By the numbers
- 180 campus rooms and 20 campus buildings are being utilized
- Zero residence halls being are utilized
- 6,696 speeches for preliminary rounds
- 420 speeches final elimination rounds
- 312 debates in preliminary rounds
- 242 elimination round debates
- Ball State's 16 member team is coached by seven people
Ball State will host students, coaches, judges and alumni from 88 universities for the National Forensics Association Speech Tournament April 14-18.
This is Ball State's third year hosting the competition.
Mary Moore, Ball State’s speech team director, said Ball State students have an advantage in some ways because they know the campus, but it is difficult to be competing at home because other commitments can be distracting.
“We’ll have about 1,000 students and coaches here. … Everyone will have suits on and heels, and we’ll be very fashionably dressed and very professionally dressed,” Moore said. “When they come to campus, no one on campus is going to not notice them. We’re a lot of people.”
Moore said she feels honored that the committee chose to host the competition at Ball State.
There was a period of time last year after the controversial Religious Freedom Restoration Act was passed where the tournament was pulled from Muncie because organizers didn't want the competition to be in a place where all weren't welcome, but the National Forensics Association ended up deciding to keep it at Ball State.
“We were delighted when the council and the community decided that, despite those decisions, … we still were able to have the winning bid [this year]," Moore said. "While they’re here, we’ve got a lot of projects in place to remind them that we are an open, welcome, diverse community, and that all members of our community are both welcome and protected while they are on our campus and in our town."
Moore said it has been a fun and an exhausting challenge to plan for everyone coming. Twenty campus buildings will be utilized during the tournament, but no competition will take place in residence halls. They will be headquartered in the Atrium and the Art and Journalism Building.
“Whenever we go to any college campus, it’s a nice interaction between the student body and the students. Lots of students stop and they ask questions,” Moore said. “I hope that we are good hosts as a population on campus to our guests, and I also hope that our guests don’t get in the way of the business that we’re doing.”
Muncie Mayor Dennis Tyler wrote a letter of support to welcome the guests competing, who will be staying at local hotels and will be encouraged to visit local businesses.
The tournament was hosted at Ohio University last year, and it generated a $1.8 million economic boost to the area.
Michael Hicks, director of the Center for Business and Economic Research, said economists normally measure the economic impact by estimating both what the spending will be for those who are coming from out of town and the spending of those who are staying in Muncie who otherwise would have gone out of town.
Ball State’s tournament will be the largest National Forensics Association Tournament since 2011.
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