State Oral Interpretation Tournament -- A Proposal for Reform
Cory Allen Heidelberger -- Montrose High School

(Originally submitted to the South Dakota High School Activities Association Speech Advisory Committee April 28, 2006. The author continues to revise specific points of this proposal based on further study and conversation with other coaches and judges. Latest revision: 05.30.2007 10:07 . The author welcomes input from all parties interested in promoting oral interpretation in South Dakota.)

Online discussion at http://sdstateinterp.blogspot.com/

Rationale

The greatest value of oral interpretation lies in offering students the challenge of speaking in front of audiences. Performing in this competitive setting builds student confidence and accustoms students to the kind of stress every one of them will face in job interviews and other important speaking situations. 

The State Oral Interp Festival, as currently structured, offers students minimal opportunities for performing. For the dozens of schools that participate in the October and November invitational interp contests, the State Oral Interp Festival, as well as the sequence of District and Region contests for those schools that must go through them, may feel like an anticlimactic and inefficient allocation of resources. Schools that participate exclusively in the District, Region, and State contests get comparatively little "bang" for their extracurricular "buck".

Consider the situation for a Class B school. A typical B interp squad makes the following investment in the sequence of District, Region, and State contests:

• 3 full days out of school, requiring students to miss class and make up homework and tests;
• 3 full days of substitute pay for the coaches who miss the classes they teach;
• 3 round trips by van or bus;
• 1, possibly 2 nights in a motel (or 1 more round trip by van or bus for schools close enough to the State site to drive back and forth);
• Entry, judging, and pro-rated contest fees of over $200 for Districts, another $200+ for Regions, and $55 for State.

As a return on that investment, contestants receive the following:

• 1 guaranteed round of performance at Districts, with the possibility of 2 more rounds for those who qualify;

Now suppose a B interp squad has a limited budget. A coach who wants to maximize participation and performance opportunities while demonstrating to his school administration and board frugal use of available funds could justifiably choose to skip the District-Region-State sequence and instead take students to compete in any of the October and November invitational contests. Compare the costs of one invitational contest:

• Students miss no school for a Saturday contest;
• The school need not hire a substitute for the coach/teacher;
• The school bus or van makes one round trip;
• No motel stay is required;
• Entry fees will be cheaper than any District or Region contest: a full 7-entry District squad to an invitational will cost around $55; hiring two judges (the coach doesn't want to judge) will cost around $100.

As a return on that investment, the coach and team get the following benefits from an invitational contest:

• 3 guaranteed rounds of competition for every entrant, usually with the opportunity to compete for a spot in a final round;
• The chance to bring multiple entries in each event.

In terms of cost, participation, and performance, the State Interp Festival has less educational value than a single invitational contest. This proposal seeks to change the State Interp Festival to increase performance opportunities and participation in the official SDHSAA interp contests, promote participation in regular season contests, and make the State Interp Festival itself more worth the investment of teams' resources.

Reforms

I. Qualification

In addition to qualifying for State through the sequence of District (Class B) and Region (A and B) contests or through coach selection (AA), students may qualify for the State Oral Interp Festival through outstanding performance at sanctioned invitational interp contests in October and November.

Standards for Qualification:

1. The invitational tournament must offer at least three rounds of interscholastic competition for all competitors. Two preliminary rounds and a final round will not be sufficient to meet the qualifying standard.
2. Students from at least five schools in a given class must be entered in the event. For example, suppose a contest has the following number of schools in each class entered in each event:

