Become a Sponsor

Sponsorship Guidelines

These guidelines describe the nature of different sponsorship-partnerships between Ziggy Online Debate® and other institutions.  Sponsorship agreements are determined on a yearly basis and by default include both of Ziggy’s premiere offerings: the Fall Semester Tournament and the Spring Semester Tournament. Please see the end of the page for details on shorter-term sponsorships.

Overview

The Ziggy Online Debate® website will feature a “Sponsors” page when you mouse over or click on the “About Us” button at the top of every webpage.  Clicking on this “Sponsors” page will display all current sponsors.  For higher tier sponsorships, the website will also feature sponsors’ logos on the “About Us” page (Silver tier) or the “Home” page (Gold tier).

Sponsors are welcome to customize and condition their prizes/rewards, but are especially encouraged to offer services that students will be able to use immediately or in the next few years. As most students are high school age, they will be considering higher education, internship and job opportunities, and various coaching services (including, but not limited to, debate/speech coaching, college application/career coaching, etc.). Students—and especially parents, who often pay for such services—often look favorably on financial incentives as important factors in which school to attend, which training program to participate in, and which coach to hire. College scholarships, for example, should ideally not expire if not used immediately, as some students who may win such scholarship awards may not be able to make use of them until they graduate high school—which may be a year or two away, depending on the student.

Sponsors are also encouraged to offer multiple prizes. Although sponsors may limit prizes to as few as one person (i.e., “1st place Individual Parli debater”), students may be more incentivized by slightly broader awards (i.e., prize for “all debate finalists” or “all debate champions”), and a smaller number of prizes/rewards may limit sponsors’ eligibility for certain sponsorship tiers. While this may result in a prize being slightly smaller, a broader reach may encourage more students to consider your services. But, of course, sponsors remain free to customize their prizes/rewards however they best deem fit. Please see the tier requirements below for more details.

Debate Events

An “event” is defined as “any category for which Ziggy Online Debate® recognizes awards for students.”  We typically recognize the following events:

  • NCFCA Team Policy (TP) (1 team, comprised of 2 individuals, will win 1st place)
  • Stoa Team Policy (1 team, comprised of 2 individuals, will win 1st place)
  • NCFCA Lincoln-Douglas (LD) (1 team, comprised of 1 individual, will win 1st place)
  • Stoa Lincoln-Douglas (1 team, comprised of 1 individual, will win 1st place)
  • Team Parliamentary Debate (1 team, comprised of 2 individuals, will win 1st place)
  • Individual Parli (1 team, comprised of 1 individual, will win 1st place)
  • *Moot Court (1 team, comprised of 2 individuals, will win 1st place) – *offered only in the spring

Our most popular events are usually NCFCA LD, NCFCA TP, Stoa LD, and Stoa TP. We typically recognize the top 40% of each event at ziggyonlinedebate.com/results. It is most common to provide prizes for the following categories of performance, although prizes can be awarded on any basis:

  • First place
  • Finalists (1st + 2nd place)
  • Semifinalists (3rd + 4th place)
  • Raffle/random draw

PLEASE NOTE: Four events—NCFCA and Stoa Team Policy, Team Parliamentary Debate, and Moot Court—are team events. This means that any awards for these events will need to be given to both team members. For example, if a sponsor wishes to award “NCFCA debate finalists” with a prize, they should expect to give out six (6) prizes: “finalists” mean “1st and 2nd place teams,” and since Team Policy has two individuals per team, that would mean 2 individuals from the 1st place TP team and 2 individuals from the 2nd place TP team get prizes, along with both individuals from the 1st and 2nd place LD teams, for a total of 6 prizes.

We will also recognize the “top speaker” for each of these events, which refers to the individual who receives the highest total of speaker points throughout the tournament. While speaker awards are less prestigious than event champion awards, sponsors may optionally consider awarding prizes to top speakers as well as to teams who perform at a certain level in the main debate events. However, most sponsors choose to award event performance, not speaker performance.

