By Dale Goodwin
Reprinted from Referee Magazine, January 2018 issue
Juli Jones had excelled as a Division I college volleyball player in the 1980s – Big Sky Conference MVP in 1988 for Eastern Washington University – and had coached as an assistant for a community college and several junior teams over the years.
“One day my friend Margie Ray asked if I’d be interested in serving as an observer for the (then) Pac-10. Once I started watching some of the best officials in the country I thought, “I can do that.” For me it was a way to give back to the sport that has been a large part of my life,” says Jones. And that started her officiating career.
Tom Konis has four daughters who played volleyball. “I loved the game and wanted to get involved,” he says.
For both Juli and Tom, although coming from different perspectives, training became a key for them. “My biggest fear was blowing a call that affected the outcome of the match,” Konis says.
For Juli, “My greatest fear was not living up to the standard that I set for myself. I also worried about being a disappointment to my mentors and their expectations of me.”
Both joined the Spokane (WA) Area Volleyball Referees Association, Tom entering “Beginning Training” classes, Juli Advanced Training. Both taught by experienced high school and Division I college officials, these two training venues provided a comfortable start for officials from diverse volleyball backgrounds.
Beginning classes are designed for officials just getting started in the sport. They represent a hug (“I’ll take you under my wing and get you going) approach. Taught by longtime referee and national scorer Barb Twohig, the class covers mission and expectations, uniform and equipment, rules and techniques, professionalism, protocols, scorekeeping and information about harassment policies and tax accounting and reporting.
Advanced classes are particularly geared to preparing officials for the college game – rule variations, speed, coach-R2 interaction, match management, professionalism, and peculiar match situations, among many other topics.
“After a year in the beginning class it was on to the advanced class where I have been for the past nine years,” says Keith Ward, who had served several decades as a youth volleyball coach and basketball official. “The impact that the advanced class and the individual feedback by D1 & 2 officials have been the reasons that I have moved from a Local to a State rated official in about three years. The advanced class was a great learning experience, hearing from advanced instructors and about their experiences. In the last four or five years more technology has been introduced to class that has helped to improve knowledge and judgment with video clips.”
But training does not stop at the classroom.
“Be a student of the game” is something I tell the newbies,” says Twohig. “Our limited training time exposes them to basic principles but they still have to take the initiative to learn as much as they can on their own by going to matches and watching officials or viewing videos online. Hopefully they will then bring questions to class that we can all discuss at the start of each weekly training session in the fall.”
Several training techniques are used in the Spokane area, where there is an abundance of high school, small college and Division I matches to see.
The Spokane trainers use on-court sessions to discuss rotations, antenna violations, line judge positioning, and R2 transition.
Video has proven helpful in
· Recognizing tight sets to the net, and differentiating between possible backrow attacks and blocks by the backrow setter, and over reaches by the blocking team
· Learning where to watch for touches
· Rotations, and out of
· Double- and four-hit situations
· Coach/referee interactions
Magnets on a classroom whiteboard can help turn the light bulbs on for those struggling with serve receive formations and possible overlaps.
Summer high school or college camps can be a fertile training ground for up-an-coming officials to take the court and hone their skills in a non-pressure situation, mentors there to help them with their questions. Pre-season college scrimmages are another great training ground opportunity.
Try taking your trainees to a match, talking them through what the referees, line judges and scorers are doing; dissecting the gym and possible obstructions or ground rules that might be necessary; learning protocol for national anthem and introductions, timeouts, time between sets, end of game signals and exit plans; talking about professionalism and what makes the crew look professional (list the various ways they portray that in their look and what they do).
Assigning experienced officials as mentors with lesser-experienced referees provides on-the-job training, and gives the mentor partner a chance to use live game situations just encountered to illustrate important points in the art of officiating.
Alan Hirayama is one of three advanced trainers in Spokane, a Division I referee and high school/small college assigner.
“For effective training, it is important to present the information and ‘show’ how the information is applied and used in context,” he says.
“Within each area of study, the other trainers and I go through an informal gap analysis/needs assessment by asking the following questions: What does the rule book and rating criteria sheets say officials should be doing? When we (and other high-rated officials from which we get input) are out ‘in the field’ and we see other college-level officials working, how are they managing these issues (best practices)? How are our local officials handling these issues and what are the differences between the two groups (gap)? What kinds of educational activities are needed locally to bring our officials closer to what is being done on the national college level (needs)? Then based on this assessment, learning activities are formulated for each topic that are designed to fill the identified gaps,” Hirayama explains. Video has become a critical teaching aid in helping aspiring referees see for themselves how rules and techniques are applied.
Add PAVO spring training camps, RefSchool and iRef modules, USAV training opportunities, and the annual PAVO Convention in December in conjunction with the NCAA Championship weekend to your list of outstanding training opportunities, and you’ve got a winning combination.
Dale Goodwin is a National Rated Volleyball Official, former PAVO National Rating and Officials Training Teams member, and longtime member of the PAVO Board of Directors. From Spokane, Washington, Dale is communications manager at Gonzaga University in his “free” time.
