HS Associations - Training Programs

[JRutledge]

Originally Posted by Judtech

One thing I think that may be missing from this discussion is the geographical area that people are working in. There are more people in the Wheaton IL area then probably the STATE of Iowa (Ok, you may have to throw Naperville in there!)

Actually Wheaton only has about 50,000 and Naperville has about 130,000. And to use those two towns as places I work games in is very misleading. I am lucky if I get a single game in either town and these are two towns that are in a much larger area. I belong to 3 different basketball organizations and we pull from a larger area. I am the Basketball Division President of one of those associations and that association pulls from many towns in the larger Chicago area. That association has about 120 members total (in basketball only) and everyone works for all kinds of levels and for different kinds of people. The other organizations I do not believe have 100 members each in their basketball division memberships. None of the executive boards decide who works what level that is for the assignors to decide of those conferences. And none hire an assignor to work for the association. We have assignors that are members, but they make it known they will hire whomever they want to and membership to the organization is not necessary. And that would be silly to do that on their part as many conferences are spread out to places that members to an association might not live or have easy access to. I will bet that IAABO in Connecticut is probably larger than the three organizations I currently hold membership in at this time. And for the record there are 96 different recognized official's associations by the IHSA. Also the purpose of those organizations from the IHSA's point of view is simply to train officials to make officiating better across the state. Any contract for a contest is between the school and the official. Assignors do not really have a stake in the assignments as the schools do. That is why they hire an assignor to decide who works the games, but if you violate those contracts you do so with the school. All the assignor can do is not hire you again, but the IHSA has a fine system where you would have to pay the school.

My question about his was just to understand why it was different. We had an IAABO board/organization/association in our area, but there are no independent meetings or independent training. It is mostly an option for organizations to pay into the membership and you will get their literature if you join. But you will not have to attend any meetings or go through a training process. For a guy like me to move to another IAABO group, I would have nothing to show for my membership. At least as far as I can tell.

Peace