American Forensic Association National Individual Events Tournament
Committee Meeting at the 2011 AFA-NIET
Holiday Inn Convention Center
Kearney, Nebraska
April 1, 2011
Minutes
In attendance: Roberts, Northup, Bates, White, Gaer, Schnoor, Collie, Leyes, Morris, Paine, Imbody, Hoover, Young, Edwards, Hindman, Pober, Thompson, Mayfield
I. Call to Order at 9:10 Bates/m Pober/s. approval of minutes
II. Officer Reports
A. NIET Committee Chair (Thompson)
Few state orgs asked for a approval of tournament of 7, so approved. Quick turnaround on tab errors, wants to recognize all the NIET members at opening assembly
B. Vice Chair (Pober)
Nothing to report, request a delay on voting issues until students join us
C. Board of Trustees Chair (White)
Move to raising uncovered judge fees to meet the cost of what we pay a full time judge. Increase to $25 to help attract a quality judging pool. PASSED
D. Chair Emeritus (Carver)
Not attending.
E. Tournament Director (Schnoor)
Tournament prep has been easy, no drops up to this point. Thanks to Susan Collie and Dave Gaer for the help in the past week of prep for registration, any changes at this point have been noted in the individual packets. Tournament is almost the same size as last year. There are 80 schools attending with 11 Community Colleges at the NIET. The Tournament does have to use of two golf carts.
F. Secretary (Mayfield)
Minutes will stand as report
G. Webmaster (Cronn-Mills)
Website is up and running and going well. Cronn-Mills will step down as webmaster. Thompson thanks Cronn-Mills for his dedication and urges us to help find the replacement for Cronn-Mills for a smooth transition.
III. Tournament Host Reports
A. 2010 – University of Nebraska-Kearny (Kamrath)
Excited that the day is here and all is going well. Thompson extends thanks to Rachelle and her team for the work they have put in.
B. 2011 – Texas State University (Kraemer)
Kraemer thanks committee for the acceptance of the bid for 2012. San Marcos is close to San Antonio (40 miles) and Austin (38 miles) so it will be easy to get to the city. The program has plenty of support: The LBJ debate society has been around for 128 years, Steven Beebe is the Chair of the department. The mayor of San Marcos is one of Wayne’s students. Texas State has a wide diversity of culture. “Welcome to our Hill Country home, we love your company” will be the theme of the tournament. Light reception planned for the night of registration, a pre-awards reception is planned with light or heavy hors devours at awards the area will be set up with tables so that districts can sit together. Prelim rounds held on campus with finals at the hotel location. The campus is hilly so competitors should prepare accordingly. 135 rooms are available on campus to accommodate the tournament. Hotel rooms are negotiated at $139 a night but will sleep 7 comfortably. For out-rounds there will not be a problem with sound bleeding between rooms. Wayne has a strong support staff to help host the tournament both on and off campus. Morris asks about the meal card, and suggests that with only 2 days on campus to use the card perhaps it is better to reduce the amount on the cards so that team has money to give to students for last day of the tournament. Wayne is looking into meal options on Monday to help cover the cost of meals for the final day. NIET next year will be over Easter weekend and they are looking in to providing a special meal for the occasion. 89 rooms are used this year and projected that that will be the need for next year as well so there should be plenty of rooms available.
C. Future Hosts Bids
Schnoor reports that there are no leads for 2013, so the call is out for future host.
IV. Committee Reports
A. AFA-NIET Student Committee
Gamboa introduces the new student reps, Ryan Cashman ISU and William Igbokwe UTAustin.
Good student meeting, representation from every District present. Graves reports that the student body is in full support for the change in duo.
B. Distinguished Service Committee
Pober reminds the committee that no nominations were received for Distinguished Service this past year.
C. New Coach Award
Pober reminds the committee that 3 New Coach Awards will be given at the opening assembly. Those receiving awards are:
Tim Brown—Cedar Crest College
Hillary Hoover—Clemson University
Abbie Syrek—University of Nebraska, Omaha
D. Research
Schnoor (for Carver) reports that one research project will be conducted at the NIET but the research project has nothing to do with forensics—research will be completed by 2 faculty at UN Kearney the tournament will have nothing to do with the distribution or collection of data. Carver submitted a proposal that will be address later amending the Research Proposal so that only projects directly related to forensic competition will be considered.
E. Awards (Schnoor/Pober)
Pober reports that Midwest has not raised the price of awards and that all of the awards are at the tournament location.
