Welcome to Cooper Tournament week.  Here are the details.

Saturday Details

First round is scheduled for 8:30 AM.  If you are debating at the tournament you should expect to arrive by 8:00 AM.  Your return time will not be until around 5:30 PM because we have to go through each and every classroom and ensure they are clean.

If you are helping out with the tournament you should arrive by 7:15 AM to help setup.  You will get to leave around awards 4:30 PM.

Friday Details

If you have something to donate or bring to the school you can drop it off on Friday night.  Anyone who is able to help move tables/chairs is encouraged to come around 6:00 PM (there is a musical at 7:00 PM - so we have to be done moving tables/chairs by then).

Thanks,

DJ

Wanted to pass a congratulations to a few people for moving degrees this weekend.

Chyenne Thibodo reached the degree Superior Distinction (750 Points) this weekend.

Scott Ragan reached the degree of Excellence (150 Points) this weekend.

As a team we have now reached a degree strength of 101 degrees which is good for 13th place amongst Southern MN District (last year Southern MN was the largest NFL district based on new degrees).

Congrats to everyone on the team for this accomplishment.

Congratulations to Marek on his final round appearance in Novice LD.  Although the final round didn't turn out like he had hoped for it was a great learning experience.  Marek also finished the tournament as the top speaker.

Scott finished in 4th place and 4th overall speaker.

Congratulations to all on a great weekend.

Big weekend of hardware for the team.  Here is a small list of what was brought home:

Speaker Awards

• Amith (7th - Varsity)
• Tony (5th - Varsity)
• Chyenne (2nd - Varsity)
• Scott (6th - Novice)
• Tom (3rd - Novice)

Places

• Tony (5th - Varsity)
• Chyenne (3rd - Varsity)
• Sydney (2nd - JV)
• Tom (3rd - Novice)

Congrats to everyone.  If I goofed up the final places let me know.  I'm doing this all from memory so it's completely possible.  Congrats to everyone.  It was a great weekend for everyone!  Scott finished in 6th place - missed the trophy from one speaker point.

Congratulations to Sydney Nolan for going undeafed at this weekend's Jefferson Debate Tournament.  Sydney finished with a 4-0 record and took 4th place.  Other notable finishes include: Chyenne who finished 3-1 in Varsity LD and Tom finished 3-1 in Novice LD.

Congratulations to Scott Ragan who (although finishing with an even record of 2-2) was the 4th best speaker at the tournament with straight 28's in each of his four rounds.

Congrats to everyone!

Interested in joining the team, or simply looking for more information about debate at Robbinsdale Cooper? Here's everything you need:

Debate Flyers & Handouts

Debate Packet for 2008-09 School Year - Our debate packet outlines many of the common questions about debate and lists NFL membership information and end-of-year awards for the previous years.  (Updated May 10th, 2008)

Debate Camp 08-09 - Each summer Robbinsdale Cooper holds a three day debate for first and second year students to improve their debate skills and experience.  The last two days of the camp, we are joined by the Varsity Team and start preparing on topic analysis for the October LD topic. (Updated May 14th, 2008)

Bad news, Emilia didn't clear.  Everyone is ready to go for Thursday.  One day off tomorrow to enjoy the town.

DJ

So the day didn't work out like we wanted to.  After six rounds of public forum debate, Erik and Chyenne did not clear to elimination rounds for later today.  They will continue to debate on Thursday in Improtu Debate.

Emilia had a good day.  She ended up base + 1 at the end.  The top 8 students move onto the Semi-Final senate which occurs tomorrow.  We have to head off to the Schwan's party to find out about Emilia.

DJ

So we have completed one day of the tournament.  So here are the highlights from today.  We don't know anything for sure as we don't get official results until the end of the week.

Erik and Chyenne have completed 4 of their first 6 guarenteed rounds.  Erik thinks they are about 2-6 (two judges in each round) and Chyenne thinks its 6-2.  So we will see tomorrow.  We need to pick up 8 of the 12 ballots to continue to the double elimintation rounds starting on Tuesday afternoon.

Emilia is +1 above base.  Base is the total average number of speeches which is an average of 2 speeches.  You want to be both above base and have a high number of quality speeches.  We won't know if Emilia moves onto elimination rounds until after Tuesday night.

We are also at 272 tickets in the arcade.  Lastly, make sure to check out the new National Tournament Photo Gallery.

DJ

So we got into Las Vegas and discovered a few things.  First its really hot.  Second its kinda scary north of Las Vegas.  Third, the new hulk movie is really really really bad!  Words cannot express how bad it is.

So many may ask what we ate for the first day.  Well, it wasn't the most nutritious meals.  We started with lunch at Raisin Canes and tonight ate a little Sonic for dinner.  I promise better food in the future.

Also, we will start our daily running total of arcade tickets we have won - 108 tickets in one day.  Not a good investment for sure.

DJ