Officiating Classes

[Curious]

I am interested in how many High Schools or Colleges around the country offer classes in officiating (any sport - but especially football and basketball). If applicable, how have they been received by students; and how effective (or-ineffective) have they been in improving the quality of officiating and, especially, recruitment of new officials?

Thanks

[dammitbobby]

I think it has been tried in this area in the past (years ago), but some of the issues encountered were that the college school year begins several weeks after we are on the field, putting them a good bit behind others going through the normal chapter-led training.  Another issue was just general lack of interest in taking it as a class through a local community college. Not sure about basketball, but football you have to be 18 to officiate (I believe) which pretty much closes that door on any possibility of getting HS kids involved here.

I brought this up as a possible recruitment possibility, and that is what I was told.

One resource you may look at, that could probably give you better info would be NIRSA (National Intramural-Recreational Sports Association.)  They have training for officials for intramurals:  https://play.nirsa.net/student-officials-development/

[HLinNC]

I would recommend that college age students get involved with their school's intramurals program.  It is tailored more for them and they're not sitting around listening to a bunch of old war stories.

I can't see too many local school systems implementing such a narrow field of interest unless they could incorporate a segment into an already existing PE class.  NC just reduced the minimum age a year or two ago but they have to officiate games below their current grade level.

[Etref]

We tried it for football at a University in the Texas Panhandle. Got 2 officials. As soon as they graduated, they were gone.

[HLinNC]

Stumbled over these while researching for training outlines-


https://montanadigitalacademy.org/course-catalog/sports-officiating/

https://campussuite-storage.s3.amazonaws.com/prod/1558552/3ab3882e-5535-11e8-afbb-0a0f7059ce40/1819541/7d4a1dae-aabe-11e8-b35a-1208237ecac8/file/Strategies%20in%20Sports%20Officiating%20-%202010.pdf

[ElvisLives]

When I was in school at Texas Tech (71-77), they offered a Sports Officiating class in the PE department, which I took as an elective. Fall semester was football. Spring Semester was basketball, and maybe a little baseball. The course was still being offered in the early 90's, and I got contacted to see if I would take over teaching the fall semester. I did, for two seasons. Then my job bosses got wind of why I was gone on Tuesday and Thursday mornings, 10:30 through lunch, and 'suggested' I not continue in the future.
Enjoyed it very much. It was a great opportunity to show folks - most of whom were wanting to become coaches - that officials are people, and, at least at the higher levels, are only interested in getting things right. With cooperation from the Rec Sports department, I got them on the field for some intramural flag football scrimmages. Those were eye-opening experiences for most of them. I hope they have been able to carry some amount of empathy for sports officials, in the many years since. I was able to get a few people interested in officiating, but it wasn't a great recruiting tool.

Sadly, I don't think that course is offered, any longer. 

[TampaSteve]

back in the day at Florida State (87-91) when I needed to improve my gpa in my junior year (darn academic probation will get ya every time), I took several sports classes. I believe the Education - sports department is who offered them.
*Golf (dont remember who taught it). Mostly remember just hitting balls twice a week at the golf course but nothing as far as any real golf lesson or golf rules - maybe a little of each

*Coaching (taught by baseball asst coach). Remember being taught baseball instruction as if I was a player. 

*Sports Officiating (taught by basketball asst coach). - at the time I was already officiating wrestling (HS varsity) and baseball (HS - JV)
Remember officiating some basketball where a few classmates would play while others would officiate, but don't remember actually any officiating instruction/philosophy as we would see in any officials manual.


But I just took a brief review of the course catalog and none are offered.

[Ralph Damren]

Several years ago all of our weekly meetings were held at a local high school. The school labled our meetings as : 'NON-CREDIT NIGHT COURSE".No one came because of that  Some came from ads in the local newspaper's sports page, the local sports radio blerb, AND AT SUGGESTIONS FROM CURRENT MEMBERS.   

[bama_stripes]

A couple of years ago, our state began allowing an officiating class as an elective in high schools.  A grand total of SIX schools chose to offer this class.  The reason most often given for not offering the class was the lack of readily available course materials.

I found out recently that NFHS will soon make such materials readily available, and hopefully that will encourage many more schools to offer the classes.

[refjeff]

The state college nearest to me does not.

A very few high schools have offered officiating as a PE elective.

Very few students continue on as officials.  Which for me isn't a problem as they may come back to it after college or otherwise.  I think we need to keep trying.

[TampaSteve]

To add another $0.02 here.
It seems ok to me if a coach talks to his kids once a year towards the end of the season ala:
hey yall, HS will probably the last time you play. but if you want to stay associated with this sport, those referees each make $x for a game. you can do the math for how much per hour that is. if you do it 2x a week that's not too shabby for anybody - especially you young adults. 
if any of yall want to stick with the game and make a little money while you're at it, I know the head official and can give him your information.

In college, I worked 3 sports and worked a lot less than my friends and had the same $ or more than others.
Sure us old guys dont do it for the money, BUT to a kid those dollar signs do speak loudly.