Stanford National Forensic Institute

34th Annual Stanford Invitational | February 8-10, 2020

 

 

The Stanford Debate Society is pleased to invite you to the 34th annual Stanford National Invitational. Students from across the nation have been joining us for this national level competition since 1987, and we hope that you'll help us build on this tradition and join us in Palo Alto this year!

 

Please visit debate.stanford.edu/invitational for our full tournament invitation!

 

2020 DATES: February 8-10, 2020

FUTURE DATES (additional details will be released in the fall prior to each year's tournament); future dates subject to change

• 2021: February 6-8, 2021
• 2022: February 12-14, 2022
• 2023: February 11-13, 2023

 

2020 Stanford Invitational airfare discount:

We have arranged a special group discount with United Airlines for tournament attendees, which is available with promotion code ZHNY748703.  To take advantage of this discount, you can use any of the following booking methods:

1) Enter ZHNY748703 in the “promotions & certificates” box when searching for airfare on United.com, or follow this link to where you can enter code ZHNY748703.

2) Provide code ZHNY748703 to a United booking agent by phone.

3) Provide code ZHNY748703 to your travel agent.

This discount is available for a wide range of dates to accommodate squads traveling before and after the 2020 Stanford Invitational, and also includes the dates for the Berkeley tournament so that you can still get the discount if you're staying in California for the week and attending both tournaments!  You can also use this discount code even if you are attending just the Berkeley tournament.  Note that discounts are in the range of 2% for the cheapest tickets (and should at a minimum make economy about the same price as basic economy); discounts increase to over 10% for more expensive tickets!

 

Every student attending the Stanford Invitational must have their parent/guardian sign an "Individual Waiver" in order to attend the Stanford Invitational.  Squad coordinators bringing students to the Stanford Invitational must ensure that each student has completed this required document, which is to be remitted on-site upon arrival at the tournament.  By registering to attend the tournament, coaches agree that they are responsible for overseeing completion of this requirement and understand that they will be asked to certify completion as a component of the final "on site" or "e-registration" process.  More information can be found on the "Individual Waiver" page of the tournament invitation.

 

All entries, including Non-School entries, must have a responsible adult chaperone with them at the tournament at all times.  Stanford Debate does not provide any chaperones or supervisions for students attending the tournament.

 

Tournament Dates: Satuday, February 8th, 2020 through Monday, February 10th, 2020