3. Preliminary rounds must be scheduled with a minimum of 5 contestants. Rounds scheduled with 4 or fewer speakers will not count toward State qualification. Rounds that end up with 4 or fewer speakers due to no shows or forfeits will still count toward State qualification (entrants will not be denied their qualification opportunity because one scheduled speaker fails to show up).
4. Preliminary rounds should be scheduled with students from the same school dispersed in different sections to minimize same school hitting same school.
5. Preliminary rounds should be scheduled to minimize the number of times individual contestants hit the same competitors.
6. The top-ranking contestant from each qualifying class in each qualifying event will qualify for State.
7. Rank will be determined first by placing in the final round, if the contest offers one.
8. If students do not make the final round or if the tournament does not offer a final round, then rank will be determined first by cumulative rank in preliminary rounds, then by total speaker points in preliminary rounds.
9. Any ties in cumulative rank and speaker points will be broken by judges' preference as indicated by comparative rank in head-to-head competition.
10. If judges' preference cannot break a tie, strength of opposition by average rank (SOAR) will determine the qualifier. SOAR equals the cumulative rank of all opponents divided by the total number of opponents -- i.e., the average cumulative rank of all opponents. SOAR considers preliminary-round ranks only, not final-round ranks of any opponents.
11. If average rank strength of opposition fails to break a tie, strength of opposition by average points (SOAP) will determine the qualifier. SOAP equals the cumulative speaker points of all opponents divided by the total number of opponents. SOAP considers preliminary-round points only, not final-round points of any opponents.

II: State Tournament Format

A. Schedule

Events are scheduled in flights to facilitate double entries. As Readers Theater will have the most double-eventers and may have triple-eventers, it takes place in a flight of its own. The distribution of the other events into their flights may be determined by random draw each year or simply placed in a regular rotation so Humor, Poetry, and Oratory contestants are not always the ones who must roll out of bed earliest on Saturday morning for Round III. However, to avoid confusing competitors and coaches, event distribution across flights should remain consistent -- i.e., if the random draw or rotation places Drama in the second flight, Drama should take place in the second flight of all three rounds. Readers Theater may work best in the final flight of each round, as it involves the most students, will likely draw the largest audiences, and may make a nice finale event for each day of competition.

B. Sections

1. The entrant pool for each event in each class will be divided into sections of 5 and/or 6. Sections of 4 and 7 should be used only when mathematically necessary. Sections of less than 4 or more than 7 are prohibited. No one section may be larger than any other section by any more than 1 entrant (i.e., an entrant pool of 11 must be broken into sections of 5 and 6, not 4 and 7; an entrant pool of 20 must be broken into 4 sections of 5, not 2 sections of 6 and 2 sections of 4).
2. Entrants must speak in their assigned order.
3. As feasible, entrants will be scheduled in different speaker positions in each section (e.g., no entrant will speak first in a round more than once).
4. Entrants competing in two events in the same flight will be scheduled at least two speaker positions apart (e.g., if Humor and Poetry take place during the same flight, a student speaking 2nd in Round I of Humor could speak 4th, 5th, or 6th but never 1st or 3rd in Round I of Poetry) .
5. OPTION: Sections may be set up so entrants from the same school (the District/Region qualifier and any regular-season invitational qualifiers) do not hit each other. However, we may wish to waive this restriction on sections to equalize the schools' chances of earning spots in finals.

C. Judges

1. Each entering school will be responsible for providing one competent adult judge. The school's coach may serve as a judge or the school may hire another person to serve as judge. SDHSAA will not hire judges for individual schools seeking judges; however, SDHSAA will hire its usual pool of 18 elite judges from among South Dakota's college professors, distinguished former coaches, and speech/theater artists.

Preliminary round judge panel options:

• One judge in each preliminary section. This option is the easiest to schedule and tabulate. Judges would be expected to judge at least 2 preliminary sections.
• Two-judge panels in each preliminary section. Each judge would be expected to hear 4 sections of the 9 in prelims.
• Three-judge panels in each preliminary section. This option provides the fairest judging and broadest exposure to different evaluators. Each judge would be expected to hear 6 sections of the 9 in prelims.
• Increasing panel size: one judge in Round I, two judges in Round II, and three judges in Round III. Student scores would be calculated based on cumulative rank and speaker points from all six ballots. (Note that under this scheme, later rounds would count more heavily in determining placement in finals, reflecting the notion that students should learn and improve with each performance.)
• Assigning the elite judge pool to judge a section every round or even every flight would lower the number of sections coaches/school-hired judges must hear.

2. Coaches/school-hired judges should not be used to judge entrants from their own class. This restriction will only be waived in cases of extreme scheduling difficulties (which may only arise if we choose to use three-judge panels, or if weather causes a number of schools and judges not to show).
3. Judge Obligation Options: There may be no need to require qualifying schools to bring any more than one judge, regardless of the number of entries they qualify. However, we might consider requiring that schools provide one judge for every seven State entries or fraction thereof. However many judges are brought, the number of sections each coach/school-hired judge is expected to hear should remain uniform for all such judges.

