Training. Kent Ref.

[Mike Simonds]

Hi Kent. Sorry to take so long to get back to you. You wanted to know how we are handling training over here in our local association. We have about 30 officials. Starting in May and ending July we do the semi-pro games in our area (about 6 games in all). After July 4th we start meeting every Tuesday evening until the first week of November. We are members of the Hawaii State Athletic Association and they are in the process of creating a state-wide officials association. But so far they are only handling the administration of the NFHS exams, evaluation of officials, and selection of officials for the state play-offs (of which we have Division I and II schools). And they selected CCA 7 man mechanics for all state play-off games. But they allow each association (of which our state has 5) to select the mechanics and training methods to use. We have enough officials so we can do 7 man varsity (CCA) and 5 man for JV (also CCA). Our training officer (new one this year) took a new approach: he made an outline for first 8 meetings (which should take us right up to the start of the regular season) that will cover all the basic rules we need to know plus the practical mechanics to cover each type of play. For example, last night we covered pass interference and then went right into the mechanics for covering the passing game. So far it seems to be working and we keep the meetings to under an hour and a half.

A few years back we joined the California Football Officials Association for their great training materials. They have some good outlines on rules, positions, and tests. We have the guys do one test every week on their own time plus read the related rules and cases (I try to focus in on the specific rules and cases instead of overwhelming them with reading the entire rule from start to finish). They turn in the tests and our instructor will grade these at home. The next meeting we pass these back with the answer sheet (that also has the rule number next to each answer) and we only review the questions that were missed the most often. Otherwise you will have these guys arguing for an explanation to each answer and the meeting will drag on forever.

Anyway, I hope this helps and I would love to hear what others are doing at their meetings.

Good luck to everyone and have a great season.

[kentref]

Thanks Mike, I appreciate you taking the time to provide the details on your training programs.

Just so I'm understanding - you use NFHS rules but use CCA mechanics for your varsity (7 man) and JV (5 man) games, correct?

Thanks again for the info.

[Mike Simonds]

Yes, in Hawaii we use Federation rules for high school Varsity and JV. Also the Pop Warner league follows Federation (except of course for some modifications in timing, etc.).

I guess we started using CCA mechanics a few years ago and never went with Federation mechanics. I guess its because when I joined 11 years ago the association used 6 man for varsity and the NFHS mechanics book only went up to 5 man. So we just went with the CCA 5, 6 and 7 man.

We found that its easier to go from CCA 5 man to CCA 7 man. This year our local league approved 5 man JV and 7 man varsity. The state play-offs (both Division I and II schools) will use CCA 7 man.

For Pop Warner we use a combination of 3, 4 and 5 man depending on official availability and also training new guys (we will work 4 man and the 5th guy is the mentor who stands behind the new guy).

I enjoy your articles and thank you for noticing my quote in Referee magazine. I'm kinda proud of that one...

Hope you have a great year...

[kentref]

Mike:
Thanks again for the info and the kind words re my articles - that was a great quote!
Best of luck to you this season as well!
Kent