Judge Information

Thank you SO MUCH for stepping forward for the Asynchronous Speech Championship tournament as a hired judge! We are so grateful for your willingness to help out! Wanted to share with you a few details for you to be able to plan what you can expect!

How Do Rounds Work?

If you’ve judged for asynch tournaments, you know that you’ve got rounds to judge within a timeframe rather than at a specific room at a specific time. That means you’ll get to schedule in when you would like to get your judging assignments completed! Woot! Sometimes I like to pre-schedule time for my rounds to make sure I know when I’m going to do them. If you’re feeling that type of organized today, you can set aside approximately the following for hours! Obviously this is all tentative and would constitute the longest time commitment you would have during these sections.

What's the timeframes on rounds, and how much time should I budget?

Wed, March 20 @ 3 p.m. CST-Friday, March 20 @ 4 p.m. CST

·Prelims: Typically we will assign 2-3 prelims, so you’ll want to set aside however long you’ll need to get that done. If you typically take 1.5 hours per round, you should set aside 3-5 hours.

Friday, March 22 @ 7 p.m. CST-Saturday, March 22 @ noon CST

·Quarterfinals: Typically we’ll only assign 1 outround per level, so schedule the 1.5ish hours you’ll need to get that done

Saturday, March 23 @  1 p.m. CST-Saturday, March 23 @ 8 p.m. CST

·Semifinals: Typically we only assign 1 outround per level, so schedule the 1.5ish hours you’ll need to get that done

Saturday, March 24 @ 10 p.m. CST-Sunday, March 24 @ 4 p.m. CST

·Finals: Typically we only assign 1 outround per level, so schedule the 1.5ish hours you’ll need to get that done

How Many Points Are Rounds Out Of

To help differentiate between the very close rankings of students we've seen in these competitive rounds, we've set rounds to be out of 30 points instead of 25. This allows for more differentiation in close rounds. 

My Prelim Ballot isn't Letting Me Rank to 6. What Do I Do?

Speechwire doesn't allow us to have rankings to 6 in preliminary rounds. Differentiate between your 5th and 6th place competitors in your prelim round by using the number of points earned. For instance, your 5th place person would be entered as 5-22, and your 6th place person would be entered a 5-20.

But I've Never Judged Online Before

We know some folks haven't been able to judge online before. Not a problem! If you are new to judging virtual tournaments, you should have received an email password from Speechwire to set up an account through the platform. These often go to junkmail, so check there if you're not seeing the account information.

If you’re not familiar, Speechwire is our platform for running tournaments. This is where you’ll access your ballots and schedule information. Most of the information is pushed out to you (so you shouldn’t have to go looking for it).

You will log in to www.live.speechwire.com to access your eballots.

Never used an eballot system before? Check out this video! https://youtu.be/YJXxeVS-KgM

Watch from start to 10:45 in the video (they go over to synchronous tournaments after that) The only comment from later in the video you may want to know will be it’s easier and suggested to judge on a computer of some kind.

Where's My Dance Card/When Do I Judge?

These are great questions. Log in to http://live.speechwire.com to access your assigned rounds. You will see a list of rounds you've been assigned as of that point in the tournament. We will assign all prelim ballots on Wednesday, all quarterfinals on Friday, all semifinals on Saturday, and all Finals on Sunday. You should get a notification when ballots are available for you, but if you're like me you'll probably want to go check just in case.

Where are the Videos I Need to Judge? 

When you log into your round the first time, Speechwire will ask you for your phone number. This is to make sure if there’s any issues, we have a number we can use as hosts to reach you. 

You will open your "round" and see your cover sheet where you record rankings and rates after the round is over. To access individual videos, you'll need to open the individual student's comments space. The video link will be at the top of the ballot.

I Noticed Some Content Warnings on Performances, and I Don't Think I can Judge This Round

Your safety as a judge is important to us. Contact the tournament director to be reassigned to a different round. Thank you for taking care of yourself. 

If anyone has questions about judging or what to expect or any other comments, please feel free to email (julie.walker@smsu.edu) or text/call me (706-844-2773).