August 2023
Hello Anderson Speech and Debate Community!
L.C. Anderson Head Coach El Contreras here! It was great to see you and your families at debate camp and the back-to-debate potluck! I am so grateful for an amazing booster club that helps events like these happen and be successful. As I mentioned at the potluck, I will be sending a monthly newsletter at the beginning of each month that details due dates, deadlines, competitions, and more! Communication with the families and the community is incredibly important to me as head coach.
If you missed previous communication, you may not have heard that we have a new assistant coach! Her name is Claire Zimmerman and I am thrilled she is joining our team. Claire has been a teacher for 5 years and previously worked at Dripping Springs high school, where she was assistant coach to the man who coached MY high school debate team, Davy Holmes. Coach Zimmerman is teaching English II and Journalism here at Anderson.
Our first judge training will be Tuesday, August 29th! We will be recording this session (thank you to Beth Payan for that idea!) so if you can’t make it, you can catch up virtually! Mina Kumar, our lovely judge coordinator, and I will go over what you need to know before you judge, how to use www.tabroom.com, and answer any questions you may have! Parents who volunteer to judge save us at LEAST $150 per tournament and it is so appreciated!!
Team Business
TLDR/Summary: Handbook permission slips are due August 25. Dues are due either before your student competes or on September 28, whichever comes first. Trojan Classic is September 29 and 30! Judge training at Anderson high school on Tuesday, August 29th!
Handbook: I passed out Speech and Debate team handbooks this week. Please read through these with your student. The handbook includes travel team policies, expectations for students, and our anti-harassment policy. We aim to be a safe and inclusive space for all students.
The last few pages of the handbook are signatures. I need your consent to register your student for our slack channel (our new team communication platform!), permission for them to use their personal emails, and permission to carpool with AISD employees or an adult volunteer. Please get those signed as soon as possible, I’d like those signed and returned by Friday, August 25th.
Dues
The dues rate is changing this year. I completely understand if these numbers are not affordable for your family and cannot stress enough that if you need to do a payment plan or anything else, please let me know as soon as possible. Claire and I never want money to be the thing that keeps your student from competing and enjoying debate. We get a budget from AISD but that unfortunately only gets us through about a month’s worth of tournaments. We have a large and competitive team and dues payments and donations are what help us get through the season.
Again, please let me know if you have any questions or concerns about dues. If paying half each semester works better, or a monthly payment, or your family simply can not afford the rate, I am so happy to work with you so your child can participate in speech and debate.
This year, you can pay dues with a check (please don’t send your kid to school with a stack of cash!) addressed to Anderson High School or Anderson Speech and Debate or with credit card on https://www.schoolcashonline.com/. If you haven’t set an account up before, you’ll need your student’s ID number and last name to register them. From there, you’ll look up the Speech and Debate team and select the level of dues they owe. Please let me know if you’re struggling with the platform!
Dues are due Thursday, September 28th. If your student wants to attend the Hendrickson tournament on September 1 and 2, the Grapevine tournament from the 8th-10th, or the Westwood tournament on September 22 and 23, they have to have either paid or set up a payment plan with the coaches.
Dues:
1st Year Competitor - $300
2nd Year Competitor - $375
3rd and 4th Year Competitor - $475
September Tournaments
September 1 and 2 is the Hendrickson/Pflugerville swing located at Hendrickson High School in Pflugerville, TX. This tournament is open to all students who are ready to compete! Sign-up is due August 25th. We will absolutely need volunteers to drive students to and from this tournament as well as a few parents to judge!
September 8-10 is our first travel tournament to Grapevine High School in Grapevine, TX! I’ll be sending invites to this tournament early next week to varsity students. Since it is an in-state tournament, students will be paying mostly for the cost of the hotel rooms and their own food. VP of Travel Brad Dieringer and I are working to find a reasonably priced hotel near the tournament in Grapevine so we can get travel estimates to you ASAP!
The Trojan Classic Tournament, which we host here at L.C. Anderson, is taking place on September 29 and 30! The booster club and I will be holding planning meetings for that, as well as judge training sessions. The more parents who volunteer, the more we can earn from that tournament! There are other ways to volunteer for this tournament, including donating food for the judge and coach's hospitality room and concessions stand for the students and organizing/running the concessions or hospitality room!
Some tentative tournaments are the Lake Travis tournament, which is on September 15 and 16. Their coach quit so if the tournament happens, it’ll be virtual. I’ll let everyone know ASAP if this tournament will take place.
Another tentative date is September 22 and 23, this is the Westwood tournament. The 22nd is the homecoming football game and the 23rd is the homecoming dance. This tournament also takes place the week before we host ours, so I’d love for this to be an off weekend so we can prepare!