Rules

 Exit 36 Slam Poetry Festival Rules & Competition Structure

Festival Overview

Total Competing Poets: 40

Poems Needed to Win: 6 (including a 2-minute poem)

Competition Stages: Preliminaries, Semi-Finals, and Final Stage

No Poem Repeats: Poets must perform a new poem each round.

Venues: Pompano Beach Cultural Center 50 W Atlantic Blvd. Pompano Beach, FL 33060

Ali Cultural Arts Center & Black Box 353 MLK Blvd. Pompano Beach, FL 33060

Preliminary Rounds

Each poet will compete in one of four micro-bouts per night.

Poets will perform one original poem per preliminary round.

Bout Draw will be done virtually through randomizer software. Poets can log onto zoom to watch the draw live, it will be recorded and emailed out only.

No poet will be eliminated in prelims.

No poem repeats are allowed throughout the competition.

Ranking System

Poets are ranked 1-10 in their micro-bout based on their scores.

If there is a tie, poets will share the rank, and the next poet will receive an adjusted rank.

Example: If two poets tie for 3rd place, the ranking will be 1,2,3,3,5,6…

Highest Score Prize: The poet with the highest score of the night wins $100 and the 2nd highest score will receive $75.

In the event of a tie, poets can either split the prize or participate in a one-minute poem-off decided by auidence noise.

Advancing to Semi-Finals

The Top 20 poets with the highest cumulative scores from both days advance to Semi-Finals.

Poets ranked 21st and 22nd will open for Semi-Finals, one in each bout.

Semi-Finals

The Top 20 poets compete in two bouts of 10 poets each.

The bout will be head-to-head battles.

The winners of each head-to-head matchup will move on to final stage

Semi-Finals will take place at venue from 12pm to 2pm.

Performance Rules:

Poets will perform 2-minute poems.

Poets will draw numbers 1-10 to determine matchups (1 vs. 2, 3 vs. 4, etc.).

Judging Method: Instead of scores, judges will vote by selecting a color assigned to each poet.

2 minute hard stop

Advancing to Finals:

The Top 10 poets move on to Final Stage.

The remaining poets will draw to determine which will be the 2 poets who will sac on final stage.

Relative strength will be used when necessary to determine ranking

Final Stage

Round 1: 10 poets compete.

Round 2: Top 7 poets advance.

Round 3 (Final Round): Top 4 poets compete

Judging & Scoring:

5 Judges 

Rounds 1 & 2 are cumulative 

Round 3 is Clean Slate 

Tiebreakers:

Ties will be broken by the highest cumulative score of all 5 scores

If there is still a tie after cumulative score poets must perform a 1-minute poem slam off to decide who advances.

The final round tie will be decided by an up to 3 minute 20 second one-poem slam-off (poets may use a repeat poem only for the tiebreaker). 

Protests

Any concerns regarding scores must be raised immediately after the bout before score sheets are signed.

Once signed, no protests will be accepted.

     Performance Rules

No props allowed.

No reading of poems on Final Stage (ADA exceptions apply).

No interaction with audience including but not limited to dancing to stage. Bout Management has discretion to decided what is or is not engagement, as well as to start poet's time.  

Time Limits

Preliminaries: 3 minutes + 10-second grace period.

Semi-Finals (2-minute round): 2 minutes hard stop.

Final Stage: 3 minutes + 20-second grace period.

Penalty: 0.5 points deducted for every 10 seconds over time.

No Poem Repeats: Poets must perform a new poem in every round except for a final round tiebreaker.

Judging

Each bout will have five (5) judges.

At least three (3) judges will be from a pre-selected panel.

Prizes

1st Place: $5,000

2nd Place: $2,500

3rd Place: $1,500

4th Place: $500

Highest Score Prize: $100 highest score and $75 second highest score of the night

Ties: Prize money will be split equally

Champion will receive an all-expense paid cultural exchange trip to Togo, Africa in November 2027! If poets choose to share first place and spilt the prize money, only the poet with the highest cumalitive score will receive the trip. 

Final Notes

Scoring Accuracy: Bout managers and organizers will take the necessary time to ensure accurate scores.

Respect the Process: Poets should allow time for calculations and refrain from rushing the scoring process. Scoring will be emailed only and posted to Sharonda “Eccentrich” Richardson Facebook page, Exit 36 Instagram Page, and next day posted on the official google festival website.