siddyp
Tough times never last, but tough people do.
- Messages
- 1,270
No. Absolutely not. We've seen in the past when judges do this. It does not end well.I disagree that simply because a judge goes beyond the categories, he is deemed to throw a competition and hence should be responsible for any perceived backlash as to why another team should have gotten first.
Perhaps that judge disagreed with the already biased nature of the Judging rubric, and thought of factors outside of the rubric that should be considered. There should be some flexibility in this sense, but without it, we are left with just a biased rubric for the judge to evaluate.
There has to be a playing field which all teams are judged equally too. That is the rubric. No team should have to predict what a judge is going to do. And that is why we have a rubric. So all teams know what they're being judged by, what is going to be valued at this competition, etc. It allows complete transparency. No team should have to pay registration fees, drive/fly out, get hotels, etc. ($$$) and spend the time/headaches/stress to practice, build the set, and do all a team does to prepare for a comp, to then be judged in a way that they had no idea about.
As you said, the rubric is "biased" which yes it is. But at least the competing teams know what that bias will be. They know which sections/categories etc will be weighed heavier than others. They'll know what the wording is that the judges are using to judge their performance. There should be no more bias or "flexibility" to take into hand.
Judges are folks that are deemed qualified or knowledgable enough to be able to watch a competition and rank teams according to said rubric. If they disagree with something on the rubric, that should be brought up long before the competition. If rubric does get adjusted, it needs to be made known to teams. All in all, no judge should be put on a pedestal to go against or "beyond" the rubric. That is not fair to anyone.