F. All-American IE Team (Morris)
Morris reports that there are 19 applications and the committee will meet to make the final decisions. All districts will have representation on the all American team. Morris thanks the Dist. Chairs for getting the material to the committee. Leyes thanks Morris for her work on getting the material to the committee
G. Manchester Scholar Series (Pober)
No award given this year
V. Old Business
A. Ad Hoc Committee on Future Planning in Forensics
Paine, reports that some discussion has happened but not in-depth. An agenda for committee is in the works: some issues, Redistricting, virtual tournaments, genre/voice in oral interp., developmental conf. resolutions, Dist. Mission statements, historical archiving (speech topics/scripts) tournament size, readdressing new coaches handbook, ethics question. Paine reports that the Committee is split on redistr. Thompson urges that the committee decide their focus. Redistricting issue will be discussed later in the agenda but the person originating the idea has since dropped the idea of redistricting. Paine has agreed to focus committee on voices/dev.conf/archiving as the issues for their work. Technological advancement perhaps should be considered as well.
Committee members include: paine, imbody, bates, young, morris, leyes, white, hoover, and Igbokwe
B. Trial period for the inclusion of other genres besides drama for Duo
Thompson asks for a District Chair report:
1 full support
2 postitive
3 loves the idea and wants to keep it moving
4 sounds good to continue
5 no objections
6 no objections
7 the dist would like to keep change going
9 in favor
Pober/m bates/s that the event description on by-laws and NIET website be changed to reflect the new description. PASSED
Morris cautions us that not all national orgs use that event description
C. District Response on President’s Challenge on Code of Ethics (District Chairs)
Thompson asks for a District Chair report:
1 no report
2 no report
3 no report
4 no report
5 questions how it could be enforced and suggests an office of a comptroller not associated with any school/team or have students read and sign the code of ethics before they participate at the NIET and urged that we didn’t set up ‘witch hunts’
6 raised concerns about intellectual property rights and worries that the membership could be feeding an individual’s research without the direct participation
7 saw it as no formal challenge,
9 no report
Thompson urges that issues should come from the dist, and not be top down in terms of items for consideration of the NIET
D. Selection Process of national student reps
Gamboa reports that a letter of intent and letter of recommendation for nomination become an official part of the selection process. No specific motion being presented at this point. Student Reps would like this as an agenda item for our Nov. meeting.
Edwards suggest that the list of potential national student reps could be distributed by the District Chairs.
E. Four-flight Pattern for NIET/Judge Comparison on last year’s judging pool
Discussion Item Only:
Schnoor used this year’s tournament for comparison. 174 judges from schools
Number of judges by dist.
1. 16
2. 5
3. 31
4. 47
5. 19
6. 25
7. 21
9. 12
40 hired judges
Of the judges 52 had restrictions against a team or competitor. Many would not be able to judge in the quarter final round, hired judges would have to judge more rounds and thus be paid more. Under the current situation with judges this proposal wouldn’t be possible given the number of judges needed for quarter final rounds.
F. State Tournament Committee (District Chairs)
Thompson asked for a District Chair report:
In the two year trial period for having 7 schools for min. qualification
1 no state tournaments
2 no opinion
3 OK has had probs in the past but have since opened it up, sees no problem
4 1 state has no problem, but the remaining states can’t meet the min.
5 no problems with states in dist.
6 for FL it isn’t an issue, but for every other state it is an issue, this area is using a tri-state issue and still having difficulty it reaching the minimum.
7 big issue, state tournament are creative way to get more involvement in schools that wouldn’t traditionally participate. VA is seeing new programs being created because of the waiver. Sees it as a way to continue growth for the area.
9 no state tournaments
Schnoor suggest that a team sweepstakes at the state level might also encourage more participation. Will officially vote on this issue in November
G. Bylaw Ad Hoc Committee
White’s committee was charged with finding discrepancies in the by-laws.
H. Redistricting (Chairs)
This item has been dropped by the originating person. Thompson asks if the NIET want to continue the discussion of this agenda item. Edwards suggests that this particular proposal is mute at this point, but this is an item that the NIET will likely be addressing again. Thompson asked for a District Chair report:
1 no need to redist.
2 not interested in redist.
3 no need to redist.
4 likes the dist structure
5 strongly interested in redisturing discussion
6 no desire to move things around
7 redist. Not the solution, but can now address what schools might see as dist. Identity issues, Old Dist 8 schools involvement
9 no desire to redist. But schools may petition.
VI. New Business
A. Revise Guidelines for Research document (Carver)
Carver request to revise the Guidelines for Research document to include the following guideline: she would insert it as guideline 2 and change the subsequent numbering of other items contained in the guidelines. To provide context, Guideline 1 currently reads, “Research conducted at the AFA-NIET must be sanctioned by the AFA-NIET Committee prior to the beginning of the tournament.”
