Marisa Cleveland
Constraints: none
Background:
High School: 2 years LD/Parli, 4 years Speech
College: Debating for UC Davis
Approach to Judging
As a judge, I take the path of least intervention. This means that I find impacts crucial. That being said, I’m open to any sort of round. If you want a more performative one, that’s totally fine as long as it’s well warranted and there’s a clear link to why going away from the ‘typical format’ is good or better.
I am a flow judge but voters and crystallization are important because voters are the first place I look when making my decision. Show me where and why you’re winning and I’ll vote there if I can. Otherwise I have to sort through all the speeches and find impacts, and I really don’t want to intervene.
Argument Preferences
Clear rounds are preferable. In terms of theory, if you set up stupid definitions and your opponents run Topicality, I’m going to have a much lower threshold than if I feel you start with a reasonable premise. The same goes for stupid arguments. If you make up factual evidence or twist analysis in a way that suits your case, if you’re blatantly wrong, I won’t directly intervene against you but my threshold will be a lot lower and there’s a higher chance that a simple argument will be able to take out your point.
I’m open to any kind of argumentation, be it style or just plain arguments. I don’t feel like having statistics or quotes furthers your case in terms of outweighing the opposing side’s analysis. I also don’t feel like one side can win because their source is ‘better.’ Your impacts and link story have to be clearer to get my vote on that specific argument.
Presentation Preferences
I flow and I can handle speed. That being said, if you’re running really technical positions that need clear framework, slow down and be clear on the A, B, C…
Speaker points have nothing to do with who wins. I give speaker points for speaking style – eye contact, courtesy, posture, etc. I give wins for argumentation.
Thank you’s really are NOT necessary. They function as a time sap because I do time them. If the first speaker from each side wants to say “thank you for being here” or something short, that’s fine. Otherwise…really not necessary.
Overall, just have fun and have clear impacts. And tell me how they function in the round.
- There are no comments yet
Leave a Reply