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middle ground debate revisited


The recent spate of post has me once again reflecting on the growing sense
of unease I feel abput the direction debate seems to be moving .  A few
months back I asked if there was some way to get a "Middle ground"
approach to debate.  somewhere between debate must be your whole life to
don't bother to do any research.  At that time the disscussion
degenereated into a discussion on divisions.  I think that was wrong.  But
still the problem (from my perspective)  exist ... what to do.

 Well my fevered brain has come up with another possible answer to get
where I want to go.  How about limits to the amount of tournaments a
school can compete in?  This is just random but Say a school can go to no
more than 6 tournaments a semester.  I believe that this would get debate
to a level of sanity that is currently lacking.  Is it for everyone?   No,
obviously not but there are other options for those who just got to debate
every weekend from Sept. to April!  

Will this solve all of the perceived problems?  No but it might work
better than alternatives.  Attempts to reform debate with a bunch of in
round rules seem to be A.  Unworkable and B  somewhat distatesful.  No
evidence debate is not where I want to go either.  It seems to me that if
you limit travel (and there are options for those that just gotta go out
every weekend) two things would happen.  

1.  The pressure on both students and faculty would drop considerably.
with limited travel there would not be the need to work nonstop.  Students
could be students and faculty could teach those classes that the
administration thinks are so important.

2.  Since NDT would still exist for those that just gotta travel every
weekend CEDA would become a self selecting pool of programs committed to
that mythical "middle gorund of debate"  

These are just some thoughts but I would apreceate feedback 

Mike
CC Debate
References:
Archive created by Jonathan Stanton (jonathan@cs.jhu.edu)
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