Quote:
Originally Posted by BillyMac
I not really sure about my answer, but I'll give it a shot. If you're going from one IAABO board to another IAABO board, then I'm sure that some type of communication would take place between the leadership of both boards and you would be assigned pretty close to what you were used to. Worst case scenario, you would be assigned both subvarsity, and varsity, games. If, on the other hand, you were moving from a non-IAABO chapter to an IAABO chapter, then you would probably start at the bottom of the ladder.
Connecticut is a 100% IAABO state, and each local board has their own "IAABO assigner".
I can't speak for, or against, non-IAABO organizations, but I do know that the main emphasis of IAABO is to educate officials. We take that very seriously, on the local level, the state level, and the national, and the international, level. I believe that we are very good at in our goal of educating, and improving, officials. That alone, may be a good reason to join an IAABO board. Assigning games takes a back seat to improving officials in IAABO.
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As someone who has recently switched from an IAABO board to another IAABO board, here has been my experience:
First, for some background---
At my first board: Rules classes, a (passing) rules test and some on court training occurs before the season. Provided that a 1st year official does those correctly, they will be assigned junior high and (some) jv games that year.
Unlike Billy's board, that official remains "probationary" until they are advanced. It is a minimum of two years of classes and training until advanced out of probationary status, but can take longer, depending on ratings and feedback by the training committee.
Following advancing out of probationary status, the official can become an "Associate" member of an "Active" member. The difference between associate and active is, generally speaking, associates get a JV heavy schedule while active officials usually are assigned a more varsity heavy schedule.
This board handled transfers quite simply (and logically). I'll give you the example of an official with 20+ years experience. He was in the same classes that I was, and after seeing him work a few practices and games, the training committee realized he shouldn't still be a probationary official. From that point forward, this guy was assigned primarily JV games. The following season, he was advanced directly to "Active" and received a good schedule of games, with a fair JV vs. varsity split.
When I left this board, I was a "very young" active official. I had my IAABO secretary forward my information to my new board.
At my new board, since it is a more metropolitan area, there are many more officials, fewer scholastic games (in comparison), but many more rec games and other lower leagues. IAABO does not do the assigning for these leagues, but being a member of IAABO is a requirement to work games (in most leagues).
The training is "training only" for the first year, meaning that officials in training will get to work scrimmages and rec games only. Following that, officials would need probably 2-3 years of good ratings in order to work up to varsity.
For scholastic games, the primary criterion to decide what level games are worked is, unfortunately, coaches' rankings. After all of the criteria are given to the school districts collectively, the games are assigned via a computer. Only X number of officials are varsity officials, and they work
only varsity games. The remainder of the officials fight to get to the varsity level and are assigned the remaining games. When I came in, I came in as a sub-varsity official (which I feel is fair) and I don't know what my standing will be next year. I also don't know how officials with higher levels of experience are handled when they transfer to this board.