Examples of Past Sponsorship Prizes

Here’s a list of some of the awards sponsors have given in years past:

  • $60,000 scholarship toward 4-year tuition to all 1st & 2nd place debate teams (Howard Payne University)
  • $56,000 scholarship toward 4-year tuition to all 3rd & 4th place debate teams (Howard Payne University)
  • Free dual credit college class for 1st place LD team with $17,000/year scholarship toward 4-year tuition upon successful class completion (LeTourneau University)
  • Free debate coaching sessions for all 1st place debate teams (Rhetoric LLC)
  • Free debate coaching sessions for 2 random tournament participants (Rhetoric LLC)
  • Free debate coaching sessions for 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place debate teams (Ace Peak)
  • Free attendance at week-long academic summer camp for all 1st place debate teams (Patrick Henry College)
  • $1000 scholarships for all tournament participants (Praxis)
  • $2000 scholarships for all 1st place debate teams (Praxis)
  • $8000 toward 4-year tuition for all 1st place debate teams (Criswell College)
  • $500–1000 scholarship toward 4-year tuition upon successful audition with the school debate team for all debate quarterfinalists (Howard Payne University, Student Speaker Bureau)

Sponsorship Tiers (Semester Tournaments)

*Note: The following benefits and requirements described assume a year-long sponsorship agreement. If a sponsor is interested in a half year sponsorship (of only one Semester Tournament), please see the Requirements section below.

Requirements

Bronze: Offer any service or product as a prize for at least one Ziggy Online Debate® student per Semester Tournament; prizes may include physical merchandise (t-shirts, notebooks, iPads, etc.). No fee. (Optional: Sponsor may choose to pay a $25 fee and offer no prize.)

Silver: Offer any service or product as a prize for at least two Ziggy Online Debate® students per Semester Tournament. Prizes may include physical merchandise. $75 sponsorship fee. Fee will be waived if prizes are offered for at least 4 students.

Gold: Offer any financial prize as a prize for at least 3 debate events per Semester Tournament. Physical merchandise may also be part of the prize, but may not be the sole component of the prize. “Financial” prizes include scholarships and discounts toward services offered by Sponsor (such as college scholarships, or discounted or free attendance of a class, camp, coaching service, etc.). $150 sponsorship fee. Fee will be waived if prizes are offered for 6 events.

Platinum/Legacy: Offer any financial prize for at least 5 events (that meet the required minimum number of participants) and for at least 2 teams for each of those events per Semester Tournament. Starting bid for sponsorship fee is $1,000. Currently accepting only 1 Platinum/Legacy sponsor with a one year commitment (Fall 2022–Fall 2023).

All requirements are based on the assumption of a year-long sponsorship (which includes both the Fall and Spring Semester Tournaments). If Sponsor wishes to only sponsor one Semester Tournament, all fees are halved. Benefits will apply only for the Semester Tournament being sponsored. Minimum event sponsorship requirements will still apply for the specific Semester Tournament being sponsored.

SPONSORSHIPS FOR NON-SEMESTER TOURNAMENTS

Ziggy Online Debate® occasionally hosts other tournaments in addition to our biannual Fall and Spring Semester Tournaments. Sponsorship agreements do not typically include any such additional tournaments because of their irregular nature. Sponsorships for non-semester tournaments may be negotiated on a case-by-case basis. All current sponsors for the Semester Tournaments will be given priority when Ziggy Online Debate® begins contacting prospective partners for sponsorship of an irregular tournament.

Disclaimers

Ziggy Online Debate® reserves the right to modify these guidelines at any point. Modifications to guidelines will not apply retroactively to any current sponsor agreements.

Ziggy Online Debate® reserves full creative liberty to execute the terms of the sponsorship guidelines as it best sees fit unless specifically agreed otherwise.

Sponsors will usually be listed (a) in order of tier (Platinum, then Gold, then Silver, then Bronze) and (b) in order of recency (first registered Gold sponsor will be listed before second registered Gold sponsor). Ziggy Online Debate® reserves the right to modify this order.

Sponsors will be sent a short formal contract to sign once their application is approved by Ziggy Online Debate®. Where payment is required, the agreement will not take effect until payment is complete.

Ziggy Online Debate® reserves the right to accept sponsors under these guidelines or under different terms.

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