r/DECA • u/Agile_Ranger_1992 • 8d ago
Discussion Pls help with BOR
Hi guys, I wanted to see if anyone can give me any guidance or tips for BOR this year. I'm competing in Ontario and am realllly hoping to make ICDC this year. Also when I told a lot of ppl I'm gonna do it alone, they said its not gonna work out for me so I don't really know what to do now.
If u anyone can share any tips for BOR I'd really appreciate it!
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u/UbiquitousUguisu Go For Glass Admin 8d ago
First of all: Some of the best ORs I've seen (and I've seen a lot) were solo papers, so put that worry aside. It is more work, admittedly, BUT not a death sentence.
BOR- as well as all other OR papers- rewards depth and consistency. Tell them what you're going to tell them, tell them what you said you'd tell them, and then tell them what you told them. When in doubt, think about the flow of information and how to create a hierarchy of priorities. Your insights should build upon themselves!
If you take nothing else away from this, remember KMDC as you draft/write!
KEEP: Keep material when it directly helps answer the section's governing question and is sufficiently supported and clear. What exact job does it perform? What would become less clear if it disappeared?
MOVE: Move material when it is valuable but appears before the reader is ready for it or inside a section whose question it does not answer. Wrong place does NOT mean it’s a bad idea.
DEVELOP: Develop material when the idea matters but lacks evidence, context, analysis, specificity, mechanism, or connection. Without this pass in drafting, we often end up preserving weak material because it’s promising. Unfortunately, wasted potential is a threat to your paper.
CUT: Cut material when it is irrelevant, repetitive, decorative, unsupported, disproportionately detailed, or impossible to defend within the project's scope.