[Andy]

Well...I'll throw in my .02 here....

I think the answers to most of your questions depend on the area where you live and work.

In my area, we have a 10 team JC league, a DII school, then the PAC10. In order to get into the JC league, you have to work and be seen at a lot of USAV stuff in the spring and summer. Some of that helps with the PAVO ratings process that Felix was talking about. I'm not involved at that level, so I will defer to him for more details. The assignor for the JC league is a PAC 10 official and has some say in helping people develop to that level. At that level, both of the referees and the line judges are assigned by the conference assignor.

The DII school in the area is in a conference with schools from California and Hawaii. Their matches are assigned by a local official who uses mostly local folks. She assigns both of the referees and the line judges.

The game does move much faster at the college level and some of the alignments that these teams can be really confusing.

Personally, I only do HS and some line judging for the local JCs. I am very involved in Softball umpiring in our area and choose to concentrate on that sport in the spring and summer.