test tomorrow

[Dan_ref]

Originally posted by rainmaker

Still not perfect, doggone it...

That makes all of us.

[BktBallRef]

Originally posted by A Pennsylvania Coach
I took my small tests to the test site, and it seemed pretty easy. I think I have the members of this board to thank for that. There were only four I wasn't sure about, so I'm guessing my score is between 96-100. I'm surprised, after taking it, that only 75 is needed to pass. Somebody who gets only 75 is going to be wrong several times in every game he or she officiates.

It'll be interesting to see what you score. If it's an NFHS exam, I too have walked out thinking that I only missed 3 or 4, only to find out later that there's usually 2 or 3 others that I just answered toofast and missed.

[JRutledge]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by A Pennsylvania Coach

I'm surprised, after taking it, that only 75 is needed to pass. Somebody who gets only 75 is going to be wrong several times in every game he or she officiates.

Many of the wrong answers I see officials get are usually very technical answers. Usually one word is out of place or they take literally which does not happen in real life. Like a question like this, " The Referee designates who is the official scorebook and official scorer for the game?" Now that is very true statement. The problem is in reality we usually are told who they are by the game management and the table people themselves. We play almost no role in that decision on a regular basis. So when someone answers that question, they use reality thinking instead of rulebook language to answer that question. This is why the Athletic Rules Study is so good. The NF uses many of the same questions, over and over and over again between the Part 1 and Part 2 exams. It helped me this past winter for promotion.

Peace

[APHP]

A test question from the latest issue of REFEREE Magazine--

How many basic components of the principle of verticality are there in the rule book ??

If you know this one without "peeking" looking in the rule book, you will ace your test.

To see if your answer is correct, see Rule 4 Section 44.

[CLAY]

JRutledge is correct, be careful when reading the questions. The test is more like and english test rather then officating test.

[BktBallRef]

Originally posted by Dan_ref

That makes all of us.

Not true! I made 100 once!

But, I've been like the rest of you since then!

[Nevadaref]

In addition to other problems with the test, I have a serious objection to the way the test is scored. Under the current system points are scored for getting questions right and there is no penalty for missing a question. This means that you should never leave a question blank, and that if you are just blindly guessing, you should theoretically get half of those guesses right (since it is a True/False test).
Now consider an association that requires an official to score a 75 to work games. So how many questions does the official actually have to know (then just guess on the rest with an expectation of getting credit for 50% of those) in order to expect to pass?
The answer is a lowly 50! He nails 50, then flips a coin on the remaining fifty and gets 25 giving him his required 75.
My point is that the coach is right, 75 is very low. But it is far worse than he realized. He was likely thinking, "Hey, I could get 75 of these in my sleep." But he forgot that he would also get an additional 12 or 13 points for the 25 that he didn't know, just by guessing, putting his score up around 88.
So coach, be very afraid of officials who only score in the 70s, they only know about half of the stuff on the rules test, and yet we are sending them out to work your games.

My cynical belief is that the only purpose of the test is to allow an association to say that they do have a certification proceedure and that such and such an official did pass with a score of whatever, in the event of a lawsuit. In short, they are covering their own a$$es.

If we cared enough to fix the problem, the solution is simple. Score the test as follows: +1 for a right answer, 0 for a question left blank, and -1 for an incorrect answer. This would eliminate the guessing problem, since every incorrect guess would cancel out a correct one. The result will be a much more accurate evaluation of what that official knew on the test.
Those of us who score in the high 90s now, would continue to score there, but for those who don't put any time into studying the rules it would really show in their scores.

[mick]

Originally posted by Nevadaref
In addition to other problems with the test, I have a serious objection to the way the test is scored.
... If we cared enough to fix the problem, the solution is simple. Score the test as follows: +1 for a right answer, 0 for a question left blank, and -1 for an incorrect answer.

I am confused as to why the test means so much that you would suggest this.
Regardless of the test scores and other requirements to officiate high school basketball, this remains a game.

[Ref in PA]

Congrats coach - I hope you pass.

The bad thing about PA is once you pass with a score of 75 or better, you never have to take the test again. Just keep sending in your money each year and you are a bonafide basketball referee. Over time, myths turn into rules in the minds of the "veteran" officials. In my chapter, I cannot tell you the number of times we get crazy notions voiced for discussion. Most of the time, these guys don't believe the correct answer and it shows in the games they call. And it is the Vets that keep getting the vasity and playoff games. Half of my chapter still doesn't believe the ball is dead after a made basket! even after reading aloud the rule from the book in the meeting ... "It really doesn't mean *that* because the clock is still running."

If I could change one thing, it would be to have retesting on a periodic basis.

[BktBallRef]

Originally posted by Nevadaref
In addition to other problems with the test, I have a serious objection to the way the test is scored. Under the current system points are scored for getting questions right and there is no penalty for missing a question. This means that you should never leave a question blank, and that if you are just blindly guessing, you should theoretically get half of those guesses right (since it is a True/False test).