D. Finals

1. Entrants will qualify for finals in event in each class on the basis of their preliminary round ranks and speaker points. The number of finalists should be 5 to 7 in each event. 5 is an absolute minimum. 8 may be permitted when there is an unbreakable tie for the final slot(s) in finals. Under no circumstances will more than 8 entrants be placed in a final round.
2. The number of finalists should be determined by three criteria:

• The final round must include at least 5 speakers, but no more than 7 except under extreme circumstances and absolutely no more than 8.
• The final round should include as many speakers as possible.
• There should be a "clean break" in scores between the lowest-ranked finalist and the highest-ranked non-finalist.

3. Criteria for ranking entrants from preliminary round results (in descending order of priority):

• Cumulative ranks from all ballots. If multi-judge panels are used at any point in prelims, each ballot will count toward the final cumulative ranking, rather than summing ballots to calculate overall ranks for each round.
• Cumulative speaker points from all ballots. If multi-judge panels are used, each ballot will count toward the final cumulative points, rather than averaging points from panels in any way.

The following additional criteria will be used only to break ties to avoid placing fewer than 5 or more than 7 in a final round:

• Judges' preference as indicated by comparative rank in head-to-head competition.
• Strength of opposition by average rank.
• Strength of opposition by average speaker points.

Only when all of the above criteria fail to break a tie will 8 entrants be placed in a final. Further discussion is required to determine how to proceed if an absolutely unbreakable tie results among the top 9 entrants in an event (or, conceivably, if there is a 5-way tie for 5th, or other such problematic permutations).

4. The same preliminary-round criteria for speaker position and protection of double-entrants apply to the final round.
5. All final rounds will use 5-judge panels, consisting of 3 elite judges and 2 head coaches.

E. Individual Entrant Awards

1. All finalists except the top performer in each event in each class will receive State Superior trophies.
2. The top performer in each event in each class will receive a First Superior trophy. The top performer will be determined by the same scoring criteria used to determine finalists. Final scores may be calculated by one of the following three methods:

• Final round ballots alone.
• All ballots, preliminary and final round.
• All ballots, with final-round ballots weighted to count twice as much as preliminary round ballots.

F. Team Awards

1. Team Excellence Awards will be awarded according to the current system: B and A schools earning 2 or more State Superiors, AA schools earning 4 or more Superiors.
2. Team Championship Awards will be awarded to the top school in each class. Team rankings will be determined by a sweepstakes format similar to that used by many invitational contests:

• Each school's best entrant in each event earns points for each round of competition (1st-place rank = 5 points, 2nd = 4 pts, 3rd = 3 pts, 4th = 2 pts, 5th and lower = 1 pt).
• A final round rank earns the same points as a preliminary round rank.

G. Applause

Audiences and fellow competitors will be permitted and encouraged to applaud after each performer in prelims and finals.

Advantages

1. More students have the chance to qualify for State (schools get more competition and educational value for their money).
2. The new qualifying system encourages increased participation in the activity during the regular season while preserving the existing opportunities for all schools to participate in District, Region, and State competition.
3. The new qualifying system encourages smaller schools to hold their own invitational contests to give their students more opportunities to qualify for State.
4. State contestants get more performance opportunities.
5. State contestants can learn to recover from a sub-par performance in one round and improve in later rounds.
6. State contestants can use earlier-round critiques to improve their performance for later rounds.
7. If multi-judge panels prove feasible, contestants receive more critiques from a wider range of judges.
8. Coaches get valuable judging experience.
9. Tournament format increases the competitive spirit and excitement of this State event.
10. First Superior and Team Championship Awards place Oral Interp on a similar footing with other competitive SDHSAA events, making the State event easier to explain to administrators, boards, and community members.

The State Oral Interpretation Festival is a unique and important fine arts event in South Dakota. The changes outlined here will increase the event's educational value and promote increased participation in the activity throughout the season.

Online discussion at http://sdstateinterp.blogspot.com/