The Atlanta Urban Debate League is committed to providing excellent debate education programs, services, and opportunities to diverse students, educators, and members of the community!
Each team is assigned three minutes of total prep time.
The three minutes do not have to be taken all at once.
If the other team requests prep time, you can also use that time to prepare.
Prep time can be used for CPR:
Consult with your partner.
Prepare for unscripted speeches.
Review evidence from your opponent’s arguments.
The prep time stopwatch does not start until the team has received the requested evidence.
Why would you want to ask to see evidence?
If a statistic sounds too good to be true.
Evidence could be unintentionally misconstrued.
This could be a new study that is critical to the debate topic.
If a piece of evidence was unclear or new.
Get clarification right from the primary source.
Write down the author and year if a new piece of evidence could be useful.
What happens if you opponents cannot produce a requested piece of evidence?
All evidence must be properly cited BEFORE the debate round begins.
Therefore, if a team cannot produce a piece of evidence, it is customary that they drop that impact or statistic from the round and ask the judge not to consider it.
When speaking second (Con)
After the Pro side constructive speech
You can prepare your rebuttal.
The Pro team has not heard your arguments yet and won’t be able to effectively use this time.
Before the Con Final Focus
The Pro team has given all their speeches already, so they cannot prepare anything.
When speaking first (Pro)
Before the Pro Summary
This speech is critical to respond to the Con team’s refutations.
Effective for both speaking first or second (Pro & Con)
Before a Crossfire
If there is an essential question to be asked, this is the time to tell your partner.
Before the Rebuttal
The rebuttal is the longest unscripted speech, so it is a great idea to plan out responses.