[eDebate] Hester's Pepsi Challenge - A Misnomer

[jason russell]

The problem with adding voting to the mix and not designating tournaments is that we may end up with a system of subtraction of national level tournaments and not addition of any. If voters decide that tournaments in the Midwest and Muontain regions are still not worth anything to first-round balloting and that only one of KY, Wake, WGA, GSU, and the KY round robin will be, then we hurt D6 without really adding anything for the rest of the country. Voting without additional objective critera that determine that some specific tournament(s) in each district figures prominently in the first-round mix does not accrue the advantages of improvements in regional debate that designating tournaments does. There has to be a way to combine Hester's "Don't tell me where to debate" proposal with the need for regional equity in nationally relevant tournament travel while maintaining a true national ranking that favors high quality competition over mere participation. I don't think we've mapped one out yet and I would be interested to hear anyone's suggestions.

Jason

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