National Christian Forensics and Communications Association
The Christian Speech & Debate League also known as the National Christian Forensics and Communications Association is a speech and debate league for Christian students in the United States. The NCFCA was established in 2001 after outgrowing its parent organization, the Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA), which had been running the league since it was originally established in 1995. NCFCA is now organized under its own board of directors with regional and state leadership coordinating various tournaments throughout the season. Since 2001, the NCFCA seeks to provide students with the opportunity to apply and  communicate their worldview with skill and clarity through competitive debate. NCFCA claims that "...their training and competition will provide a supportive opportunity for them to apply a biblical worldview to real-life issues." Structure of the organization. The NCFCA is a volunteer-run, non-profit organization. Tournaments are run by volunteers, who are usually parents, club directors, and league officials in the area. The judging pool includes parents of competitors, NCFCA alumni, and members of the community. Coaches also serve as judges on a volunteer basis. The NCFCA is governed by a board and divided into eleven regions. Each region  has a regional coordinator and each state has a representative. National Opens. Additionally, a certain number of national invitational slots are awarded each year at competitions known as National Opens. Currently, each national open awards two nationals slots for every individual speech event and debate event and four slots for moot court. These are large tournaments held mostly at colleges or large convention centers and are open to the entire nation. Qualifying at a National Open tends to be more difficult than a regional qualifying tournament because of their increased size. National opens since 2005: National Mixers. National Mixers debuted  in the 2017–2018 season. They were officially known as March Mixer, because they only occurred in the month of March. As national level tournaments, they host moot court, but they only give out one national championship slot in each individual event and debate event and two slots in moot court. In the first year, there were eight March Mixers, all occurring in the first two weeks of March. There was a mixer in a city inside every region except 1 and 3 (which are much smaller than the other eight regions). Because of the large number of mixers and their  close proximity in time, most competitors went to only the mixer closest to their home in the first year even though they could technically attend any mixer in the country. Competition. During the 2005–2006 season, there were roughly 5,000 competitors, making the NCFCA the third largest national high school speech and debate league after the National Speech and Debate Association and the National Catholic Forensic League. Individual events. The NCFCA offers ten individual events from three categories: Platform, Interpretation, and Limited Preparation. From 2002 to 2007 and 2013–2014, the NCFCA also provided a different Wildcard event each season: Debate. The  NCFCA offers two types of debate — Team Policy Debate and Lincoln-Douglas Value Debate. The NCFCA discourages the use of overly complicated theory and extremely fast talking (also known as "spreading"). References. http://iew.com/