• • Registration Opens: December 6, 2019 expected, will be announced via email
  • Debate Events Early Drop Fees: All debate event entries (Policy, LD, PF, Parli) are subject to $20 per entry drop fees as soon as they are cleared into the field in order to reduce the number of purely speculative entries made, which block others from accessing the competition.  After the tournament wide drop deadline explained below, normal drop fees will apply in place of this reduced early drop fee.
  • Priority Entry Deadline: Tuesday, January 7, 2020 (provisionally)
    • We will continue to accept entries beyond this date, however we plan to accept all teams on the waiting list as remaining room space allows (such as entries from schools in excess of the initial entry cap in each event) after this deadline so that schools may make appropriate travel and accommodation arrangements with sufficient lead time, so remaining space after this date may be extremely limited.  Please plan to register teams prior to this deadline in order to avoid disappointment!
  • Drop Deadline / Fees Frozen: Friday, January 10th, 2020
    • Drops after this point are charged 100% of the entry fee.
    • TBA entries that are accepted to the field are subject to the same/full drop fees as any other team with named participants.
    • Past years have proven that the only way to keep the tournament accessible to all entrants, even those who can't confirm attendance and arrange travel until later in the process, is the assessment of drop fees.
    • Revisions to the drop deadline schedule in recent years have proven necessary due to significant increases in registration and high numbers of "TBA" name entries that ultimately fall through and prevent others from attending.
  • Fees Received Deadline: Friday, January 24th, 2020
    • By this date we must have received all fees for all entries which we have accepted up through Tuesday, January 14th, 2020, plus fees for any and all judges that you plan to hire from the tournament.  Please get this in the mail right after January 14th or earlier so that we receive it by January 24th.
    • We reserve the right to assess an additional fee equal to the school fee owed by your squad in the event that you don't remit payment on time (as described above).
    • For entries that clear the waitlists closer into the tournament such that payment by January 24th is not feasible, please be sure that we have received your payment no later than a week prior to the tournament.  Bringing your check to the tournament is not workable for an event of this size!
  • TBA Name Specification Deadline: Friday, January 24th, 2020
    • Any TBAs that remain in the field after this date will be dropped from the tournament.
    • As TBA entries are "confirmed" entries that block other squads from entering the field(s) just the same as non-TBA entries, TBAs accrue drop fees after the drop deadline and will remain on fee sheets.  This is true both for drops initiated by the squad coordinator or by the tournament once the TBA deadline passes.
  • Judge Entry Deadline: Sunday, January 26th, 2020 (provisionally)
    • By this date, we MUST know if you plan to cover each entry's judging requirement via paying the judge fee or by providing a qualified judge.  If providing a judge, we need the name and contact info for each judge, and for judges in Varsity LD, Varsity PF & Varsity Policy a complete entry paradigm must also be listed on tabroom.  Visit the Judge Information page for more information.
    • For any judge information that is missing, we will assess a nuisance fine of $500 per uncovered entry as a reminder to enter your judging.  The fine is automatically removed once you have entered a given judge, but if you make it to the data freeze / registration immediately before the tournament with this fine on your account we will not remove it.  This has proved necessary due to the significant number of programs that have taken no action to enter any of their judges into tabroom.
    • We can't guarantee our ability to fulfill any requests to hire judges.  Any hire requests made after the judge deadline that we are able to fulfill will be at a rate equal to 125% of the initial judge hire fee. Again, this has proved necessary in order to incent programs to get their requests submitted in a timely fashion.
  • (Mandatory) Registration: Friday, February 7th, 2020 at the Santa Clara Marriott from 5:30-8p - Salons A-C
    • Coaches must complete on-site verification on Friday 2/7 (details to be posted closer to the tournament).
    • Teams that do not register via one of the approved methods will be dropped from the tournament.  We must know that you are present, and we can't hold up the pairings in the morning due to any uncertainty about your presence since that impacts well over 1000 people!
    • In-person registration attendance triggers a nuisance fee of the greater of $50 or 10% of the squad's total entry fees - please just take the steps needed to be e-verification eligible!
    • There WILL NOT be phone registration offered, nor any sort of Saturday morning registration.  If you haven't gotten payment into us in advance or by the close of registration your entries will be dropped, no exceptions!  Any drop initiated in this way will not relieve a squad of their obligation to pay all fees accrued to their account.
  • Competition: Saturday, February 8th, 2020 to Monday, February 10th, 2020
    • Exact 2020 tournament schedule decisions are not finalized.  We are evaluating feedback from 2019 and considering all possible schedule permutations that are possible in the space we ultimately receive for this year's tournament in order to improve the schedule if possible.
    • 2019 event schedules:
      • IEs: Saturday and Sunday (finished by approximately noon on Sunday)
      • Congress: Saturday and Sunday (finished by approximately noon on Sunday)
      • Varsity Policy, Varsity LD, Varsity Public Forum & Varsity Parliamentary: Saturday to Monday, most elims on Monday
      • JV Policy, JV LD, JV Public Forum & JV Parli: Saturday to Monday, although Monday will only have several "late" elims per event and should impact only a few schools

• Debate events offered:

  • LD:
    • ​Varsity: 6 prelim rounds, all 4-2s clear with a cap of 64 total elim teams
    • JV: 5 prelim rounds with a generous elimination round break (see the 'debate' page for guidance)
  • Policy:
    • ​Varsity: 6 prelim rounds, all 4-2s clear with a cap of 32 total elim teams
    • JV: 5 prelim rounds with a generous elimination round break (see the 'debate' page for guidance)
  • Public Forum
    • ​Varsity: 6 prelim rounds, all 4-2s clear with a cap of 64 total elim teams
    • JV: 5 prelim rounds with a generous elimination round break (see the 'debate' page for guidance)
  • Parliamentary:
    • ​Varsity: 6 prelim rounds, all 4-2s clear with a cap of 64 total elim teams
    • JV: 5 prelim rounds with a generous elimination round break (see the 'debate' page for guidance)
  • Worlds Schools: 5 prelim rounds, up to 8 teams will clear
  • Congress: 3 prelim rounds with a break to finals.
  • MIddle School Congress: 3 prelim rounds with a break to finals.
  • TOC Bids in 2020 include:
    • Octafinals in Gold Public Forum, Double Octafinals in Silver Public Forum
    • Quarterfinals in Varsity LD
    • Semifinals in Varsity Policy
    • Top 16 finishers in Congressional Debate
    • IE events, level dependent on final entry numbers (see TOC IE bid tournaments page)
    • *Note that all TOC bids are awarded per the rules and guidelines created by the relevant TOC commitee, and "bid levels" are subject to TOC confirmation (they do list this information on the TOC website).

  Please note that JV Policy, JV LD, JV Parli and JV PF will have a number of elim rounds on Monday, although of course this will only effect a small number of students / schools.

