Judging Requirements

Teams should bring one judge for every 3 LDers or PF teams, every 2 Policy
teams, and every 5 Speech entries, rounded up in the case of fractional
obligations. Teams with Congress competitors must bring 1 Congress judge. You
may not cover VLD entries with JV-only judges. Congress judges may be swapped
into the Speech pool by Tab; Qualified Speech judges may also be asked to judge
Congress. Judges in all divisions are obligated to stay and judge one round
past any round in which their students are active. We will assume judges are
staying past their obligation unless we hear otherwise; let us know if you are
leaving.

Judges in Varsity LD should be strongly qualified to judge Lincoln Douglas.
There are a variety of approaches to LD, so we ask Varsity judges in LD to
provide paradigms; schools may enter them in our online registration, or judges
may email us at yale@tabroom.com. Please email or enter paradigms even if they
are posted elsewhere. Paradigms will be made available on our website as we
receive them. Each school with Varsity LDers will have five judge strikes.
Strikes are by school; students may not strike judges individually.

Bringing a qualified pool of judges to Yale can be an epic hassle, and we want
to ensure both the quality and quantity of our judging pool. The online system
will explicitly ask you to request judge hires. Please request early; when our
pool is exhausted, we will turn requests down. You may add judges to the
tournament at any time, but judges dropped after registration is frozen, even
if you have dropped students to compensate, will incur a hefty fee. We¿ll also
be asking for judge cell numbers on registration, if you have them. Please
collect as many as you can from your judges. Yale’s campus is sprawling; being
able to contact judges quickly & directly helps us stay on time.

Schools whose judges fail to appear for an assigned round will be fined $25 for
a prelim or $50 for an elim. Judges who are fined may work off the fine by
judging rounds beyond their assignment. However, competitors from any school
with outstanding fines will not advance to eliminations, nor may the school
pick up awards or ballots. Speech or Congress hired judges cost $60.00 per
entry they cover (If you have 12 entries and 2 judges, your hired judge costs
$120). LD and PF hires cost $95.00 per covered entry. Policy debate hires
cost $125.00 per covered entry. Partial fees apply for your judges who are
only available for part of the tournament. If you can bring extra judges,
we’ll credit your registration fees. Please email us first: don’t assume you
can do this without contacting us.

Fees

• Lincoln-Douglas debate: $70 per entry
• Duo Interpretation: $50 per team
• All other speech events: $45 per entry
• Student Congress: $50 per entry
• Public Forum debate: $70 per team
• Policy Debate: $70 per team

Unreported Drops

Some schools in the past have not reported all their drops to the tournament; this harms our ability to panel rounds for good competition. Schools with unreported drops will be assessed a fee of $50 per drop. Please notify Tab immediately if a student falls ill or withdraws from competition during the tournament. We’ll panic otherwise, and probably be very angry at you if we find out you knew about it. The safety of the students demands nothing less.

Ballots and Awards

Fabulous awards will be given to all competitors reaching elimination rounds. Also, sweepstakes trophies will be awarded to schools based on team performance. Please pick them up during the awards ceremony, or arrange to have someone else do so on your behalf. We do not mail trophies, nor do we release ballot packets until awards under any circumstances. If you anticipate leaving early, bring a self-addressed, stamped envelope of sufficient size and postage to mail your ballots, label it with your school name, and deliver it to main tab in LC. We will put your ballots into the envelope and send it along after the tournament.

Adult Supervision & Independent Entries

All students must be accompanied by their parent or legal guardian, or a
school-approved guardian. All registrants must provide a name and phone number
for an adult contact responsible for their students in their online
registration.

Safety

The tab room phone number is (617) 981-2754. Please make all your students and
judges aware of this number, so they can contact Tab. This number is for
on-site issues only, and will not be answered except during the tournament.
The policy of the Yale Tournament concerning consumption of alcoholic beverages
by minors, illegal use of controlled substances, vandalism, and destructive,
and other illegal or disorderly behavior shall be: (1) to disqualify involved
contestants from further competition, (2) to communicate the offending incident
to the contestants’ on-site guardians and/or parents, (3) to require financial
reimbursement for all damages or liabilities caused directly or indirectly by
the incident, (4) to notify the local legal authorities. The precise remedy or
remedies selected will remain at the discretion of the tournament staff.
Every student must be accompanied to the tournament by an adult empowered by
the student¿s school and/or parent to care for that student in the event of a
medical or other emergency. The contact information for this adult must be
given to the Tab Room on registration. The Yale Tournament can take no
responsibility for the health and safety of students beyond notifying this
accompanying adult of concerns or problems as we become aware of them.