year. I try my best not to bring any ideas about what I think should be read in a debate round into my decision making. I view debate as an activity to challenge one’s critical thinking and advocacy skills, so do that in whatever way you think is best suited for your situation (granted that it is respectful and not offensive). I won’t tell you to run or not run any particular argument in front of me. That being said I’ll briefly go through some smaller-scale preferences that I have pertaining to certain arguments.

Meta things:
 * 1) 1. Be clear - I don’t want to have to decipher what you are saying and if I’m doing that I’ll probably miss your following arguments. Annunciate tag lines especially. If I can’t understand your answer to an argument I will consider it dropped.
 * 2) 2. Be respectful – debate is a competitive activity but before anything else it is a thought exercise. I encourage assertiveness and confidence in round, but if you are rude I will (first) call you out and (if you don’t relax) largely reduce your speaks.
 * 3) 3. Be logical – a lot of times debaters get wrapped up in the technicality of their debates. While tech is important it shouldn’t come at the expense of doing things like explaining your arguments, pointing out logical flaws in your opponents’ arguments, and telling me how I should evaluate the debate in its entirely. I tend to reward teams that provide consistent, clear, and smart meta-level framing issues – it makes my job 100 times easier. I will not do work for you on an argument even if I am familiar with it – I judge off of my flow exclusively.

Certain arguments: T – I like a good T debate, if both teams compare their interpretations and evidence adequately. The impact level is the most important to me in T debates, and if you don’t do a good job comparing the standards/impacts being gone for in the round, do not be mad if I intervene and weigh them myself. DAs – are essential to a good debate I think. If you don’t start your speeches with impact overviews, however, I will be less inclined to vote for you and more inclined to look at the aff’s impacts first. Ks and Framework – I love kritiks, I went for them a lot in high school. I am probably familiar with your literature, however, I will not weigh your buzzwords more than logical aff arguments against the K’s logic or the 1AC. If you want my ballot, you need to first and foremost TALK ABOUT THE AFF. If you don’t say a word about the aff in the debate I will probably not vote for you. Read specific links to the aff’s representations and impacts, not just to the topic in general. The link debate is crucial – and the aff should recognize if the neg is not doing a specific job of this. Additionally, you need to make turns case arguments. I will not be compelled by a mere floating pik in the 2NR – that’s cheating. Give me analysis about why the aff reifies its own impacts. Absent this, I usually default to weighing the 1AC heavily against the K. Relating to framework, I have a high threshold for interpretations that limit out critiques entirely. I would rather see debaters interact with the substance of the criticism than talk shallowly about fairness and predictability (especially if it is a common argument). A lot of the times, framework debates are lazy. Lastly, K affs: Plan texts are important, unless you have good offensive reasons why you don’t have to read one. Expecting the negative to predict every possible advocacy statement or hypothetical argument the aff can defend is a little ridiculous. This should be a priority for the aff to defend.