Resolved: Public high school students in the United States ought be required to pass standardize

Quite the interesting argument indeed. For the sake of staying on topic, I'll simply agree to what my opponent says and move on to the actual topic that we're debating here, namely, standardized exams. Yes, morality and justice are subjective and unreliable standards. Let's see how my opponent links that to the resolution: ================ 1. " I think that my opponent and I will both agree that LD is a morals debate. " Wait, morals don't exist, right? Why would LD be a morals debate, then? Lincoln-Douglas debate provides education, entertainment, and competition for 1000s of high schoolers across the nation (I, myself, am one of them. ) Should we accept both of my opponent's arguments that: I. Morality doesn't exist. II. LD is a morals debate. Then we would conclude that LD is a pointless waste of time. Now let's look at the alternative. We can't change argument I; my opponent clearly laid out why morality is too subjective. It makes sense, then, not to accept argument II, since that is the only way to lead to an educational, entertaining, and competitive debate. I see no reason why we should accept argument II as it only leads to a dreadful bore of a debate. ================ 2. "ought implies a moral standpoint" A. Apply the same argument as above. We define words in order to make the debate clear and concise, not to further our argument and make debate unwinnable. My opponent's definition does just that. Why define ought (in a debate) in a way that wouldn't allow us to debate? It just doesn't make sense! It's as bad as me doing this: HIGH school students means: school students who are on drugs because high is slang for drugs United States: was a short-lived half-hour comedy-drama or dramedy that NBC added to its Tuesday primetime schedule in March 1980 Ought: A word used to represent the number 0 Pass: travel past; "The sports car passed all the trucks" Graduate means: calibrate: make fine adjustments or divide into marked intervals for optimal measuring; "calibrate an instrument"; "graduate a cylinder" Therefore, we should debate whether or not public school students on drugs that were in the short-lived comedy drama, United States, zero not be required to travel past standardized exit exams in order to mark intervals for measurement. Strictly speaking, the definitions are all correct, so we could debate that. Why has nobody ever done that in the 30+ rounds I've had on this topic? Because it's absurd and undebatable! The same applies to his defining ought as something moral when morality doesn't exist. Technically it might be a definition, but it would lead to such an absurdly pointless debate that there is no reason why we should ever do so. --- B. The word is most commonly used without implying any moral obligation at all. Thus, this is the more correct definition: Ought: used to express obligation , advisability , natural expectation , or logical consequence This is every definition on Merriam-Webster Dictionary (. http://www.merriam-webster.com...), the most commonly used dictionary on the English language. This is every way people naturally use the word ought. For example, if I said "I ought to brush my teeth," it wouldn't make sense for anyone to respond, "No, you shouldn't! Ought implies a moral obligation, and there's no such thing as morality! " That's essentially what my opponent is doing to this resolution. ================ An LD case for Exit Exams ================ I define Ought in accordance with Merriam Webster Dictionary, as defined above. This is preferable because: 1. My opponent cites no source for his idea that 'ought' has something to do with morality. 2. Merriam-Webster Dictionary is the most commonly used dictionary, and thus the most reliable source. 3. Defining it in the way my opponent wants to or any way else makes no sense (see above arguments. ) 4. The resolution is asking a question of policy, not morality. Would exit exams be a desirable policy or not? ------------- Framework ------------- Obviously we are not tied to acting morally or justly or anything else of that nature, as my opponent proves above. It makes more sense that we keep the standard as objective and measurable as possible, thus I propose: The value is education. Education is the primary purpose of public high schools, and therefore should be of primary concern in determining the preferable policy for high schools. The criterion is ensuring minimum competency. According to the Center for Education Reform, we have a clear problem. We spend the most of any country on education per capita, yet we still rank in the bottom 30% of developed nations. It also points out the reason why: 25% of our high school graduates are deficient in concepts learned in elementary school. This is because about 1/2 of our states don't have exit exams, and of the ones that do, only 2 aren't considered medium or high competency exams. ---------- Observation: We need not ensure minimum competency perfectly in our students, simply as best as we possibly can, thus my burden is to prove that these exams better ensure minimum competency than any alternatives. Contention One: Standardized exams create the most fair and objective standard for graduation. All teachers, principals, schools, and school boards want to ensure that their students have minimum competency. The problem is, they all define it their own ways. Each teacher makes his or her own test, or each school will. If it were a form of government, it would be anarchy, everybody setting their own laws. Instead, we ought to advocate democracy in the form of a single exit exam, either state or nation wide. As with the SAT, the standards are set by teachers, professors, and professional test makers working jointly. This ensures the most fair and objective standard the democratic way, by collective vote. Contention Two: Standardized exams prevent push-outs. There is the problem in our school system of funding. Teachers love it, but can never get enough of it. Hardly a day goes by without me hearing one of my teachers complain about being underfunded. Unfortunately for us, there's an easy way for teachers to get that much needed funding (as well as keep their jobs), and that's grade inflation. Teachers don't like failing kids, because it reflects poorly on them. Many of my teachers give us open book quizzes, bonus point opportunities, and tons of participation grades just to keep our GPAs up. This is a HUGE problem. The students who need the extra help and attention aren't getting it. The ones who need to fail, because they need the remedial help or extra year of attention, aren't failing. Instead, they are pushed out of high school and on their way without proper education, simply because their teachers wanted to look good. Standardized exams solve this problem. It's impossible to push the student out without him first passing the exam, so inflating grades won't do diddly-squat for the teachers. With an outside standard in place (and one that doesn't stand to gain from students passing) we no longer see the problem of these high-school pushouts. Instead, they receive the help they need and stay in school until they reach minimum competency. ------------ Summary My opponent wrote this abstract kritik of justice and morality. It was a nice read, but didn't really prove anything for him. There is nothing in my case relating to justice or morality. Exams provide pragmatic, measurable benefits (namely competency) that aren't subject to this attack. He has no specific case refuting the use of test scores.