Judging Obligations and Expectations

Mutually Preferred Judging and Obligations

Mutually preferred judging only works if all available judges are available. The tab staff will do its best to accommodate round requests. The tournament reserves the right to place judges in the best interest of the competitors and may not be able to accommodate every request for rounds off.

Programs are required to supply 3 rounds of preliminary judging for each of their teams competing in the tournament. A limited amount of rounds are available for hire.

Programs that fail to provide judging for required elimination rounds may have their team's preferences deactivated for the remainder of the tournament and/or face fines.

Judges may only place themselves in the elimination round judge pool if they are registered for a minimum of 1 preliminary round.

All judges are obligated for the double-octofinal round. All judges are obligated one round past their program’s elimination from the tournament.

Judges who miss any preliminary or elimination round commitments will cause their program to incur a $75 fine per round missed.

Every judge must have a judge philosophy posted under the “paradigm” section of their Tabroom account. It is the responsibility of every program to ensure their judges have a philosophy posted. If a program’s judge does not have a philosophy posted, that program’s judge preferences will be deactivated for the tournament. We will do our best to inform program directors if their judges do not have judge philosophies, but it is the responsibility of each school to ensure their judges have philosophies posted.

Programs that have not fulfilled their judging obligation will be unable to take part in the mutual preference system. Tabroom will not allow you to fill out a judge preference sheet unless your commitment has been met.

Professional Conduct

Judges and coaches are expected to provide constructive and educational feedback for students. Debates are an extension of the classroom and as such require judges to behave in a professional manner. Our tournament and school administration strongly believe that a safe and friendly learning environment is necessary for students to develop in debate. All judges should work to encourage that environment of belonging.

Judges, debaters, and coaches should refrain from posting inflammatory, derogatory, and negative comments on the Internet about any of the debates they’ve observed or students they’ve judged. Judges who create uncomfortable environments for students due to their comments or are found to be inciting cyber bullying of any competitor may be asked to leave the tournament.

Schools are responsible for their judges. If your judge is removed from the tournament due to inappropriate behavior, that school will be held financially liable for the remaining obligation. The tournament reserves the right to fine judges who are late to their rounds.