Proposed Guideline 2: To be considered for sanctioning, research must be related in some way to the forensics activity.
Rationale: The current Guidelines for Research make it clear that while the NIET wants to try to be supportive of research projects, our primary objective is the running of a national tournament. To that end, it seems prudent that the only research that should be considered for sanctioning by the Research Committee would be research that is actually related to the forensics activity. The national tournament provides potential access to a large group of undergraduate students and if researchers became aware that these students could be tapped as a population base, it is possible that a significant number of research requests unrelated to forensics could be received.
m/Carver. s/Schnoor. Schnoor states that research done at the NIET on the participants should be directly related and beneficial to the forensic community. Morris cautioned that we close the door to anytime of research whether it is directly related to the forensic community or not. Paine suggest that as long as it doesn’t interfere with the running of the NIET or block other forensic related research and suggest that priority be given to forensic research.
Motion: Failed
B. Change in Mid-year graduates competing in District Qualifiers
Imbody points out that:
III-F. Mid-year graduates may not compete at District Qualifiers. A student may not pursue at- large qualification status after the final day of the term in which he/she has met the requirements for graduation and has been approved for graduation by the student's respective school.
Proposed Change:
Mid-year graduates may only compete at the District Qualifiers immediately preceding that year’s NIET. A student may not pursue at-large qualification (except at-large qualifications earned at the district tournament) status after the final day of the term in which he/she has met the requirements for graduation and has been approved for graduation by the student's respective school.
Imbody/m, Morris/S.
Igbokwe asked if the student received their 3rd leg at the dist. tournament would it could as a dist qualification or an at-large qual. Imbody under this proposal, students would not forfeit previously earned legs in that event. Schnoor asked if a student in this situation could enter the dist. Tournament in events that they have not earned any legs in. Yes they could. Gaer if they are not enrolled in school, who is liable for them at that tournament and the national tournament. Collie and Roberts also point out the difficulty of institutions funding an individual who is no longer a student at that institution. Paine summarizes; if we vote the proposal it is sending the message that students should be discouraged from finishing early and questions the choice of staying in school 4 extra months to compete at additional tournaments.
Motion: Failed
Imbody points out:
III-J. If a participant qualifies for the AFA-NIET while eligible under the preceding requirements and then graduates during the academic year, he/she will be permitted to compete in the NIET for that year. (Midyear graduates may not compete at District Tournaments.)
Proposed Change:
III-J. If a participant qualifies for the AFA-NIET while eligible under the preceding requirements and then graduates during the academic year, he/she will be permitted to compete in the NIET for that year. (Mid-year graduates may only compete at the District Tournaments immediately preceding that year’s NIET.)
Rationale for changes to III-F and III-J
These changes are proposed together in order to maintain consistency in language in the by-laws.
Under the status quo, students who are in position to graduate in December have been unable to continue to qualify for the NIET after that December graduation date. This rule change will allow students to continue to seek qualification at the district tournament for that year’s NIET.
Motion: Failed
Edwards makes a formal motion that we revisit this in the fall for vote at the NCA 2011. Morris/s (will be Old Business at NCA 2011)
C. Change in Standards for at-large qualification (Imbody/District 3)
Imbody points out:
V-R. All standards for at-large qualification must be determined and regulated by the NIET Committee. Any changes or exceptions must be approved by the NIET Committee.
Proposed Change:
V-R. All standards for at-large qualification must be determined and regulated by the NIET Committee. Any changes or exceptions must first be approved by the NIET Committee then by vote of the full membership of the AFA-NIET member institutions before taking effect.
Rationale for the change to V-R.
Qualification for the NIET is central to the planning and administration of forensics teams hoping to attend the NIET. If changes are made to any standard for the qualification to the NIET then all member schools, on an individual basis, should have the chance to weigh in on the issue before rule changes take effect.
Imbody/m, Cashman/s.
Schnoor asks for clarification of what constitutes a ‘member’ school. Imbody says this committee would then be charged with defining membership.
Pober urges that since this is a charter change we table this discussion, take it back to our district schools and then discuss and vote on this agenda item at the NIET meeting at NCA 2011 in November.
Motion: TABLED
C. Change in New Coach Award materials
The new coach of the year award should solicit input from current and/ or former competitors which were officially coached by the nominee. Collie/m, Young/S.
Motion: PASSED
D. Election of Chair and Secretary Positions (National Committee)
Chair: Peter Pober elected.
Vice Chair: Lee Mayfield elected (1 year position).
Secretary: Karen Morris elected.
Tournament Director: Larry Schnoor elected.
Schnoor/m, Morris/s moved to adjourn Motion Passed