Monthly D1 Assigning?

[Raymond]

Originally Posted by BillyMac

Not sure what all the COVID protocols will be in Connecticut scholastic games this upcoming season.

Last year: Masks for all (players, coaches, officials, fans). Officials come in uniform (no locker rooms available for officials). Number of fans limited (varied from one school system to another, usually one, or two parents allowed per player, no student fans). Short regular season. No state tournament (just conference tournaments).

This year: Interscholastic athletic officials must be fully vaccinated for COVID, or be exempted from the vaccine requirement for reasons of medical contraindication or firmly held religious or spiritual belief. Governor's executive order in already in place (expires February 15, 2022) for an indoor mask mandate in all schools (fall indoor girls volleyball players and indoor girls swimmers (on pool deck) wore masks, as did officials, coaches, and fans). Full regular season and state tournament planned.
...

Well, for college assigning, supervisors and conferences commissioners have to account for multiple states and their individual policies before publishing the conference policy. That may affect where some officials can and cannot work. It may affect where some officials choose to take assignments. That begins the domino effect that has no equivalency at the HS level.

[BillyMac]

Originally Posted by Raymond

Well, for college assigning, supervisors and conferences commissioners have to account for multiple states and their individual policies before publishing the conference policy. That may affect where some officials can and cannot work. It may affect where some officials choose to take assignments.

Understand. Sounds complex. Glad I'm not involved with such. Thanks.

Originally Posted by BillyMac

Interscholastic athletic officials must be fully vaccinated for COVID, or be exempted from the vaccine requirement for reasons of medical contraindication or firmly held religious or spiritual belief.

We already have several scholastic officials who have chosen not to work games this year because they choose not to sign an affidavit that they are fully vaccinated, or complete the necessary paperwork with the state association that they have a medical contraindication or firmly held religious or spiritual belief (Note: There is no testing option).

I'm not sure if they're opting out because of COVID in general (as many did last year, 40% of our guys chose not to be assigned games last season due to health concerns), or to protest mandates, citing medical privacy concerns.

[Raymond]

Here is a portion of an email I received from a supervisor today.

"The D1 leagues on the East Coast (consortiums) have decided this year to hold their schedules and release periodically. Most have released November but not December yet! As you might imagine this puts D2 and D3 in a fix!"

Sorry Billy, explaining to us how high school assigning works where you officiate will add no insight to this conversation. I still referee high school basketball and this has nothing to do with my high school schedule.

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[BillyMac]

Originally Posted by Raymond

"The D1 leagues on the East Coast (consortiums) have decided this year to hold their schedules and release periodically. Most have released November but not December yet! As you might imagine this puts D2 and D3 in a fix!" Sorry Billy, explaining to us how high school assigning works where you officiate will add no insight to this conversation. I still referee high school basketball and this has nothing to do with my high school schedule.

While I fully agree that I can not add any expert (or otherwise) insight to this conversation (way out of my league), there is some similarity between college and high school assigning, but only if one assumes that the high school officials work lower level (recreation, travel, middle school games not assigned high school assigner, i.e., Catholic middle schools), a similarity that I can demonstrate by rephrasing Raymond's email.

High school assignments will be held and released periodically. As you might imagine, this puts recreation and travel assignments in a fix.

Many years ago, before email and computer assigning, in the days of snail mail and phone calls, we got our full season high school assignments first, and after that we got our full season (from multiple low level assigners, park and recreation directors, league officers or coaches, hometown officials, etc.) recreation and travel assignments (with weather related changes coming later), with low level assignments coming in some type of priority order based on officials preferences.

After the invention of email and computer assigning, and after a particularly nasty winter of bad weather, our high school assigner discovered that it would be better for him to "trickle" out our high school assignments two weeks at a time. Of course, that forced recreation assigners and travel assigners to do the same.

Last year with COVID, our high school assigner often published assignments days, or even hours, in advance. While I no longer work lower level (recreation, travel) assignments, I can imagine the problems ("fix") this generated for lower level assigners.

Apples and oranges (D3 college game has little to do with sixth grade girls travel game), but they're still both fruit (and need assigned officials).

It's still a hierarchy, granted, not as important, but it's still a hierarchy.

Of course, many of you work for multiple assigners at multiple levels, multiple high school assigners (different leagues, individual schools, different states), and multiple college assigners (multiple levels and multiple leagues at the same level), making for very complex assignments, with lots of "big money' at stake, lots of miles to travel (many by plane), and many assigners to appease.

I've never had more than one high school assigner (same all across the six local boards in Connecticut), and I've never worked for more than two, or three, low level assigners at any one time.

