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I'm willing to bet those states that pay higher than Ohio are states where it's more expensive in general to live. So the pay has to be relative to the cost of living and must be worth while for people actually want to do it while putting up with all the other issues associated with officiating. Yes, love of the game is great, but it's obviously not worth people's time or else there'd be a waiting list for people to become officials.
You'd lose that bet. Tennessee, Iowa, and South Dakota all pay over $125 for varsity football, just to name a few.
What do you propose the fee should be and who is going to pay for it. (I guarantee you it won't be the schools)
I'm struggling about what's hard to understand about this. Schools would enforce it. Each school can decide if it's temporary or permanent. Perhaps the first time it's removal from that one and only game. Next time it's the rest of the season. If there's a third, it's permanent. If schools want to host thousands of people at their facility, then they are responsible for monitoring those people and their behavior.
Like most of your "solutions", this is what's done already..... Guess what, "it aint workin"
So, they don't get playoff games? That's the only thing I've seen mentioned on here.
Lack of (or minimal) playoff assignments and a regular season schedule that mirrors the ability of the official(s).
But again, just like any business,
Again.... it's an avocation
there can be regular evaluations.
Who is providing said evaluations?
Maybe head coaches must give report card grades on officials after each game.
They did that years ago and thankfully ditched it..... It was a terrible idea for a couple of reasons.... First, the coaches (collectively... there are some good ones whose opinion I value) don't have an unbiased point of view. Next...... they either didn't do them because they simply don't have the time or they waited til the end of the year and did them all at once in a haphazardly fashion.
Or there is regular check-ins/evaluations with superiors that pick a game at random to look over film of to see if you are actually doing the job well.
This happens, but not in a regular fashion like you propose. (who is going to do it?)
Maybe associations should give officials grades like state grades teachers and schools
There already is already a process in place where members rank their fellow officials
Maybe every official has a public rating system like this official here is a 4.7 highly rated official. We could prevent poor officials from getting games.
There's already not enough officials to cover the games..... You propose to make it worse?
Not working would be pretty motivational to get better for most. How about we stop protecting people who are bad at their job, if that means games are cancelled, or your crew is short a guy because he blows calls all the time..... well, I bet you would make sure that everyone else in your crew would make sure he's doing his part.
Happens all the time. Crews release members for poor performance at the behest of assigners and on their own volition.
I am not perfect by any means, and don't expect officiating to be perfect,
You expect high school officials to be treated in the same fashion as professional officials.
but it's frustrating when so many simple things are not enforced regularly. A perfect example is players in proper equipment per the rules. Every game has kids in violation of those rules with knee pads not covering properly.
A point of emphasis for years.... That said, there is a major misconception of this rule..... Simply having the knees exposed at any time is not a violation.
Accountable can mean a few things as I explained above. But to add, maybe officials should be required to have a higher score on passing the mechanics and rules test..... 75% now is I believe what's required.
Would have worked (and it did) 40 years ago because the numbers were so strong.... Doesn't work any more. There was an official (now retired) in your part of the world that pushed for officials to have to take a post season test and achieve a 90% grade to be eligible for post season assignments. That idea got about a 3 second consideration by the powers that be.
Or Ohio could list what score the official received so everyone would know how well the official knows the rules. How about a basic vision test, seeing clearly is pretty important for officiating any sport.
Now I'm convinced that you just have an axe to grind here.
Or how about a basic physical fitness requirement.... can you jog from point a to point b.
You just proved my prior point.
I've given more than a few suggestions and specifics on how to help get rid of problematic officials. I'm sure you and others will come back and tell me how ridiculous and unrealistic these are. Fine, but doing what we have been doing isn't working. So someone has to think outside the box to fix the problem. And let me reiterate 85-90 percent of officials are doing a phenomenal job and should be applauded for the work that they do.
More proof that you are just grinding an axe.... Throwing all this against the wall while praising 85-90%
But the bad ones are really bad and it's hurting the game and sticking up for them is also hurting the game that we all love.
Just like coaches, teachers, admins, police, doctors, accountants.....
2 years ago in NKY, they started a program where they are encouraging 15 year olds to get a youth football certification to officiate youth games. They get paid, and work games with at least 1 KHSAA official. And it's been great so far. Time will tell if it translates into more officials, but as of now it's looking like it will because the number of high schoolers officiating youth games has increased from year 1 to year 2 significantly. If more states or regions can implement similar programs, it should hopefully grow the number of officials long term.
Also done in Ohio and other parts of the country.....
Yet, we lose 80% of those kids inside of 2 years.....
Because of the BS that comes from the parents, coaches, and fans.