Canadian University Society for Intercollegiate Debate
General Meeting
Saturday March 15 and Sunday March 16, 2003
Dalhousie University
VP Central, 2002-2003
Written Report
Emma Lowman
Recap of Events
First Term
For those outside of the Central Region, the following tournaments occurred from September to December, 2002. Novice at Western went off in typical fine fashion. Hart House and Queens were also great successes. World Prep was again hosted by Ottawa, and again was the only British Parliamentary style tournament in Central Canada. This was followed up by the Central Championship at Carlton University. A special congratulations should be given to Rory McKeowen, who upon winning the Leger Cup, completed the hat trick of Regional, National and North American Championship titles.
Second Term
So far, the Central Tournaments this term have been fantastic. McGill Winter Carnival was, as expected, a fantastic time. The break rounds were all wildly entertaining, the parties were smashing, and the overall quality and organization top notch. McGill, as always, deserves great thanks and applause for their efforts. Western was an excellent event with a very high level of competition; despite what many think, a sixteen team tournament can be a fantastic time, as Western was. It was also a great chance to get to know fellow debaters. Some people seemed dismissive of the fact that there were few teams present; I personally felt, and others who were there agreed, that it was a good counterpoint to Winter Carnival, a nice low stress experience that still yielded great debate. York Pro-Am was again an interesting and educational tournament, and it seems that the novices really appreciated the experience (I certainly did). The Break rounds were excellent and proved very informative and entertaining for everyone watching (including proud parents of debaters). French Nationals took place at the beginning of this month, and by all accounts was an excellent and anglo-friendly affair. Thanks to RMC for all their work making the only French language tournament in Central Region a success.
Initiatives Undertaken:
Judging
I would like to thank all the club presidents and CUSID Central members for their comments to date on this issue. It is my hope that with continued dialogue on possible changes to judging can continue. If I have learned anything in the past four months, it is that there appears to be, in the Central region, a consensus that judging is a problem area and needs to be addressed.
Some problems, concerns and ideas that have been raised thus far include standardized scoring ranges, consensus judging, bias in judging (favouritism towards certain schools or people based on reputation, or bias against certain schools for various reasons) and establishing a deeper judging pool for all schools and tournaments. Right now, I still see judging as a problem area for CUSID and believe that it both can and should be improved. I would like to hear your thoughts on this and based on what I get back, we can decide how to proceed and tackle this issue.
As you are all surely aware, there have been discussions about consensus judging and standardized ballots on CUSIDnet. However, both of these discussions have been either largely in the context of CUSID West or sparked by judging experimentation in CUSID West. I hope to be able to work with the Vice Presidents from both East and West over the summer to discuss their experiences and attempt to find a solution that can work in Central and that might also be acceptable to those regions as well.
Format Modifications (PMRE & Split Rebuttal; BP Style)
The PMRE was brought in as an option at McGill along with the opposition split rebuttal (thanks to McGill for providing a statistical breakdown of how it affected the rounds). There was, as yet, no conclusive evidence that it wildly affected the government win-loss ratio. However, I would like to hear from each individual club what they thought of it. There has been an extensive discussion on the subject on CUSIDnet which I encourage you to read (some good points were made), but personal feelings and club positions on the matter are what I believe is most important. Did you like it? Would you introduce it as an option at CUSID sanctioned tournaments? How about a full-scale switch? Tell me what you think. Also on the issue of format, there was lots of discussion recently about British Parliamentary style. First, I’d like to thank everyone for their input, which was often detailed and insightful. The general results are that only one school would actually be in favour of switching an entire term to BP style. Of all schools holding tournaments first term next year or bidding for title tournaments, none are planning on switching to BP. One of the most interesting commentaries I heard in the course of this discussion was that regarding the low turnout at Ottawa’s Father Guindon Cup, the already established BP tournament in Central. It has been suggested that this is indicative of a certain lack of interest; if more schools supported the Father Guindon Cup, there might be more demand for other BP tournaments, but right now, there is only just enough interest to fill one BP tournament. Of course, schools holding invitational tournaments can always choose to hold another BP style tournament, and should a club not already hosting a tournament choose to do so, there would obviously be people more than happy to attend.
Overall Condition of Region:
Upcoming
Guelph Novice is March 28-30, and if last year was any indication, is one of the best bang-for-your-buck tournaments, a great way for novices to close out the year, and a great chance for experienced people to get together to conduct last minute business before the summer (if by business, you mean socializing and carousing). That will officially end this year of CUSID tournaments. Waterloo is re-establishing their summer tournament to kick of the 2003-2004 year, and 13 rounds in 24 hours sounds almost too good to be true (that’s the equivalent of two and a half tournaments, all in one day). If you survive, it’ll probably be the time of your life.
Trent
As posted on CUSIDnet, as of the beginning of March, I had not heard anything from Trent or Shingi since early in the year. Despite more than a few attempts to contact them, we had to assume that Trent Dionysis would not be held this year. To this date nothing has yet been heard and unless another member of CUSID knows otherwise, we can only assume that debating at Trent has collapsed for this year at least, though I will continue to try to establish contact with Trent.
Other Clubs
This year has seen some participation from members such as Waterloo, Laurier and McMaster which were in the past few years considered in danger of disappearing. I believe we must continue to engage and promote the participation of the members. Other member schools are all, to the best of my knowledge, healthy and functioning as normal.
I have been disappointed that, to some extent, there has been some reticence among some organizations to make contact with the Vice President when they have had problems or I have contacted them for input. In my election platform I promised communication, but I hope that this promise can actually be carried out, and that needs the participation of everyone involved.
Overall, the past year has been a good one for Central Region and, I believe, CUSID as a whole. We have many issues to address but I also believe we have the resources to properly address them. With candidates from the Central Region standing for election to CUSID executive positions, and very interesting and competitive bids being introduced for our regional championship and also for the North American Championships, next year is looking very promising indeed. Here is hoping that everyone has a great rest of the tournament.