The problem with your stance is that it's, as you stated, theoretical. My experience is that guessers get more wrong than right. In reality, a person being tested will guess based on their misinterpretation of the question. They use a flawed reasoning and make the wrong choice. It's not as if they go down the page answering without reading, in which case your "50 right, 50 wrong" percentages might be close. But they don't "blindly" guess. They read, misinterpret and guess wrong.

In thoery, no one who scores less than 100% should be allowed to officiate because there are obviously things they don't know. But this is reality, isn't it?

[wizard]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by BktBallRef

In thoery, no one who scores less than 100% should be allowed to officiate because there are obviously things they don't know. But this is reality, isn't it?

What do you can someone who finished last in his class in medical school?

Doctor.

Now that's reality.

[JRutledge]

Originally posted by mick

I am confused as to why the test means so much that you would suggest this.
Regardless of the test scores and other requirements to officiate high school basketball, this remains a game.

This has been my point all along. Whatever your score is on the test, you still have to run, handle conflict with coaches and players, call the game and use good judgment and to be believable, use the proper mechanics. I have made a habit of looking up every question and finding the section it is in before the season. The test at best is a good study tool before the season. Especially with the new rules and changes that come up.


Peace

[CLAY]

They make the test harder than what is needs to be by the way they word the questions, and then you find yourself second guessing yourself.

[Dan_ref]

Originally posted by BktBallRef

The problem with your stance is that it's, as you stated, theoretical.

The real problem with his stance is that as a theory it is incorrect. Theories of random probability do not apply to any single person, they only apply to very large groups of people. In theory it is very possible for a person to guess on every T/F question and get 100% correct. As the number of people taking the test increases the probability that the overall score is 50% approaches 100%. Gambling casinos show these theories to be true every day.

[Nevadaref]

Originally posted by Dan_ref

The real problem with his stance is that as a theory it is incorrect. Theories of random probability do not apply to any single person, they only apply to very large groups of people. In theory it is very possible for a person to guess on every T/F question and get 100% correct. As the number of people taking the test increases the probability that the overall score is 50% approaches 100%. Gambling casinos show these theories to be true every day.

Dan,
First, I have a math degree. Second, I live in Nevada. So if you want to talk probability and gambling, I'm your man.
Unfortunately, you are not right in saying that my stance is incorrect. Here's why:
What you said above about the score of a single person taking the test has merit, but your claim is terribly misleading.

You are saying that if we give a bunch of officials only the answer sheet and let them just guess T or F, that their average score will approach 50% as the number of officials that we do this with gets bigger and bigger. That is absolutely true. However, you are also saying that if we select only one of these officials at random and look at his score that his score could be very far from 50%. You even used 100% as your example. This is the part of your claim that is misleading. While this is theoretically possible, it is HIGHLY UNLIKELY. This is due to the normal distribution of the "Bell" curve and the fact that the vast majority of scores are within a standard deviation or two of the mean.
Doing this is exactly the same as flipping a coin 100 times and recording the result. The official now uses Heads = true and Tails = false to fill in his test answers. The chance that someone could score 100% on the test doing this is one-half to the 100th power. That number microscopic! However, above you said, "In theory it is very possible for a person to guess on every T/F question and get 100% correct." Sorry, but no. It is certainly not "very possible." It is in fact, ALMOST IMPOSSIBLE. (This is why casinos make so much money. Ever play roulette?) Actually, there is the same probability that the official will miss all the questions and score a ZERO. These outlier values occur with such small frequency that we can basically ignore them. That is the whole basis of the theory of probability.
So all of this supports my claim that an official should expect to get roughly half of his guesses right on the test. Yes, some officials will get more than half right and others will get fewer, but it won't vary that much from the 50% figure.
For an example, with some hard numbers to back me up, if you give the test to 256 officials and each of them guesses on exactly 8 questions, you would only expect 1 official to get all 8 of his guesses correct. If each official guessed on 10 questions, you would have to give the test to 1024 people in order to expect a single person to get all 10 guesses correct. For 30 guesses, that number jumps to 1073741824. How many officials do you think we need to test before someone would correctly guess all 100 questions? The answer is 2 to the 100th power. A huge number.
Now remember, my problem is not with those officials who need to guess on only 10 questions (due to wording problems and some technical definitions most of us have a few guesses), but those who are so lacking in rules knowledge that they have to guess on about half of the test.

To get a hard number that we can work with let's say 50. If an official is guessing on fifty questions, his chance of nailing all of them is 1 in 2^50 (which I believe is a 16 digit number). However, he has about a 50% chance of getting either 23,24,25,26,or 27 of those guesses right and an 88% chance of scoring between 20 and 30 correct. So he can basically add a safe +20 to his score by guessing. Therefore, someone who knows only 50% of the stuff will look like he knows over 70%. That is not helpful for evaluating an official.

Therefore, the scoring of the test is misleading because the scores not only don't reflect your officiating ability, they don't even accurately approximate your rules knowledge!

Mick, that is what I object to. I believe that if we are going to go through the process of taking the test that we should at least make it meaningful in some manner.