And I only pledged allegiance and was only totally loyal to two assigners (high school and Catholic middle school). For the rest, for low level games, easy come, easy go. Maybe I'm available, maybe I'm not, maybe thank you, maybe no thank you. I have skills and experience that are needed, there are not an unlimited number of available, experienced, skilled officials, I work on my terms, I can always shop around. Supply and demand.

The college woes that many of you are experiencing doesn't come close to comparing to the high school and low level woes that high school guys like me can experience.

[BillyMac]

Originally Posted by BillyMac

For the rest, for low level games, easy come, easy go. Maybe I'm available, maybe I'm not, maybe thank you, maybe no thank you. I have skills that are needed, there are not an unlimited number of available skilled officials, I work on my terms, I can always shop around. Supply and demand.

In ancient times, before my local board assigned girls high school games, and we had more available officials than games to be assigned, our local high school assigner actually assigned a few mens league games, subvarsity officials couldn't opt out, it was viewed as a training ground. That stopped when we started working girls high school games, doubling our assignments.

Here in my hometown, we had a veteran official assign our hometown mens recreation games. Most of the games went to his longtime buddies, I was the new guy. I worked a few fill in games for him and found that it wasn't my cup of tea. Extremely lazy mechanics. Never any switching. Unsporting behavior almost always ignored. Every game I worked I felt like I was the new sheriff in town. While I didn't totally quit his league, I did tell him to put my name dead last on the fill in list. Thankfully, he complied.

[JRutledge]

I do not work anything but high school and college. I do not work girls or women's basketball at all either. I keep it simple. Works for me and we do not have any assigning organization for the most part in Illinois. Assignors work for the conferences and they have very little if any affiliation with one group. The only one that does is the COA which the assignor assigns mostly Catholic League Members, but hires many more that are not members of the COA.

I do not have the stomach for middle school, Men's leagues, rec leagues or anything not associated directly with schools. Then again I have little time. About 4 days a week is enough.

Peace

[SC Official]

Not sure where this notion that college assigners don't use Arbiter comes from. Four of my five leagues are on Arbiter.

[Raymond]

MultipleSports hopefully will jump into this discussion, but it is my understanding that even if you do not share information it still shows up that there's something going on with your account on that day.



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[SC Official]

Originally Posted by Raymond

MultipleSports hopefully will jump into this discussion, but it is my understanding that even if you do not share information it still shows up that there's something going on with your account on that day.



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This is my understanding as well and has been confirmed by more than one person. Even if you don’t share any details of your assignments with other assigners they always can see that you have “something” on a particular day.

[JRutledge]

Originally Posted by SC Official

This is my understanding as well and has been confirmed by more than one person. Even if you don’t share any details of your assignments with other assigners they always can see that you have “something” on a particular day.

My understanding you can just block the time and not give details about the level or the site. That is what I do but not much of an issue anymore because so many levels now use different platforms.

Peace

[Matt S.]

Originally Posted by JRutledge

My understanding you can just block the time and not give details about the level or the site. That is what I do but not much of an issue anymore because so many levels now use different platforms.

Peace

Correct...but for college leagues that still use Arbiter, some coordinators will simply pass over you if you show that you have 'something.' And in a state where HS assignments are done thru Arbiter well in advance of college assignments, it cost me from getting more college games in the past.

Now, our state cut a deal with rSchool, so all schools use that for their schedules and for emailing officials contracts. All of these software companies are trying to make a buck and the state associations are either making money off the licensing deals or something else. Kinda like NCAA & state associations switching up shirts. The whole thing smells like a giant money-grab to me.

[SC Official]

Originally Posted by Matt S.

Correct...but for college leagues that still use Arbiter, some coordinators will simply pass over you if you show that you have 'something.' And in a state where HS assignments are done thru Arbiter well in advance of college assignments, it cost me from getting more college games in the past.

Yep, and this exact conundrum is one of the reasons I am glad I live in a state where HS games are assigned 2-3 weeks in advance at the most.

It also is another flaw of Arbiter that they have refused to address.

[Raymond]

Recent email from supervisor:

"...attempt to schedule and knowing that the D1 Leagues have NOT sent out their dates/sites,it looks like a lot of you have been assigned and/or accpeted dates from other JUCO and/or D2 or D3 leagues that use Arbiter. When this happens, and even if you have not accepted these dates, if the other league uses Arbiter you show not available..."

"...I had a call with Arbiter about this and there is nothing they can do about this..."

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[Valley Man]

When an officials does not show up, all you have to do is click Potential Officials and then you can see where and the group that is making that official Unavailable

[Camron Rust]

Originally Posted by Valley Man

When an officials does not show up, all you have to do is click Potential Officials and then you can see where and the group that is making that official Unavailable

If true, that is actually a huge security/privacy hole. Assignor A should have zero visibility into what Assignor B is doing unless either Assignor B or the individual official grants access to that information.