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This would align with the ten minute time limit in this category for NSDA.

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I would like to understand more of the reasoning behind this idea as, to me, this seems like it would be very similar to the category of Oratory (beyond the purpose of the categories, what would be the difference?)

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I assume a note card would still be allowed? (this is another difference between Info & Ora) Is one 4x6 card sufficient for a 10 min speech? Perhaps 2 cards or 1 full sheet of paper?
Burton - Franklin HS/WFCA Treasurer

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When the organizing dropped/changed Four-Minute to Informative, we discussed the importance of having a speech category that is accessible for newer competitors. I worry that increasing the time to 10 minutes takes this away.

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Speech categories can often be a tough sell to kids, particularly novices, when choosing a category. Having a speech that is both broad and straightforward in its expectations is helpful for students to find success. This is also a stepping stone to more complex speech categories. It allows students to gain significant skill in preparing and presenting a speech before tackling a category like Oratory or Extemp.

Are there justifications for extending the time limit beyond aligning with NSDA rules? Changing one speech with this purpose in mind presents equity issues for the majority.

Informative Speaking is currently our largest speech category. We may see these numbers drop because of the added amount of time and prep. We need to support our speech categories and fostering ones that have been successful so that they continue to flourish rather than decline.

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I am a big fan of standardizing events with NSDA.

That said, I think short informative speeches still have a place in forensics. My preference would be to increase the cap to 10 minutes, but add language that explicitly tells judges that shorter informative speeches can still be ranked highly -- quality > quantity. The goal isn't to fill 10 minutes of content, it's to inform an audience about a concept. I know that speeches often expand to fill time limits, but I think explicit judging instructions to focus on the quality would help mitigate this.

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John Rademacher - Madison West.  This will be an opportunity for our students, not a discouragement to them.  I strongly support it. 

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John Rademacher - Madison West.  This will be an opportunity for our students, not a discouragement to them.  I strongly support it. 

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The proposal is to give this a test-run for this year only.  The language states that we will assess the impact and vote on making the change permanent at the spring 2021 meeting.

It is absolutely true that this is partially motivated by a desire to standardize our rules with how this category is run nationally.  If we concede that our tournaments this year will be virtual, it means that our kids can compete at tournaments all over the country, which they could not do before.  Having the same rules means they can easily do the same piece at our tournaments and at tournaments in other states, and schools in other states could easily enter our tournaments.  All the other Wisconsin categories that are also national categories (Duo, Extemp, Farrago/POI, Oratory, OIL, Solo Serious/DI, Solo Humorous/HI) have the same time limits as the rest of the country.

If we compare to other competitive activities like sports, Science Olympiad, Model UN, DECA, and debate, we see the rules are the same nationwide.  We have a lot of other unique categories in Wisconsin forensics, but we should have some consistency with the categories shared around the country.

Another reason has already been mentioned, but a longer time limit allows more depth and analysis.  Visual aids, when used, take up a bit of that time.  In my experience, the challenge for students is not filling up the 6 or 10 minutes, it's cutting what they have down to fit into 6 or 10 minutes.  And again, there is no minimum time limit, so a 6 minute speech that is solid in content would not be penalized.

I strongly urge the membership to give the 10 minute Info a chance for at least this year, and vote for this proposal. It could open up whole new worlds for our kids.

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I am concerned that this change would eliminate an important “entry” category for first time Forensics competitors. We already have lengthier and more topic-specific speech categories. I always viewed informative as the prose or poetry of the speech categories. Furthermore, this is yet another change away from WHSFA. At some point, our organization needs to decide if we will align with NSDA or WHSFA because it seems like we won’t be able to do both. What percentage of students participate in NSDA? What percentage also participate in WHSFA?

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I wear several different forensic organization hats, directing the WHSFA, serving as a Board member of the NSDA, and serving on the Speech and Debate Advisory Committee of the NFHS, so I appreciate any effort for alignment.  As a Wisconsin coach from 1997-2008, I saw the benefits of promoting "competition with oneself" (the WHSFA model), which also matches the philosophy of tracking NSDA merit points without comparison. I also had driven students who wanted to push harder, so competition in WFCA, NSDA, and NCFL -- along with comparing ranking of NSDA point earning -- was a motivator for them. Our young people are as strong in their forensic character as the multitude of perspectives and approaches we foster as coaches.  That's all to say I wish we had a more deliberative process of "visioning" rules changes in Wisconsin Speech to facilitate a more meaningful dialogue between the two in-state organizations. What's interesting is one organization or the other will often bring forward a change, and that will eventually filter-through to the other organization. WHSFA, as a representative democracy, works through a system where proposals are brought to our district chairs (who are on our Board of Control), who then refer those discussions to our Speech Advisory Committee, which is comprised of five individuals evenly distributed, geographically, throughout the state.  I provide that committee with survey data (and I'm pleased we typically have a ~50% rate of return on surveys from among ~340 schools who participate in Speech). What I have learned is if you push a change immediately, people are more resistant to it, but if you pilot it, give people time to think about it, show them samples, and then survey again, they are much more likely to embrace it. Many WHSFA coaches have expressed an appreciation for alignment with national standards, so WHSFA and national organizations are not necessarily mutually exclusive. As a member of the NSDA Board, in fact, I sponsored a new policy put in place to "slow down" changes to make them a more deliberative process expressly so any national changes would also be able to be piloted in partnership with state associations, and to increase the collaboration among various organizations.

TL;DR - In short, there is perpetually too much "us vs. them," and if movements in Equity and Justice as well as our situations with the pandemic teach us anything, it's how we can foster more "we" and efforts in which we are *stronger together* in working toward common goals. I'm grateful to Ben Kroll and John Rademacher for working so hard to foster collaboration with WHSFA in development of annual Speech topics. I'd love to see a similar process for the development, piloting, and assessment of rules change proposals between our organizations in Wisconsin.

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I'm in the 10 min camp. Six or Ten minutes means one group of students are/will be required to adjust their speeches for some purpose (festivals or inter-state competition). Keeping things or changing them is a burden on one group of students regardless what we decide.
I don't really think there are "intro" categories. I've had students stick with 4min/Info all four years because they had topics they wanted to speak on, just like there are poetry readers who stay put. Those students certainly didn't make competition any "easier" for new students. All our events are state-level varsity events - there are no novices at state. But the number of events we have also makes offering early season all novice divisions logistically difficult for tournaments. While some comment that speech events are harder to get kids into, I have the opposite problem - I have far more who want to give speeches, so speech attraction isn't a default problem for the activity.
Particularly for our abnormal upcoming year, I think a trial of 10-min times that allow students to access a broader set of tournaments this year is worth exploring. I undoubtedly have a bias towards the NSDA's approach given the 1/4 century I've been an active member, and I want to cultivate those opportunities for my students.
I don't think we lack deliberation when it comes to our assessment of categories. As coaches we discuss our events and our activity constantly. It's one of the things that will be quite missed this year as we end up with more virtually run events. I recall discussions 15 years ago about MN's standard info time that was at 8 minutes with visual aids. Discussions about info as a ten minute event have been going on for 6+ years since the NSDA expanded their choices for competition and provided a national standard. Deliberation and acting slowly are not necessarily synonymous, but the schedules our two state organizations operate on haven't always seemed compatible with coordination. Instead our changes have always tended to come in fits and starts and some strife.

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I feel that the informative speech needs to be geared more to beginners. Stepping stones are important in education, and forensics is no different. Furthermore, as someone else commented, being concise is a skill. Also, logistically, shorter speeches are nice to have in rounds for the sake of time and staying on schedule..