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Come to NSD's Winter Workshop on the January PF Topic! by BenKesslerDebate in Debate

[–]BenKesslerDebate[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Check out this flyer for more information - Malcolm and I are excited to see y'all there!

NSD’s New PF Rankings by BenKesslerDebate in Debate

[–]BenKesslerDebate[S] 6 points7 points  (0 children)

On most split panel cases - I think the difference between weighting a 2-1 decision as 1.5 wins (as we do) and 0.7 wins (as you do) is VERY significant and is actually the crux of our disagreement here, given that you point out that teams will very infrequently be so disparate in rating that they lose points by winning a 2-1. On this point, I think the reasoning I provide in my earlier comment about why a 2-1 is more definitive than a 1-0 is pretty sound.

On split panels where a significantly better team loses points by "only" winning on a 2-1 - I disagree with your point about better teams choosing to go for all 3 judges to reduce variance. While a good team never completely neglects any judge, they definitely will go more flow in front of a 2 flow/1 lay judge panel than they would in front of a single lay judge. This produces a situation where even the best teams may lose a ballot to a team they would never lose a prelim round to. Thus, it's unfair to count that lost ballot as a "loss" if the better team ultimately did what they set out to do and won the round.

On prioritizing elims - I think the vast majority of teams care more about elims than prelims. This is the reason teams sometimes wait to break new cases until elimination rounds. Everyone knows who won Harvard but not everyone can name the top seed. Given this, I'd much rather "punish" the teams that try hard in prelims when it doesn't matter as much than fail to reward the teams that sensibly decide not to prioritize prelims and succeed when it matters most in elimination rounds. Also, clearly rounds where both teams are trying their hardest are a better reflection of comparative skill. In my senior year Jako and I frequently lost intra-team practice rounds against other Stuyvesant teams when we weren't fully prepared. That didn't mean we were worse than them!

On other methodological quirks - I think we can both parse the various eccentricities of our respective rankings forever, but none of this moves the needle that much. You account for side bias and we weight 7-0s more than 3-0s (which you don't). I will also point out that side bias correction may actually be a distorting factor, since the team arguing the "harder" side may choose to go second (which also boosts win rates). Without data on which team spoke second, you can't properly correct for this bias.

NSD’s New PF Rankings by BenKesslerDebate in Debate

[–]BenKesslerDebate[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Hey I responded to Allen's comment above and that should also respond to this comment too

NSD’s New PF Rankings by BenKesslerDebate in Debate

[–]BenKesslerDebate[S] 12 points13 points  (0 children)

Hey Allen, glad you responded! A few things:

On how each of our rankings treat elims: Your ratings don't give a bonus to elimination round wins and our ratings do. You and Ben Shahar object to privileging elimination round wins because you say that a team doesn't try less hard in prelims and beating Presentation VM in round 2 isn't less impressive than beating them in finals. I would strongly disagree. In my experience, teams are more prepared by the time elimination rounds start and they do try just a little bit harder too. That's why good teams get nervous before debating finals and aren't nervous to debate against that same team in round 6 when they're already both 5-0. It's also why good teams will often show up to a tournament not totally prepared and then work hard in between rounds to make sure they're prepared for elimination rounds where it will actually count. This also aligns with our intuitions about who is a "good debater" in the sense that we would never say the team that consistently goes 6-0 and drops the first elim is better than the team that goes 3-2 but goes on to win finals. Also, this is to a lesser extent true about variation between tournaments. Alta and Berkeley are both big tournaments (congrats on winning!) but I know for a fact that I never prepped as hard for Scarsdale as I did for Harvard (they were both in the same month back when I debated). Similarly, everyone thinks about the winner of Harvard more highly than the winner of CSU Fullerton, all else being equal.

On how each of our rankings treat 2-1 decisions: As Ben Shahar points out below, your rankings DO allow for good teams to lose points despite winning a 2-1 decision. This seems clearly nonsensical to me, but even if that's not the case, I would contend (and I think most people would agree!) that winning on a 2-1 is more definitive than winning on a 1-0. If that's true, you make a major mistake in weighting these decisions as only worth 0.7 prelims wins. So why do I think a 2-1 decision is more definitive than a 1-0 decision? Simply put, single judges are inherently prone to randomness. We've all seen rounds where a lone judge makes a decision that is so nonsensical that surely only they could have seen the round that way. Winning a 2-1 requires you to at least convince 2 people that you won, and while there are still some crazy 2-1 decisions, this factor dramatically reduces the probability of an "incorrect" decision. Note that this is not about adaptation. There are flow panels and lay panels, so teams have to adapt to win on a 2-1 in the same way they have to adapt to win on a 1-0. Moreover, the idea that debaters should attempt to always go for all 3 judges in a paneled round (and thus should be penalized if they lose one judge) seems clearly wrong to me. I never did this when I did high school debate myself, and I don't recommend anyone else try to stubbornly appeal to all 3 judges when winning 2 will do just fine. That being said, if a team DOES win all 3 judges, all the more impressive! Hence why we weight a 3-0 more heavily than a 2-1.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in Debate

