Draft:National Parliamentary Tournament of Excellence

The National Parliamentary Tournament of Excellence (NPTE) is one of the three national intercollegiate parliamentary debate organizations in the United States. The other is the American Parliamentary Debate Association and the National Parliamentary Debate Association. The primary difference between the NPTE and its sister circuit (the NPDA) is that to get to the NPTE you must attain a certain amount of points throughout the year at sanctioned tournaments making the number of teams at this tournament more limited.

The Rules of NPTE Debate
In the NPTE teams of two debate head-to-head. Teams are encouraged to write topic papers and the top 5 are voted on and will be selected. However it is unknown which round uses which topic so teams still get 20-30 minutes of prep at the tournament. For the first several years final rounds were voted on by the spectators and not by the panel but due to controversy this was changed to a panel. The standard time limits for an NPTE debate are:
 * Preparation Period: 20 Minutes
 * First Proposition Speaker: 7 minutes
 * First Opposition Speaker: 8 minutes
 * Second Proposition Speaker: 8 minutes
 * Second Opposition Speaker: 8 minutes
 * Opposition Rebuttal: 4 minutes
 * Proposition Rebuttal: 5 minutes

There is a ban on quoted evidence. This simply means that the debaters may not bring in printed, published evidence and consult it during the round. It is expected that debaters will use their own pre-existing knowledge and research conducted prior to the start of the actual round to back their arguments with reasoning and empirical data. This places parli in stark contrast to the other common intercollegiate debate format, policy debate, where debaters may utilize quoted evidence.

NPTE National Champions
Every year since 2001, the organization has held a national championship tournament. Winning teams include:


 * Also won NPDA that year