MS Congress

Preset Randomized Recency

Click Here for Explanatory Document

The Presiding Officers must use precedence and recency to determine the next speaker as well as the next questioner.  Preset randomized recency must be used to determine each participant’s initial “recency” with respect to speeches and questioning.  This will be established based on the seating chart order unless detailed otherwise.  For speeches, the ordering is from low to high.  For questioning, the ordering is from high to low.  For example, in a chamber with 15 participants, the student listed in the first slot (1) has priority for the first speech (followed by 2, 3, 4, etc), whereas the student listed in the last slot (15) has priority for the first question (followed by 14, 13, 12, etc).  As the chamber progresses, speakers and questioners must be selected correctly based on precedence and recency.  If a PO selects the incorrect student as the next speaker or next questioner, this can only be addressed and remedied at that time (prior to the speech or questioning) by a student, the parliamentarian, or another judge in the chamber.  A PO’s incorrect selection of the next speaker or questioner based on the preset randomized recency will not be grounds for a protest.

Legislation Submission Overview

OSDA students are encouraged to submit legislation to their coach.  All legislation shall follow guidelines set by the National Speech and Debate Association and be typed using the OSDA Legislation Templates and shared as a Google Document.

Coaches then share the Google Document with their OSDA District's Congress Liaison by the Legislation Deadline (see below).

Monthly dockets will be divided into weekly tournament sections.  Tournament hosts should clearly communicate/confirm the legislation that will be on their tournament's docket. 

For the OSDA Middle School Tournament, legislation will be posted online by February 15 in sections: preliminary and finals

Important Dates

October 1

Submissions for the initial 2023-2024 MS Congress Docket Due

December 1

Submissions for the second 2023-2024 MS Congress Docket Due

January 15

Submissions for the 2024 MS State Tournament Docket Due

District Congress Liaisons

2023-2024

Akron:  Anthony Paridon (Norton)

Canton:  Kayla Hrindak (Louisville)

Cleveland:  Vicki Balzer (Laurel)

Columbus:  Julia Bray (Gahanna-Lincoln)

GMV:  Jeri Neidhard (Centerville)

Toledo:  Jaiden McQuillin (Otsego)

Youngstown:  Nicole Fryfogle (South Range)

Past OSDA HS Legislation