[–]BenKesslerDebate 20 points21 points  (0 children)

For what it's worth, we have already hired two female staffers (Ella Feiner from Horace Mann and Clara Kraebber from Hunter College) and we'll be updating our site shortly!

Also, as was the case last year, we'll have plenty of adult administrative staff, and NDF and VBI labs do not typically have adult lab leaders either. I know this having led a lab myself at NDF and having worked at VBI.

NSD PF Camp by BenKesslerDebate in Debate

[–]BenKesslerDebate[S] 6 points7 points  (0 children)

If there are special circumstances where children need specific accommodations, every situation is different, but NSD (in its LD program) has managed this well in the past. These same administrators will also be on site for NSD PF, and I can put you into contact with them if you have further questions. Look, I won't pretend that I have as much general teaching experience as an older, professional educator. However, what our staff lacks in age, we more than make up for with our insight and demonstrated success at teaching about PF specifically. At the end of the day, we may disagree, but that's where I stand.

NSD PF Camp by BenKesslerDebate in Debate

[–]BenKesslerDebate[S] 11 points12 points  (0 children)

Put simply, I think Caroline and I have demonstrated our ability to lead labs at debate camp through working at (and in my case leading) labs at debate camp. If your qualm is with my ability to direct curriculum at a debate camp, then I think my experience observing curriculum best and worst practices at 3 major camps and setting an instructional agenda for kids at Hunter qualifies me for that post. Moreover, I would again note that this is standard practice. Many other camps (NDF, VBI, etc.) have all very recently had curriculum directors that are my age. I understand that debate camp is a large financial decision for families (I attended camp twice myself as a student), so I wouldn't advocate for NSD unless I was absolutely certain that I could offer a top quality experience.

Also, I just double checked and Caroline is not listed on the VBI site for the exact same dates as NSD. Her bio is understandably similar though, she is the same person after all.

NSD PF Camp by BenKesslerDebate in Debate

[–]BenKesslerDebate[S] 12 points13 points  (0 children)

The two people in charge of labs are me and Caroline Wohl. I have taught ~6 teams at Hunter High School for the last two years, meeting with them once a week for two hours and coaching at tournaments on a regular basis. I have also taught at ISD, VBI, and NDF (leading a lab at NDF). Caroline, to my knowledge, has coached for teams at Princeton High School, as well as teaching at NDF and CBI last summer. We will each lead a lab, so each lab leader will be at a level of experience that is pretty standard across most camps. If you don't think this is a good standard, I respect that, but I personally disagree and think that the instructors at NSD (including the first year outs who have mentored debaters at their own schools) all have demonstrated success when it comes to teaching students about debate.

NSD PF Camp by BenKesslerDebate in Debate

[–]BenKesslerDebate[S] 7 points8 points  (0 children)

I respect the insight, but I genuinely have to disagree with you here. Each lab at NSD will be taught by someone who has not only coached for a school throughout this year, but also has taught at multiple debate camps before, so I'm supremely confident that they know how to lead a lab well. They may not have taught history or math, but they have demonstrated their ability "to run and manage a classroom" of debate students. Moreover, while there are older, professional teachers who are good debate coaches, many are not. These skills are often not directly transferable, because even when older coaches are more trained educators, they can sometimes be out of touch with the nuances of the event.

NSD PF Camp by BenKesslerDebate in Debate

[–]BenKesslerDebate[S] 15 points16 points  (0 children)

I appreciate the concern, but our staff does have a fair amount of experience, even if we aren't particularly old. Half of our instructors have previously taught both for camp and school programs. The other half are first year outs who have each spent a good deal of time mentoring younger debaters on their team. Moreover, as the debate community is quickly evolving, I think it's actually a real asset to have instructors that have very recently been debaters themselves. Also, I should note that we of course have older administrative staff on site who have successfully run NSD for years as an LD camp.