Judge Philosophies
April Griffin - Cerritos College
Bobby Lebeda - CSUN
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Brianna Broady - CSUN
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Calvin Abbasi - CSUN
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Chris Loeffler - IVC
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Eric Garcia - IVC
Ilknur Erbas-White - IVC
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Jen Page - IVC
Joann Chen - IVC
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Jodi Titus - IVC
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John Kephart - CSUN
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Kelly Kehoe - IVC
Nichole Barta - IVC
Nick Matthews - IVC
<p>~~Nick Matthews<br /> Irvine Valley College<br /> PSCFA Parli Philosophy</p> <p>Ten things to know when I am judging you:</p> <p>1. You must speak at a conversational speed in front of me because I have a significant hearing impairment. Any rate of speed that is faster than conversational destroys my ability to accurately understand your arguments and impedes my ability to do my job.</p> <p>2. I am not a fan of fact and value rounds. I think they are much more difficult to judge, and they are largely subsumed by policy debate anyway. As such, I don’t mind if you extrapolate policy cases from fact, value, or metaphor topics (within reason, of course).</p> <p>3. My default evaluation method in policy rounds is to compare a topical plan to the world of the status quo or a competitive counterplan or alternative. As a competitor, I specialized in straight-up strategies: disads, counterplans, procedurals, and case. These are also the debates I am most competent at judging. Don’t let me stop you from arguing what you are most comfortable with, but my understanding of straight-up debate is a lot stronger than my understanding of critical debate.</p> <p>4. I reward big-picture storytelling, intuitive arguments, impact comparison, and strategic decision-making.</p> <p>5. I rarely vote for arguments I don’t understand.</p> <p>6. I am biased against arguments that rely on faulty factual premises. I may vote for such arguments from time to time, but even minimal responses will likely defeat them.</p> <p>7. My biggest pet peeve is when you whine instead of making an argument:</p> <p>Whining: “Their implementation is vague and they don’t explain it! They don’t solve!” (Waaah!)<br /> Argument: “Three reasons why their implementation of the plan undermines solvency. First…”</p> <p>8. You should take at least one question from the other team in each constructive.</p> <p>9. The affirmative team must read either a plan or an advocacy/thesis statement with a clearly defined text. The text should be written down for the opponent.</p> <p>10. I don’t care if you stand or sit or if you prompt your partner a few times. You do not need to call points of order; I will protect against new rebuttal arguments for you.</p> <p><br /> NPTE-level debaters: my national circuit philosophy is located at https://docs.google.com/document/d/1RV69pX3KyMwkkotPQ5whfUSH91D5ba027xgvj2Ig04M/edit?usp=sharing</p>
Robert Loy - CSUN
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Skip Rutledge - PLNU
<h1>Skip Rutledge Point Loma Nazarene University</h1> <p>25 +/- years judging debate 14+ years judging NPDA Parliamentary</p> <p>6 +/- years as a competitor in policy debate (college and high school)</p> <p> </p> <p><strong>Academic Debate Background:</strong> Competed 6 years +/- in team policy in High School and College (NDT at Claremont). Then coached and judged at the high school level for a number of years as a part time volunteer. Returned to academia and have coached since 1989 in CEDA, we switched to Parli in about 1995. In addition to coaching teams and judging at tournaments I have been active in NPDA and helped at Parli Summer Workshops to keep fresh and abreast of new ideas. I have also tried to contribute conference papers and a few journal articles on debate. I love well reasoned and supported theory arguments where debaters are aware of the foundational issues and prior research on topic.</p> <p> </p> <p><strong>Judging Paradigm:</strong> For lack of a better term, I embrace what I know of as the Argumentation Critic paradigm, but certainly not to the exclusion of appreciating strong delivery skills. I encourage fewer, well-developed arguments with clear claims, reasonable warrants, and strong evidentiary support to back up those warrants, rather than the shotgun method of throwing lots of claims out, hoping something slips through the others’ defense. That probably makes me more of a big picture critic, rather than one that gets fixated on the minutia. I do recognize too, that big pictures can be defined by small brushstrokes, or that details can count heavily in proving big arguments. I don’t hold Parli case/plans to the same level of proof that I might in CEDA/NDT since they are constructed in 15 minutes without direct access to deep research, so spec arguments are not very compelling in many cases. Disadvantages, solvency arguments, or counter-plans share the same burden of proof that the government does. Impacts are very important, but the establishing the links are critical.