August Newsletter

SCFCA Coaches Meeting     August 7, 2004       

Columbia, SC

Coaches in Attendance:

Hillcrest HS - Bill Evans; JL Mann Academy - Seddrick Bell; Riverside HS - Scott Moore; Mauldin HS - Kerry Cottingham; Dorman HS - Holly Hollifield; Greenville HS - Leigh Story; TL Hanna HS - Angela Billings; Westside HS - Brian Slusher; Greer HS - Jeff and Deb Warren; Irmo HS - Peter Lauzon; Eau Claire HS - Azure Agnew; Wando HS - Mia Gross; Northside Christian - Julie Washburn; Trinity Collegiate - Lydia Goodwin;  Barnwell HS - Chester Palmer

The meeting was presided over by Gail Nicholas (Bob Jones Academy), SC District Chair.  Deb Warren kept the minutes.

1.   SCNFL Report:  The 2004-2005 SC NFL  Committee members are Gail  Nicholas (chair),  Bill Evans, Holly Hollifield.  The alternates are  Kerry  Cottingham and Angela Billings.

        a.     National Competition Results- go to "2004 Nationals Results"  link for a look at our students at nationals and for a list of students who placed.  SC did exceptionally well this year.  Congratulations to Ben Adams of Bob Jones Academy who is the National Champion in Storytelling.  Ben received the pewter trophy and a scholarship for his win.  Chuck Nicholas received a trophy for being the coach of a national champion.   Chuck Nicholas and Ruth McAllister had the privilege of being final round judges;  Chuck judged US Extemp finals, and Ruth judged Dramatic Interp finals.

        b.     NFL Dues, Membership:   $99 is due from each school - pay now!  Once your dues are paid, you may enter points on the website beginning September 1.  The chapter renewal form (click here) and the affiliate renewal form (click here) can be printed from the link on SC website. Enter points weekly. Please remember that a student only gets points for his placement in the round. When there are multiple judges per round, the student does not get points per ballot.  Novice judges can get service points for judging.

        c.     Other NFL Business

            1.) If you are interested in having the 2003 NFL final round videos for the interp events, please notify Bill Evans, and he will duplicate them for you.  Pay Bill $8 for the videos (checks made to Bill Evans).  If Bill has to mail the videos to you, please pay him $10.  Thanks so very much to Bill for undertaking this service for all of us.  The 2004 final round videos should be available some time this fall.  If you have not filled out a video release form, you will also need to do this in order to get the videos.  Please contact Gail if you need this form.  

               2.) We all need to use all the slots allotted for Districts. It is important that all your slots are used, so that SC can send as many to nationals as possible.  

                3.) If you are interested in hosting District in March of 2005, contact Gail for the information about being the host school.  You will need to send a letter showing approval from your principal to be host for districts. There are several judging and food requirements for the host school.

                4.)  Make sure you keep track of original sources for your pieces for Districts.  Please read the NFL District manual for the piece requirements. Remember that you cannot have photocopied material to compete at Nationals - you must have the original source, and the ISBN number is preferred.  

                5.) Most Internet publishing sites are not approved by NFL - must have an ISBN #. Gail will check with NFL re questionable sources for material.

                6.) The NFL Website will be better, bigger, better this year!  Lincoln Life has donated much money to improve the site.

                7.) Future Nationals locations:  Philadelphia 2005, Dallas 2006, Wichita 2007  

                8.)  Make sure you print out the new District Manual. There will be over 40 rule and wording changes.  One great change will be a new quota system for District entry numbers.  Duo/PFD/CX teams will only count as one entry - rather than 2 as in the past.    600 degrees will be the cap for entries at Districts.

                9.)  The SC District committee will consider allowing doubling at Districts this year - but with some restrictions based on the 2004 District tournament.  If you have any thoughts, opinions, suggestions about doubling at Districts, please contact Gail.   There will be no doubling at  Nationals.  Single entries at the Utah Nationals opened the door for many more schools and contestants to take part.

