NCFCA Georgia Qualifier Highlights

This qualifier was held at the Technical College in Acworth, Georgia. I believe I remember the number of competing students being about 225. The above photo was on opening night before the students changed over to professional, tournament attire.

Qualifiers are a time to catch up with friends. All of whom shall remain nameless, because I never post names of minors on my blog. The only exception is my daughter.

Above, my daughter Kali is in the middle of a debate round. Her opponent is presenting at the time. Kali was the Negative side. (I am getting better at taking photos through the windows on doors - lol! I was hall monitor at the time. All the windows had wire mesh on them, I got decent at shooting between the mesh.)

A friendly critique after the debate. Kali won this particular round.

The story about Georgia is this - it rained the entire time we were there - four days! I posted this shot earlier on my blog, but I reallly like it, so here it is again :O).

Seas of professional, business attire. It's a requirement and a great thing for the students to learn at this point in their lives. I wish I'd had something like this when I was their age.

Meal times were also gathering times to discuss how your speeches and debates were going. You could hear students all over the building bouncing ideas off each other, searching for ways to make their speeches and cases better, asking their friends to listen to their speeches as they practiced. It's amazing how they all work together, help each other, and get excited for the ones that do so well - even when their own events don't always go as well as they would have liked.

These two guys are best buddies! And, they both like to have their photos taken. I am guessing this is going to become a tradition at every tournament/qualifier. Oh, wait! I think the older one is graduating this year. No!!!

I mentioned we were at the Technical College. As such, they had some interesting rooms. With as many competitors as we had - we needed all available rooms. I found the room shown above to be the most interesting. Two covered stretchers in the back. Wow! As you look at the photo, the debaters sat at the table closest to you. The judge and timer sat at the table closest to the stretchers. Not my cup of tea - lol! Thankfully, I didn't have to judge in this room. We would have been rearranging the furniture for sure.

I did get to judge in this room, however. There were skulls lining the shelves around the room. Interesting, but not as creepy as the other room. These guys are in the middle of an interpretive speech - My Fair Lady. In interps, you take parts of the literary piece, string them together and act them out. There's a lot more to it than just that - but that's a definition in a nutshell. This was a great duo interp. They were hysterical. (I need to point out that I was not judging, I was invited in to watch.) I need to find the video and add it at the bottom of this post. I took photos during some of the piece, then video'd the rest of it.This is a common sight at qualifiers. The students are milling around waiting for the next event list to be posted. Typed assignments are taped to the walls and list where each student should be, what event they will be in, and who they will be competing with. Then it's a mad dash because the events usually start in five minutes and the judges are already in the rooms wondering where the students are - lol.

There are always lots of siblings at our events. No one is too young to come. The moms with toddlers or newborns get special assignments that they can handle with their children. No one gets turned away. Many siblings act as timers in the event rooms, of course, this little sweetie is too young to time. She won't be for long, though. She's from our chapter :O). Isn't she precious?

Listening with great intensity to the Finals round for Team Policy debating. This is where two teams, of two persons each, debate the foreign policy between the United States and India. The debate topic changes each year.

Then it's on to awards at the end of the qualifier. We started out with some praise and worship music. Have I mentioned this is a Christian organization?

Just one of many photos I have of students receiving awards. You can find more on Facebook.

Congratulations all around! You survived and made it through!

Then, on to the after party at Fuddrucker's. I posted some different shots earlier in a post about something else. Here are just a few new ones.

OK, the balloon lady was officially awesome! She could make anything you wanted - and did! Some of her creations really reminded me of Dr. Seuss.

Even some of the parents enjoyed the balloons :O).

I don't know how they got these things in their cars - lol!

We had a great time in Georgia. Now I need to edit shots from North Carolina - O.o!

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