</p> <p>Debaters should be well read in current events, philosophy and especially political philosophy. Poorly constructed arguments and/or blatant misstatements will not prevail just because someone happens to not respond to them. While I attempt to minimize intervention, claims like “200 million Americans a year are dying of AIDS” does not become true just because it might be dropped (taken from an actual round). I think your word is your bond. If you say it with conviction, you are attesting that it is true. If you are not quite certain, it is preferable to frame a claim in that manner. The prohibition on reading evidence in a round is not carte blanche to make up whatever unsubstantiated claims you think may advance your arguments.</p> <p>I enjoy case clash, smart arguments, exposing logical fallacies, using humor, etc. . . I dislike rudeness, overly quick delivery, or presenting counter warrants rather than engaging case straight up. I will try to make the decision based the content of the arguments and also rely on delivery for determining speaker points. It is not uncommon for me to give low point wins. </p> <p>I also think it is the debaters’ job to debate the resolution, not my own views on styles of debate I prefer to hear. If a resolution has strong value implications, please debate it as such. Likewise if there is a strong policy slant, debate it as such. Additionally, I do not feel that there is only one way to debate. I will not try to implement unwritten rules such as the Government must argue for a change in the status quo. They certainly should if the resolution requires it, but may not have to if it does not. I think the resolution is key to the debate. This does not negate Kritiks. It invites sound logic and framing of Kritiks and alternatives.</p> <p>I do have some a priori biases. I believe the resolution is what is being debated. That has implications on counter plans. My a priori bias is that they should not be topical and should be competitive. Just because the negative team finds another, perhaps even “better way” than the affirmative chose, to prove the resolution is true, does not seem to me to automatically warrant a negative ballot. I am though open to good theory debates, You should first know my beginning basis of understanding on this issue. And although I enjoyed debating in NDT and CEDA, I think the speed of delivery in that format was built around the need to read evidence and specific research to back up the claims and warrants. The absence of such evidence reading in NPDA should invite more considerate and slower argument analysis, not provide opportunities to shotgun out many more, less developed arguments. I believe the reason for not allowing researched evidence briefs to be read in this particular format of debate was to encourage public focused debate, which implies a slower rate of delivery and genuine consideration of case. The gamey technique of negatives throwing out lots of flak, or obfuscating issues to throw off governments time use, only to collapse to a few key arguments, does not seem to advance strong argumentation development, a fair testing of the resolution, or solid speaking skills..</p>
Susie Virzi - IVC
William Neesen - IVC
<h2>Bill Neesen - California State University-Long Beach</h2> <h3>Saved Philosophy:</h3> <p> </p> <p>Bill Neesen<br /> Cal. State Long Beach & Irvine Valley College<br /> <br /> Parli Debates judged this year: 40+<br /> Non-Parli Debates judged this year: Policy 10+<br /> Years Judging Debate: 15<br /> Years Competed in Debate: 7<br /> What School Competed at: Millard South/ OCC/CSU- Fullerton<br /> <br /> Making Decisions: 'My decision is based solely on how the debaters argue I should decide; I avoid using my own decision-making philosophy as much as possible. It is your round. choose how you want it to happen and then defend it.'<br /> <br /> Decision-making Approach: 'I really don t like any of the above. It is up to you and you can do whatever you want. I decide who wins based on what you say in the round. So it is up to you. '<br /> <br /> Assessing Arguments: 'I am addicted to my flow but drops only become important if you tell me they were droped and why that makes them important.'<br /> <br /> Presentational Aspects: 'Speed is ok I would be amazed if you went faster than I can flow but if your not clear that might happen. I hate offensive rhetoric and if it gets bad so will your speaks. That is the one place I get to imput what I think and I love that.'<br /> <br /> Strong Viewpoints: 'No I see debate as a game. I have defended some pretty scarry shit. So I would not punish you for doing it but you better be able to defend it.'<br /> <br /> Cases, DAs, CPs, Ks, T, etc.: 'I like all of what is listed. My advice is to make some arguments and then defend them. I really don t care what they are.'<br /> <br /> Other Items to Note: 'I might have a higher threshold on T and similar args. I have also been told that I am a K hack even though I never ran them and was a CP debator. '</p> <p> </p> <p><br /> </p>