Unexpected email

[boiseball]

man, email is the way to go; you just send one email to partner, jv officials, school administrator and you are done, forget the phone thing; I loved the arbiter for that, easy to find and cut and paste emails; now I live in an area where we are supposed to drive to a central location to pick up a hard copy of our assignment (are you kidding me), luckily the assigner has been willing to email the stuff

[JRutledge]

I know I was not debating which is better, email or phone calls. I agree that email is the best way to go in most situations. The reality is not everyone uses email the same as they do with phones. I know I do not use email all the time and I work with a computer. As it relates to this conversation, not all ADs are in their office. When I do call a school, I usually want to speak to the Athletic Secretary. They have all the information anyway.

Peace

[BktBallRef]

Originally Posted by boiseball

man, email is the way to go; you just send one email to partner, jv officials, school administrator and you are done, forget the phone thing; I loved the arbiter for that, easy to find and cut and paste emails; now I live in an area where we are supposed to drive to a central location to pick up a hard copy of our assignment (are you kidding me), luckily the assigner has been willing to email the stuff

Ordinarily, email is fine. But the phone is a necessary evil when you have a 3pm cancellation for a 6pm doubleheader. You can't be certain that everyone involved will check their email within a three hour time span.

[JRutledge]

Originally Posted by BktBallRef

Ordinarily, email is fine. But the phone is a necessary evil when you have a 3pm cancellation for a 6pm doubleheader. You can't be certain that everyone involved will check their email within a three hour time span.

This is why you have a cell phone handy.

Peace

[JugglingReferee]

I couldn't imagine a system where the AD/coach deals directly with the officials. I've got experience in 3 sports and each of those three, across the province, uses the official <--> assignor <--> school model.

Weather is quite possibly more of a concern here than most places in the US. I've never had a lacrosse game cancelled or altered. I couldn't tell you when I've had a basketball game changed. (But it has happened; maybe 3-4 times in my career.) Football? Rarely as well. Game mgmt phones or e-mails our assignor, who tells us.

In fact, our football assignor has a Blackberry (I in fact live in the same city as RIMs offices), so he can forward e-mail info from whereever he is. We all know to keep an eye on e-mail if weather is very bad.

[JRutledge]

Originally Posted by JugglingReferee

I couldn't imagine a system where the AD/coach deals directly with the officials. I've got experience in 3 sports and each of those three, across the province, uses the official <--> assignor <--> school model.

Weather is quite possibly more of a concern here than most places in the US. I've never had a lacrosse game cancelled or altered. I couldn't tell you when I've had a basketball game changed. (But it has happened; maybe 3-4 times in my career.) Football? Rarely as well. Game mgmt phones or e-mails our assignor, who tells us.

In fact, our football assignor has a Blackberry (I in fact live in the same city as RIMs offices), so he can forward e-mail info from whereever he is. We all know to keep an eye on e-mail if weather is very bad.

I did not say I live in a model where I have to deal with ADs. In most of my games I deal almost entirely with assignors. And now more and more games are assigned completely online. I would still contact the ADs because I am the one responsible for getting to games. ADs also have access to our contact information through out state website and through our any assignor we work for. I worked the last two weeks of playoff games and our information was released to the schools (the state assigns all post-season games) and I had both ADs email or call me about details. If they did not contact me, I would have contacted them. There are things I want to know and I am responsible for I do not expect an assignor to be on top of or even know about.

Peace

[Raymond]

Originally Posted by boiseball

man, email is the way to go; you just send one email to partner, jv officials, school administrator and you are done, forget the phone thing; I loved the arbiter for that, easy to find and cut and paste emails; now I live in an area where we are supposed to drive to a central location to pick up a hard copy of our assignment (are you kidding me), luckily the assigner has been willing to email the stuff

Email doesn't work if your partner is a corrections officer or a construction worker.

Everything goes through our commissioner. He gets a handsome fee to take care of all the communications. If he or the school screws up we still get paid for the game.