The Pro's And Con's Of New Officials Attending Camps

[dblref]

Originally posted by BktBallRef

100%? I have to disagree with you there. Our JV officials work the 3 man system. While they do use 2 man for middle school games, most 1st year officials will also get JV games their first year. We also use 3 man in 15U and older AAU games. We have a lot of inexperienced officials working with veterans during these games.

The first camp I went to was a 3 man camp. Of course, it was easier then as there was no rotation. But everybody switched on every foul. Don't get me wrong, learning the 2 man system is important. But in some cases, it's important to learn 3 man just as quickly. Different areas do things differently.

Interesting that in NC the JV officials work 3-person. In VA, at least in northern VA, we work 2-person freshman and JV. We work 3-person for all varsity games and we have several rec leagues that are 3-person.

Regarding camps, I echo what you guys are saying. My first camp was the George Tolliver camp at JMU and it was all 3-person and I had never worked 3-person. Talk about a learning experience! I had been offiating for a couple of years and thought I was fairly good, but knew I needed to get much better. We had one camper that came from Colorado and he had never officiated a game at any level. He said he wanted to learn the right way from the beginning and he did. As I watched him throughout the camp (4 days), you could just see how much he was learning. He won the award as the most improved (naturally).