Why do High School officials dislike College officials so much?
 

I have seen this for about 2 years now and am so glad I got out of H.S. basketball.

Please tell me this happens elsewhere???

I'm confused as to the question. Could you please eloborate?

Disclaimer - this only applies to the areas where I've lived.

It is jealousy. What I will here often is high school officials don't want to put in the extra time, but if a college contract was dangled in front of them they would jump at it.
We have HS meetings and people always say something negative about college officials. This year I told this guy that when I go to a HS meeting, I'm a HS official. I don't think there should be any animosity, but there is.
Many officials can't take when someone learns something and brings it back, normally from a higher level. Other times you will hear people talk about the differences when they really don't know the differences. Just my opinion, from my experience.

I can't really speak to why there is hostility because I certainly don't feel it. Different folks look for different things out of officiating. I've worked with a bunch of folks in sub-varsity this year who are just fine staying there and have no aspirations to move higher.

I have my sights on HS varsity but no further because the extra travel/effort above and beyond HS varsity isn't worth it to me. It would be silly for me to dislike someone who decided that was their ultimate goal, however. I say more power to them, good luck, and I hope they have fun doing it.

People seem to get worked up over some very strange things but this one seems especially ridiculous.

I have heard from some high school officials that they get the impression that college officials look down on them. The high school officials sometimes feel that the college guys don't really have any regard or respect for officials who are "only" high school refs.

My main gripe is that college officials will routinely dump high school games if there's a makeup college game without regard to who they get as a replacement. It happened in a few games around here last night. My partner ended up working the JV and varsity games because of a shortage. Another game was going to use 3 officials and one of the guys bailed to take a college game.

Also, some college officials work just enough HS games to qualify for the post-season and then swoop in and expect every possible HS post-season assignment to go to them now that their college season is done. It's transparent.

That's one advantage of having an assignor, instead of getting your own games. When I have to turn back a HS game, I just call my HS assignor and he fills the slot. He's assured me that it's very easy to do so, now that everybody is online. But I still always offer to make calls if he wants me to.

It's understood here that college assignments take priority over high school assignments, even if it means that you turn back the high school game. There's no "retribution" (for lack of a better word) from the assignor.

I agree that some officials work the minimum number of games to be eligible for the tournament, but I have never seen an official expect to get "every" possible game. They expect their 2 or 3 games, just like any other selected official.

Seems like from your statement, you dislike high school officials.. but I digress.

Agree with the others, I see college officials that want the best of both worlds, and expect as much. Ticks me off to see college officials working a high school game using college mechanics.

So if you're doing college now Joey, just leave us mean-spirited, dis-liking, high school officials alone and just do college ball. :p

BTW, I know college officials that do high school and they respect and use NFHS mechanics. I like those guys a lot.:D

If college is the priority and you only work the minimum, why should you "expect" anything? The guys and gals that made HS their priority deserve those post-season games...thus the friction.

Priority, even the morning of the 2 contests? I don't get this. If I was a high school assignor, I'd like to work with my officials, but this absolute pecking order thing makes it sound like nobody has any respect for the high school game. I know a guy who was offered 3 varsity games recently, but already had 3 fresh/JV games scheduled (different assignors) and politely declined.


We work in different places. But...

I work 35 HS games and someone works 8 and we should get the same number of games?

EDITED to ADD: With some minor exceptions, I'm happy with my postseason schedule. This isn't personal whining, here, just an observation.

To get a proper answer, you need to define "college" officials. Do you mean a D1 college official? Or do you mean the guys that might be working D2, D3 or JUCO ball out in the middle of nowhere because no one else is available at the times that the games are played, the money isn't really worth it for the travel/time lost, and the fact that some officials would rather work a local high school rivalry game in front of a packed house as opposed to working a D3 game 100 miles away in front of 13 people.

Iow, imo there is no possible one-size-fits-all answer available to your question. I've seen high school officials who I thought were quite capable of doing D1 games. I seen college officials at all levels that I thought should pay to get in the games they were officiating. I also seen college officials at the lower college levels that were quite capable imo of handling D1 games if they were ever given a chance.

Every case is different, every official is different, and generalization is inherently wrong imho.

Wait a minute. That might be the case where you live or your surrounding area that is not the case here. Actually many of the D3 and D2 conferences around here are very hard to get into and in a few case D1 assignors. The league I work that is NAIA the supervisor assigned a D1 conference for years until last year. And the D2 in this area was assigned is currently the assignor for a D1 conference and will be the NCAA Supervisor starting next year. And almost every other conference around here is assigned by former D1 officials that have a lot of power in HS assigning. You do not just get a phone call and go work those games. Even many of the staff members of these conferences I referenced are D1 officials. I worked a JV game at the D3 level last night and one of the officials is a current D1 official and one of the officials is a former D1 and NBA Official. It is unbelievably hard to get a shot at the D3 level let alone NAIA around here.

Peace

I completely agree with Jurassic that doing JC ball is not for the money. And in every case, every official is different... You really can't generalize.

From one HS association, I have refs who think I don't deserve to be there because I'm relatively young to officiating (experience wise). From another association, I have refs who think highly of me now because I now work at the JUCO level.

I want to share one of my experiences with you guys....

I did a JC game this season that took me about 8+ hours and got paid only $115. Take $35 dollars our of the $115 for gas because round trip from work to gym and back home is about 260 miles. I make about $120 dollars doing two local varsity games that'll take me 3 hour at most and 5 minute of travel time.

So tip off is 6pm on a Friday night. Our JC association requires us to get there at least 1 hour before tip off. I assumed the drive will take about 2 hours without traffic. On Friday afternoon, you never know what the roads will be like. I left work at about 2:00 pm to give myself ample of time for travel. The drive took just about 3 hours. I got there right around 5:00. Game ended at about 7:45pm. After our post-game talk and shower, I left the gym at about 8:30PM. Got home at 10:15ish

The gym had about 30 fans and that was it. It was cold and empty. But JC college games will always take precedence over any hs games - despite of an 8+ hour trip.

Virtually all of our varsity officials fall into one of 3 categories:

1) they are a college official
2) working on being a college official
3) has no interest in being a college official, including those that have worked college and don't now for whatever reason -- travel, time, lack of interest, etc.

I don't get any hint of animosity between any of the groups, personally. If you can work, you can work, and most guys take notice of that fact alone. There's more issues concerning personality than there are with being or not being a college official.

I had a discussion with a long time full schedule D1 guy recently. He works 6 or 7 HS games a year and at the end of every season he gets calls begging him to take HS playoff games. He said he doesn't like to do HS playoffs because it's a no-win situation. If he does well they say he should do well, he's a D1 guy. If he doesn't they'll point and say look, the D1 guy f'ed it up. But that's the way it is, generally the assignors want the best people possible to work their games, it makes them look good.