• Speech events offered:

  • Varsity IE's: 3 prelim rounds with domestic & international extemp in opposite patterns!
    • Pattern A: National extemp, oratory, dramatic, spar, and expos
    • Pattern B: International extemp, duo, humorous, impromptu, oratorical interp, informative and program oral interp
  • JV IE's: 3 prelim rounds with domestic & international extemp in opposite patterns!
    • Pattern A: National extemp, oratory, dramatic, spar, and expos
    • Pattern B: International extemp, duo, humorous, impromptu and oratorical interp
  • Quarterfinal rounds in Varsity IE's: All Varsity IE's with 60 or more entries will break to a quarterfinal round (events with 30 to 59 entries will break to semis).
  • JV division in all IE events: Students who did not compete in any high school speech events prior to August 2018 are eligible to compete in our JV division.
  • Finished by approximately noon on Sunday: based on feedback, the IE tournament will continue to conclude by approximately noon on Sunday.

• TOC Bids: The 2020 Stanford Invitational is an octafinal qualifier in Gold Public Forum, a double ocafinal qualifier in Silver Public Forum, a quarterfinal qualifier in Varsity LD, a semifinal qualifier in Varsity Policy and a top 16 qualifier in Congressional Debate.  A number of IE events also award TOC bids for final round placement.  Please refer to the TOC website for more details on bid levels and qualification.

• Required Friday Re-Confirmation/Registration (electronic only, fee for on-site registration): Mandatory tournament re-confirmation will be held at the Marriott of Santa Clara on Friday, February 7th, from TBA (evening hours). The tournament will be offering a courtesy electronic registration (details to be announced closer to the tournament). In order to be eligible to register electronically, a school’s fees (in their entirety) must have been received by the tournament no later than Wednesday, February 5th and they must have no changes to their judges. Please note that no changes to Varsity LD or Varsity Policy judges will be accepted at registration whether in person or over the phone as strike and ranking sheets will have already been issued and processed.  No registration by phone will be offered, as anyone ineligible for e-registration needs to come to registration in-person or their teams will be dropped (no registration of any sort will be offered on Saturday morning)!

• Tournament hotel: The tournament hotel is the Marriott of Santa Clara.  The property offers discounted rooms in the Stanford Debate block.  The block is now open and rooms are available at $149 (quad occupancy).  For more information, visit the Tournament Hotel page.

• United Airlines discount: We have arranged a meeting discount code for the Stanford Invitational with United Airlines, the carrier with the largest number of flights in the Bay Area.  For more info, please see the Airfare Discount page.

• Middle School students: All JV events are open to 8th grade students this year! We do, however, encourage all participating middle school students to sign up for our Middle School Student Congress event which is open to students in grades 7 & 8, as we believe this is the best fit for most middle school students.

 

SPECIAL AWARDS:

• Champions receive an excellent award: Your squad will be excited to know that in addition to their trophy the following students will each receive a special award. The past few years this has been a Kindle Fire, iPod or iPod Nano! For the 2020 tournament we will have another great award for the:

  • Champion in Varsity Policy

  • Champion in Varsity LD

  • Champions in Varsity Parli debate

  • Champions in Varsity Public Forum debate

  • Champions in each Varsity IE event

  • Champion in Student Congress

  • Note: Champion is defined as the 1st place winner only. Awards are for students only.

• Partial scholarships to the 2020 SNFI Speech & Debate Camp: In addition to their trophy and award, students meeting the criteria outlined below will receive a partial scholarship to attend the 2020 Stanford National Forensic Institute.  Scholarships are not combinable for multiple event winners, or transferrable to other students or events.

  • Speech events (all IEs):

    • ​Varsity: Champions in each varsity speech event will receive a 50% scholarship to attend the 2020 Stanford National Forensic Institute in Individual Events.

    • JV: Champions in each JV speech event will receive a 25% scholarship to attend the 2020 Stanford National Forensic Institute in Individual Events.

  • Debate events (policy, LD, PF, Parliamentary & Congress):

    • ​Varsity: specific details TBA
    • JV: specific details TBA

 

Questions: Questions about the 2020 Stanford Invitational should be directed to tournament director Rich Boltizar or our other staff by e-mailing invitational@stanforddebate.com. You may also try calling the Stanford Debate office at (650) 723-9086, however email is the most efficient way to reach our staff, and likely will receive a much quicker response.

We view this tournament as an opportunity to provide a service to the high school speech and debate community, and hope that is apparent to past attendees. We welcome feedback about how we can continue to improve the Stanford Invitational. So that we may accommodate all of your students who wish to compete, please take care of your tournament registration as soon as posible, and please book your hotel as soon as is feasible. This will ensure a pleasant and trouble-free tournament for everyone, and allow us to host you in the way you deserve!

 

Rich Boltizar

Director of Debate, Stanford University

Executive Tournament Director, Stanford Invitational