Sunday - Wednesday: Colds in July

The past few days have been a bit trying for both Josh and Chetan; Josh came down with a bad cold, and promptly passed it on to his lab partner (hence, the choice to sleep instead of blog). In-lab lecture topics over the past few days have included answering specific positions on the resolution, word economy, crystallization, 1AR strategy, and weighing. Additionally, students have participated in circle blocking (writing out answers to arguments as a group), word economy drills, 1AR redos, and a particularly memorable tag-team round (kudos to Lauren Mahomes for saving the day on that one!). Yesterday, we began the camp tournament, where Philip had to face the mighty Sheryl Kaczmerack, the coach/teacher who's been observing our lab. Rounds continue today as we move towards the end of the camp experience. We hope to stop sneezing soon.

Saturday: No rodents allowed

On Saturday morning, we began lab with a lecture on how to use prep time effectively, which covered topics like how to determine what must be answered and what may be dropped, and emphasized the importance of using the opponent's prep time, too. After the lecture, Josh explained the standards refutation drill, and the students broke into groups to practice explaining the syllogisms behind their standards and refuting each other's standards analysis. The first step of the drill involved simply identifying flaws with others' standards (no link to the value, not necessary, not sufficient, etc.); the second required debaters to isolate one particular flaw with their opponent's standard and explain why, comparatively, their own standard didn't commit the same violation.

The afternoon lab began with an explanation of how to use theory to justify one's interpretation of the resolution in the AC. From there, Chetan and Josh provided analysis on answering multiple a priori arguments, and had the students write out a theory violation to use against such strategies. They were joined by Mr. Timmons, who offered several additional justifications for rejecting multiple a prioris. After a terrifying discussion about rodents, students were treated to a lecture from Josh on how to run topicality violations, and then received instruction on how they might answer such violations if opponents are running them. The session concluded with a sample abusive definition of "on balance," which students were asked to answer in either T-shell or lay terms.

At the beginning of the evening session, we broke into groups, and students practiced their T arguments, in addition to writing responses to the violations others had run. We regrouped as a lab for additional discussion on T, followed by a brief lecture on how to crystallize. Once again, we broke into groups, and students practiced regiving their NR or 2AR voting issues from their practice rounds at the end of lab. We look forward to a productive and rodent-free second week.

Friday, June 29: Refute that nonsense

In the morning lab session, the students had casing conferences withChetan and Josh in an effort to solidify their positions. While the conferences were going on, Mr. Timmons provided feedback to students doing rebuttal redoes, emphasizing argumentative clarity and technical precision. Later in the morning, Chetan delivered a lecture on refuting value/criterion structure, which served as the basis for a nightly homework assignment—and various exercises to be done on Saturday. In the afternoon lab, we discussed in detail different categories of responses to arguments, and the advantages and shortcomings of each type. This segued into a drill where the students applied each category of response to an argument they'd encountered in their practice round. We'd like to complement Chey Mashburn on her outstanding word economy during the afternoon drills.

Wednesday and Thursday: Rounds and more

The last two days of the Andertzig lab have been intense. On Wednesday morning and afternoon, students debated a full round in front of instructors, followed by extensive comments on their cases and rebuttal strategies. That evening, they received a lecture on CX strategies from Josh and Chetan, and then proceeded to participate in a practicum in which one student read a case and the other students cross-examined her, attempting to put into practice the strategies they'd just learned. In addition, labs featured different kinds of flowing drills designed to hone various skills, including the ability to comprehend speed reading, write down words without vowels, and process information without flowing all of it.

On Thursday morning, the students were broken into groups and were asked to regive a rebuttal (either the NC refutation or the 1AR) from their round. Following the rebuttal, they received comments on how to improve their issue selection, time allocation, and word economy, and were given an opportunity to practice regiving the speech in less time. That afternoon, they participated in their second debate round, and again received extensive feedback on their performances from instructors. Last night, after a discussion on solvency issues in LD, students participated in case conferences with Chetan and Josh, and also did rebuttal drills for Mr. Timmons.

Today's shoutout goes to Paul Tyger, who managed to drastically revise his AC over the course of the day after receiving comments on it from instructors. Good going!

Tuesday, June 26: Topic (de)Construction

On Tuesday, the students in Josh, Chetan, and AT's lab enjoyed a variety of topic discussion and lecture in preparation for the case positions they will be turning in on Wednesday. The morning session began with a brilliantly informative lecture on casing technique by Chetan, emphasizing considerations of clarity, strategy, and developed warrants. Our afternoon lab debriefed regarding Monday night's demonstration debate between Liz Mullins and Shane O'Neil. This developed into a great discussion about strategic decision-making and argument "packaging." The lab also did a number of flowing diagnostics—initially flowing an actual case used on the year's previous domestic violence topic. This segued into a discussion of frameworking techniques. Finally, the lab got into their evidence groups to compile an argument list, which from there, expanded into a position list. We'd like to specifically commend Seif for his constant and thoughtful contributions throughout the entire day. We continue with spirit and thrift!

Monday, June 25: Topic Analysis Labs

As promised, today's lab meetings have been action-packed. We began this morning with Josh's mini-lecture on trade agreements (which included an explanation of tariffs, the WTO, and various other related terms and concepts), followed by a discussion on how to define "worker welfare," "developing countries," and "economic gains." We concluded that while foreign nations' compliance with U.S. labor standards is sometimes economically beneficial to America, the resolution assumes a conflict between worker welfare and U.S. economic gains. Thus, debaters should evaluate the resolution as a trade-off: the affirmative gets to claim benefits from protecting worker welfare, but must weigh those against economic costs; the negative gets to claim economic benefits, but those come with a decrease in protection for workers. After a brief interruption in which students received ID cards, lab resumed. We identified the type of resolution, the object of evaluation, evaluative term, context, agent of action, types of conflict in the topic, burdens on each side, presumption, and extremes versus middle ground, in addition to listing out authors and search terms for the students to use in the library. (Today, we'd like to recognize Nikita Lalwani for her active participation and helpful contributions!)Following an afternoon lecture by Dr. Robinson, we discussed last night's assigned reading in depth, and then took students to the library to begin the research process. Each student has an evidence assignment due tomorrow, with cases to be due shortly thereafter.

Sunday, June 24: Lab Introductions

The Hertzig/Anderson lab held an introductory meeting this evening. After a brief icebreaker ("two truths and a lie") in which Josh revealed his religious roots and Chetan revealed his age, the students wrote out their goals for the institute, as well as their competitive goals for the year and their long-term debate career goals. (We plan on incorporating as many student-suggested areas of instruction into our lab curriculum as possible.) Students received their instructors' contact information, and were given a list of lab expectations. Additionally, they were told that they will have access to their lab leaders at all times during the day, and should feel free to approach their instructors with questions and concerns. Just before the lab's conclusion, we began the process of topic analysis, focusing on the "on balance" phrase in the resolution and concluding that it rules out extreme examples on both sides. We plan to continue this process in greater depth tomorrow.