 2.  Website (www.scspeechanddebate.org).   A motion was made by Bill Evans to have SCFCA pay for the website for this year  ($390).  The motion was passed.  For a new version of the website click on NFL football on the current website.  Please email your comments to Gail concerning the new version.  Currently all the comments have been favorable towards the new website.  Thanks for you comments and suggestions that we are trying to implement.  There is much to update, so please be patient with us!

3.   Mailing List/Directory (Click here):  The list has been updated as of August 12.  Please check your information and contact Gail with any changes or corrections.  The PRINTABLE copy is not available yet, but should be in the near future.

4.   Financial Report:  Financial reports from both the SCFCA treasurer (Seddrick Bell)  and the SC NFL were given to all those present at the meeting.  For copies, please contact Seddrick and Gail.  Both funds have a substantial balance. Gail reminded the group that Utah scholarships - $100/ kid - were given to the 26 students who represented SC at nationals.  Hopefully there will be scholarships for Philadelphia – maybe $50.

5.   2004-2005 Tournament Schedule (Click here)

• The 2004-2005 is now available, but many of you have not confirmed or given a date.  The tournaments in blue are confirmed.  The rest are considered possibilities at this point.  Please keep me updated so that this schedule is correct.

• The Westside tournament has moved to October 2 (and Dorman is now Sept. 25).  Westside will host and Icebreaker tournament as described in the Rostrum Feb 2004  Vol 78 #6 (pp. 54-55).  Team events will consist of 1 novice and a varsity. Kids judge themselves. The cost will be $5.00/team.  Contact Brian Slusher for more information.  A tournament invitation will be posted on the website.

• The Dorman tournament will be a NOVICE tournament.  

• This schedule is lacking Low country tournaments.  If you plan to host a tournament, please contact me ASAP.

• Discussion was held concerning splitting Districts into two weekends: Congress/CX one weekend and then the all other events on a separate weekend.  This would increase opportunities for students, increase # of qualifiers, and be easier to fill judging slots.  A vote was taken with 6 out of 15  agreeing to splitting Districts over two weekends.  Therefore, Districts will be in its entirety March 18-10.

• Annellen Hughes (through Bill Evans) suggested having States after Districts. A vote was taken and 9 out of 15 preferred States before Districts.  Thus, States will be held the week of March 4-5.

6.   Officers and State Competition Host for 2004-2005  

    The following slate was suggested for the State officers:

        a.     President                                          Jon Charles ( Fort Dorchester ) or Denny Ferrell (Summerville)

        b.    Vice Pres./Host                                 Jon Charles ( Fort Dorchester ) or Denny Ferrell (Summerville)

        c.     Secretary                                          Mia Gross & Janet Woodhall (Wando HS)

        d.    Treasurer                                           Frank Flanigan (Academic Magnet HS)  

PLEASE NOTE:  Since the August 7 meeting, Jon Charles and Denny Ferrell have turned down the officer positions and State tournament host possibility.  This leaves us without a Charleston host and a complete officer's slate.  If you are a Charleston coach, please contact me with State tournament suggestions = or please volunteer. 

7.   Mentoring and Support for New Coaches –  We need to get principals informed and excited about speech and debate. Gail expressed a concern about a lack of newspaper coverage. Please send her any new school contacts and any newspaper contacts.  Minhaj sent word that he would like to see more mentoring of new coaches.  If you have a new coach in your area, please taken him/her under your wing!!!

