Chabot,+Becky

Background: I was a policy debater in high school and also did speech and mock trial. Throughout college, I judged for various high schools in the Omaha area at speech and debate tournaments. I coached speech for a year at Cretin-Derham Hall and am currently an Assistant Speech Coach for Eden Prairie. I'm an Assistant Debate Coach at Wayzata HS.

For the most part, I am a flow judge. If tags and cites aren't clear or if I lose the thread of an argument, it's almost always entirely due to a lack of enunciation and vocal variation on the part of debaters. Talk as fast as possible while remaining understandable is how good debates work. I want a roadmap and signposts Talk to me. I'm especially watching to see that the technical elements of things (DAs, T, etc) are present and responded to by the other team.

I'm a PhD candidate in philosophy and religious studies, so I love Kritiks. I listen to them very carefully, as I'm looking for proper use of the theory as a method to attack an argument. If the theory isn't sound, the Kritik won't hold up. Good Kritiks win rounds; bad Kritiks can cost a team a round. Know the theory and the primary sources for Ks in rounds I'm judging. This also applies to critical affs and other critical theory-based arguments.

In rebuttals, I want both teams to tell me why I should find for their side. I want to know that participants have paid attention to the entirety of the debate and have tracked the arguments they've won or lost. It also helps provides points of feedback, based on how well the rebuttals make a strong case for their side.