Beyond black and white: Danique van Koppenhagen (l) and Fred Cowell (r) are looking for Co-DCAs

“We will not be appointing DCAs on a specifically regional basis but will instead be appointing those individuals who meet the qualifications and are best placed to fulfil the duties and expectations of a DCA. The qualifications and duties of a DCA are set out below, we will be using our application form and the feedback process to assess which applicants best meets these requirements. We reached this decision after an extensive consultation process and speaking widely to the European debating community. In true debating style, there are three points to make about why we came to this decision:

1. The core tasks of a DCA in the year leading up to the tournament involve scrutinising the prospective judging pool, visiting developing debating circuits and working on the adjudication teams of different competitions. We feel that this can be achieved without appointing someone from a specific geographic region and our application process is structured to recruit the people best qualified to deliver these tasks.
2.  There is no clear way to demarcate regions that track the activity of the European debating circuit. Unlike with WUDC, where the process of appointing regionally representative DCA’s exists to accommodate very different debating styles and continentally divorced debating circuits, there are simply not equivalent, clear divisions in European debating.
3.  We are putting a strong emphasis on assisting the development of new circuits and aim to have a member of the adjudication team at over 20 tournaments across Europe in the 2013-2014 academic year. Write to us if your tournament would like a member of the EUDC Adjudication Team to attend and we will try our best. We are seeking European Union grant money specifically to facilitate this.

We still have to be ratified by EUDC Council at Manchester but we are moving ahead with the application process in advance of ratification to allow maximum time for applicants to apply. We will also be happy to give a detailed report on lessons learned from our consultation process at Council. There are some specific details concerning the application process, which we would like everyone to be aware of;

1. The Application process will open and the form will be published on the 1^st of August 2013. The process will close on 30^th August midday GMT.  Information about the feedback process will be published shortly afterwards along with a list of the candidates.
2. We will use the feedback process to gather information about applicants, which will be open for two – three weeks after the close of applications. During the process, we would welcome any comments on the applicants and will be actively seeking out feedback on their abilities.
3.  We will be appointing four DCAs through the application process. At least two or more of these four appointments will be individuals from an ESL background.
4.  Following the example of previous WUDCs and EUDCs we will be appointing an additional DCA who will be a member of the Durham Union Society to help bridge the gap between the org com and the Adjudication Team. This appointment will have no bearing whatsoever on the application process and will be announced along with the Equity and Language appointments at Manchester EUDC.
5. We will aim for as gender-equal a team as possible from the pool of applicants.
6. We will announce the full adjudication team on the 28^th of September.

DCA Criteria 

These are the ‘job specifications’ for the role of Deputy Chief Adjudicator at Durham EUDC. Just by way of explanation – “qualifications” are facets that we expect all applicants to posses prior to their application. Duties are requirements of DCAs. Expectations are things that the org com and wider debating community can expect from DCAs in the year leading up to the competition.  We will publish these criteria along with the application form on 1^st August. The information and answers on the form and the feedback received from the debating community will help us assess the extent to which an applicant meets these criteria.

Qualifications

Applicants for DCA will have:

• Broken as a speaker or a judge at EUDC or WUDC.
• Good teamwork skills – you should be a confident team player and be able to balance critical and creative inputs with genuine co-operation.
• Adjudication skills – you should be a confident adjudicator with experience of judging BP intervarsity competitions.

Duties

Between your appointment in September 2013 and Durham EUDC in August 2014 you should:

• Be on the adjudication teams of competitions across the European debating circuit –you should be on the adjudication team of 2 competitions over the course of the academic year.
• Actively be assessing judges across the European debating circuit – this will involve judging at 2 or more competitions (in addition to the ones above) of various sizes.
• The ability to attend competitions across Europe is highly desirable. We expect our applicants to be able to attend competitions in different countries and competitions at different points in the academic year.
• Contribute to motion discussions and other aspects of running Durham EUDC 2014.

Expectations

The org com and wider debating community in Europe expect you to:

• Be open and welcoming to all members of the debating community – being friendly to everyone in the debating community is one of the most important qualities of a DCA.
• Speak competitively at a tournament in the year prior to the competition– speaking occasionally makes you a better judge and reminds you of the challenges faced by debaters.
• Work closely with the org com and be contributing to the administrative aspects of running the adjudication team– such as helping with independent adjudicator registration, developing briefings and conducting the judging test.

Questions? –  Contact Fred and Danique at adjudication [at] durhameudc [dot] com.”

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Text: Frederick Comwell/fpu