8.   Rules and Bylaws

        a.   Standard Ballots:    

• Gail suggested using the same ballots for every tournament.   She offered BJA’s as a prototype. The new ballots get rid of the "weak" option and use "needs improvement" in its place.  They are also more streamlined.  The group voted and all agreed to standardize ballots for local tournaments and for States.  Angela made the suggestion that the ballots be put on the website so we can voice any suggestions. As of August 16 the new ballots were emailed to each coach for approval and suggestions.  Please meet the August 23 deadline for comments so that we can post these ballots for your use.  The ballots will be labeled as SCFCA Ballots with a place for your school name to be added.    Please note that debate ballots are purchased through the NFL, so they are not included in this new set.

         b.  State Rules

• Gail explained that with the computer program for States the deadlines can be adjusted to later dates for State entries.  The group agreed to allow Gail to adjust deadlines for entries. Congress legislation deadlines will be adjusted to 2 weeks prior to States with the posting on the website no later than 10 days prior to States.  Gail emphasized that there is a need to be strict about this deadline and about format.  Legislation should be in a single Word document (please so not send each piece of legislation separately) and e-mailed.  Use Times New Roman font 12 pt. Use NFL  guidelines.  It is a computer nightmare when legislation is not standard from school to school.  Late legislation will not be accepted for States and Districts.  It was strongly suggested that late legislation not be accepted at individual tournaments as well.  

• A discussion was held concerning allowing more than 9 entries in one event for States.  Again, the use of the computer makes this possible.  The group voted to have the cap stay the same.

• A discussion was held to increase the 5 students double entry limit. Scott suggested 10 entries. The group voted to increase this limit to 10.   Duo teams will count as one entry - but the cost will be per student.

• If you do not want contestants to use the same piece in two events at your tournament, you must state this in your invitation. State and Districts mandate a different piece in each event entered.

• The wording in the State invitation concerning Congress legislation will be changed from "must" to “may submit 5 pieces of legislation."

        c.   Use of Base System in Congress  

• A discussion concerning base system in congress was held.   Did Districts this past year work? The group voted to use the base at States -  8 out of 14 agreed.  

• Scott suggested using it at other tournaments so judges and students understand the system before they get to States and Districts.

        d.   Standardized entry forms

• Deb Warren presented an Excel program for all to use throughout the school year for tournament registration sheets.

• Gail reminded that group that it is a logistical nightmare to have entries coming in many different formats.  The new format will be on the website.  Each coach will need to save it to their files, file it out, and then email it back.  The format is user friendly to the computer program used for tournaments.  Hopefully in the future it will be linked to the program!

•  Coaches agreed to try this out. Gail and Deb will work out kinks in entry form.

9.   New Business 

• Bill Evans expressed the need to name coaches of the year in Speech and Debate.  He reminded the group that sports coaches get this recognition from their circle.

• Bill moved that based on their national success and help with SC programs/tournaments Gail and Chuck Nicholas be the            SC Speech and Debate Coaches of the Year 2004-2005. This motion was seconded and passed unanimously.  Bill will write a citation that will be on the SC website.

• Bill suggested that we also nominate coaches from each division for recognition (A, AA, AAA, AAAA).

10.  Final note

• Gail expressed her concern about the treatment of judges after tournaments.  We need to show more respect to our judges as an example to our students . Someone has to win and someone has to lose.  That's how it works.   If you have a problem with a judge's ballot, go the coach of  the team for which he judges.  There are legitimate complaints such as bad language on a ballot, personal insults, or rule ignorance.  But  complaint about a loss on a ballot is generally nothing but sour grapes.  We also need to train our judges better - keep them up on rule changes, etc. We have some very faithful parents and college students who give up their Saturdays to judge.  Without them we have no tournaments!

•   Jeff suggested using people from the media as judges.  

• Riverside will have judges training on Thursday Sept 23 or 30 - more info to come.

I know that this report is long.  But we accomplished much that needed to get done and updated.  Please make sure you refer to these changes throughout the school year.  It is important that we are all on the same page!!

Please email or call me anytime with needs, questions, suggestions, etc.  I wish each of you the best in this new competition season.

Gail

SC NFL District Chair

PS   Thank you so much for the honor bestowed on me and Chuck by the group!