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Dear Teachers, Coaches, and Adjudicators,

Welcome to Auckland Schools Debating for 2024. This post concerns the entry process for 2024 as well as other crucial information for the year ahead.

Important Links

• 2024 Registration Guide and Competition Information
• 2024 Calendar
• 2024 Changes
• How to Debate Guide

Registration Deadlines

• Teacher in Charge Confirmation Form – Due Wednesday 28 February
• Seasonals Championship Registration Form – Due Monday 5 March
• Premier Grade Registration Form – Due Monday 11 March
• Open Grade Registration Form – Due Friday 15 March

Tournament Dates

• Counties Manukau Regionals – Saturday 24 February
• Seasonals – Sunday 10 March
• Auckland Regionals – Saturday 23 March and Sunday 24 March

Changes in 2024

Following feedback and discussions with teachers and coaches during 2023, the committee are proposing the trial of three changes to ASD during 2024

Time Change for Advanced Open, Premier Junior, and Premier Advanced

Debates for Advanced Open, Premier Junior, and Premier Advanced will start 30 minutes earlier (motion announcement at 5:00pm and 6:30pm). This is to allow an earlier end to nights.

Student Adjudication for Senior Open 

Schools may nominate a Year 13 student to become an adjudicator for 1 or 2 Senior Open teams. The student must have completed at least 1 year of debating in Premier Advanced or Advanced Open participating in a minimum of 3 debates, or must have been an active member of the 2023 Development Squad.

Delayed Draw Release for Open Grades

During 2023 the Draws for Junior Open, Senior Open, and Advanced Open were released at least one week in advance. In order to reduce the number of teams who miss out on debating due to the default of their opposition, we propose that:

• Teams will be allocated a time slot at least one week prior to the debate. For prepared rounds, teams will also be allocated a side.
  • If a team cannot attend a debating round, they can either defer their debate to the catch-up round or default the debate.
  • Teams must notify the committee of their intention to defer the debate by 4pm the weekday before the debate. Teams in these grades can only defer one debate per year.
  • If a team has already previously deferred a debate, or if notification occurs after 4pm the weekday before the debate, the team will default the round.
• A team must notify the Committee by 12pm on the day of a debate if they must default the debate.
  • The Draw for each round will be generated at 12pm on the day of each debate and published on our tabulation website. However, this can be subject to change up until the start of the debate. This Draw will exclude any teams which have already deferred or defaulted the round.
  • If there is an uneven number of teams available, one team will win the round by default, and be notified that they are not required to attend the debate. If the team is already en route to the debate, the committee can organise for the team to receive feedback on a practice debate case.
• No change will be made at this stage to the way the draw is generated for Premier grades.

ASD welcomes feedback on these proposed changes to be emailed to us at info@asd.org.nz prior to Friday 16 February.

ASD invites those leaving high school at the end of 2023 to express interest in become an ASD adjudicator in 2024.

Link to Form

Given the heavy weather warnings, and advice from Auckland Transport, we have made the decision to cancel Round 2 of Senior Open tonight.

At present, we are not planning to add an extra round to the competition (meaning SO will just be 4 rounds for 2023). However, we will likely keep the same draw and advised topic of Round 3 so that your teams’ work does not go to waste. Please let us know at info@asd.org.nz if you have any feedback about our proposed plan.

We hope everyone is able to keep safe and dry tonight.

We’re pleased to let you know that all of our venues are now confirmed for 2023. Thank you to all of our host schools as it would be impossible to run the competition without them.

• Junior Open: Rangitoto College (North), Epsom Girls Grammar School (Central), Lynfield College (West), Howick College (East), Tangaroa College (South)
• Senior Open: Westlake Boys High School (North), ACG Parnell (Central), Sacred Heart College (East), De La Salle College (South), Avondale College (West)
• Advanced Open: St Cuthbert’s College, Carmel College
• Premier Junior: Diocesan School for Girls
• Premier Advanced: Auckland Grammar School

We will be updating the venue pages on our website with updated venue information for 2023 in the coming week.

ASD is looking for adjudicators to judge its Tournaments, Premier and Advanced Open grades. We welcome any university age students or older who are interested in adjudicating to express their interest.

Complete this form and we’ll get in touch with more information about what adjudicating for ASD entails and on when our adjudicator training sessions. Completing this form does not commit you to anything.

All new adjudicators will go through an adjudicator training programme before becoming an ASD accredited adjudicator.

ASD 2023 – Adjudicator Express of Interest

If you are a high school student and are interested in adjudicating Junior Open for your school, please speak to the Teacher in Charge of debating at your school. Our policy on high school student coaches/adjudicators is available on our website linked here.

Welcome to Auckland Schools Debating for 2023.

Important Links

• 2023 Registration Guide and Competition Information
• 2023 Calendar
• 2023 Changes
• How to Debate Guide

Registration Deadlines

• Teacher in Charge Confirmation Form – Thursday 2 March
• Seasonals Championship Registration Form – Monday 6 March (5pm)
• Premier Grade Registration Form – Tuesday 7 March
• Open Grade Registration Form – Thursday 16 March

Tournament Dates

• Seasonals – Saturday 11 March
• Counties Manukau Regionals – Saturday 25 March
• Auckland Regionals – Saturday 1 April and Sunday 2 April

Changes in 2023

Debating In-Person

We are expecting to return to in-person deabting in 2023, dependent on the willingness of our host schools to host ASD in-person this year.

Coaching and Adjudication Seminars via Zoom

In order to make our coaching and adjudication seminars more accessible we will continue running these via Zoom as we did in 2022. You can see dates for these on our website:

• Grade Coaching Sessions
• Adjudication Seminars

Entry Fees

We are currently reviewing our entry fees for 2023.

As in previous years, we will be offering fee subsidies to schools who need it. We will be reaching out to schools which qualify for these fee subsidies individually. If you believe you will have issues paying but have not been contacted, please get in touch with the committee via email.

Seasonal Championships

The Seasonal Championships (Seasonals) is a one day tournament that gives students the opportunity to debate multiple times early in the year, and immediately implement feedback offered by experienced adjudicators.

We are still working to confirm a venue for Seasonals for 2023. If your school would be interested in hosting, please reach out to at info@asd.org.nz.

When: Saturday 11 March 2023
Where: TBC
Who: The tournament is open to all Year 10-13 students.  We recommend entering your most senior speakers as a first priority.  The tournament will be particularly valuable to those who intend to compete in the Auckland Regional Championships.
Team Cap:  Schools are guaranteed entry to four teams. (Schools may also enter a mix of teams, i.e. 2 in the championship division and 2 in the novice division).
Cost: TBC (fee subsidies are available for low decile schools)
Timetable: Four round robin debates from 8.30am – 6.30pm.
How to enter: Complete the entry form on our website linked here
Deadline for entries: 5pm, Monday 6 March