Originally Posted by Mark T. DeNucci, Sr.
In the interest of full disclosure, I have been a member of IAABO since the 1992-93 season: First as an Individual Member, then as a Member of the now defunct Board 55, and now again as an Individual Member. I have sat on four of its National Committees. And I am a proponent of membership in IAABO for all basketball officials.
One: Any basketball official in the world can be a member of IAABO. It does not matter at what level of basketball you officiate. H.S., college, WNBA, NBA, FIBA, amateur, or professional. That means, that even if one lives in an area where there is not an IAABO Board, one can be as Individual Member.
Two: I have a BE with a major in Civil Engineering and a minor in Mechanical Engineering, and practiced Structural Engineering (I am now retired.). When I am asked to explain what IAABO is, I use the analogy of professional and technical organizations in the engineering profession.
Three: Engineering organizations can be divided into two types: 1) Professional organizations, and 2) Technical organizations.
The National Society of Professional Engineers (NSPE) is a "professional" organization. The NSPE, as an organization, represents, if you will, the interests, regardless of discipline, of all engineers. NSPE is much like the National Association of Sports Officials (NASO). NFHS has such a "professional" organization which when the NFHS created was called the National Federation Officials Association (NFOA).
The American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), the Structural Engineers Association of California (SEAOC), and the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) are examples of "technical" organizations.
IAABO is an example "technical" organization with regard to sports officials. It is no different than the Local Officials Associations (LOAs) that one would find in most states. The OhioHSAA is a great example of LOAs because of it meeting requirements to maintain registration in one's chosen sport to officiate or umpire. Other examples of "technical" organizations are the Amateur Baseball Umpires Association (ABUA) or the California Basketball Officials Association (CBOA), of which I was a member of the San Gabriel Valley Unit when I lived in Glendale, California.
As an engineer, I belonged to NSPE, ASCE, SEAOC, and ASME in my days as an active engineer for the same reasons that I belong to NASO, IAABO, and the many LOAs in the various sports the I officiate/umpire. And while networking (that means finding employment or game assignments, both which of translate into income) is one of the by-products of belonging to these organizations, engineering or officiating, in the long run, the educational benefits far out way any possible negative (of which I was never able to find) aspects of not belonging. At the very worst, membership dues and mileage to meetings are a tax deduction on one's Schedule C (and I hope that every one is obeying the law and filing Schedule C's every year).
MTD, Sr.
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