NCAA has adopted the JAS (Judges Assigning System) administered by NAWGJ as mandatory for the 2006 season for any team wishing to use their scores for qualification to the NCAA Regional Championship. This measure has been approved and applies to all divisions.

The following guide will help you enter your information on the system should you desire to be selected for collegiate assignments. It has been proposed and supported by the National Association of Collegiate Gymnastics Coaches/Women (NACGC/W) with the following rationale:

• To discontinue selection of judges by coaches and meet sites and events by judges

Please refer to the following guidelines when accessing the site to enter your information. You are encouraged to print this document and write your password on the document or in another safe place. NAWGJ and the assigners cannot access your password.

The assigning process will begin on Oct. 1, 2005 so it is suggested that you complete your availability by that date. The assignments will be completed and sent to the institutions by Nov. 15, 2005.

Most importantly, DO NOT ENTER YOUR NAME MORE THAN ONCE. Doing so will actually hinder your assignment.

If you did not use this system last year and you are having difficulty inputting your data, send an email to Carole Ide at ci.nawgj@adelphia.net

It is possible that the site becomes very busy at times. If you cannot log on try at a different time during the day. For judges on the east coast, morning may be a good time. For those on the west coast, evening may work better. It may take those of you with dial up service longer to log on.

SET-UP: Click on “Set up New Account for Yourself” (It is the link in blue). The page will say “Add New Judge” It is important that you only enter your full and proper name (as it would be listed on a plane ticket). Enter your information as requested. Please use Capital letters correctly (ex. Carole, not carole or CAROLE)

PASSWORD: When you select your password keep it simple and use lower case letters. You may use numbers. You MUST enter your password exactly the same way each time you enter the system. The system is case sensitive.

BASIC INFORMATION: Enter the basic information requested. There are some pull down menus. You may choose “No preference for” an event assignment.

AFFILIATION: The NCAA has a new affiliation policy. Please read the policy below and indicate if you meet any of the affiliation measures. If so, indicate the college or university with which you are affiliated.

NCAA Affiliation Policy 2006

No official may judge a team with which he/she is affiliated.

However, an official with “affiliation” may serve as a Meet Referee.

In that capacity, if an emergency arises and no other judge can be found, he/she may judge.

No current collegiate coach may judge any college competition.

This list will be posted on the JAS and NAWGJ websites

to help judges to determine whether or not they have affiliation with any institution.

Examples of affiliation include the following:

Works for spouse or relative of a collegiate coach

Has any current business transactions with a specific team or coach

Former team member, parent of team member, donor, gymnastics alumni, and/or coach within 5 years of leaving the program

Currently employed by the university

TEAM AFFLIATION: This is not where you graduated from or attended unless it was as a team member, etc, see above, within the last 5 years. You do not need to list if you work for a club, unless that club is under the auspices of a university or college.)

LOCAL WEEKDAY MEETS: – indicate either Yes or No if you are available Monday through Thursday.

TRAVEL WEEKDAY MEETS: - indicate either yes or no if you are available to travel out of your local area Monday through Thursday.

MEETS DESIRED PER WEEKEND? The weekend is considered Friday, Saturday or Sunday. You will be able to enter more specific times on a later page.

This is important because the NCAA has developed modifications of the JO rules appropriate for the collegiate athlete. The NAWGJ Library has produced a DVD with the NCAA collegiate modifications for 2006.

This DVD is available through every SJD, RJD, and collegiate assigner. It is imperative that you watch this DVD prior to stepping on the floor to judge an NCAA competition. Your regional and state judging directors can make this available for you to watch either individually or in a small group. You are on your honor to agree to watch this prior to accepting a contract. Do not check yes until you have viewed the DVD. You can be assigned prior to watching the DVD but you need to be willing to view it at some point prior to the season. This is most imperative for consistency throughout the country, which was a major issue during the 2005 season.

COMPLETION OF BASIC INFORMATION: You must complete this page before moving to the next page. You must click “OK” at the bottom of the page to “SAVE” your information. Should you have a need to change your information at some point, you may go back to this page and hit “RESET”.

Airports: You may enter more than one airport. If you know the correct AIRPORT CODE, please use it. As an example, I entered HHH/SAV. I can fly from either airport.

Event Preferences: You may list your events preferences to judge but there is no guarantee you will be assigned this event. Remember, if you receive a championship or regional meet contract, you may not be able to select an event.

TIME SCHEDULE: Enter the parameters of your personal schedule. For instance, you may be able to leave your house at 7:00AM on a Saturday but because you work during the week you cannot leave until 4:00PM. You may enter different times on various days of the week.

DRIVING LIMIT: Enter how far you are willing to drive – this is one-way. Carpools are not required, but you may put a note at the bottom, if applicable. Then hit OK. To change information hit RESET, enter new information and then hit OK. You may do this at anytime you need to update your information.

MAIN MENU: Whenever you need to go to the main menu, hit the BACK button. If you feel unsure that your information is entered correctly, LOG-OFF; then LOG-IN, using your new, case sensitive password. Click on “Edit Basic Information” and see what has been saved.

DATES ENTERED: click on “List Availability Previously Entered” and print out what you listed. We suggest that you print out the list so that you have a record of what you entered into the system.

UPDATING: It is also important that you update this information when it changes. There may be opportunities for judges to be replaced for emergencies during the season and up to date information is important. You may also return to the site and click on “List availability previously entered” and print out what you listed. It is also very important that when you accept another contract for a date that you have entered as “available” that you go into the system and update your availability. During the 2005 season this seemed to occur more toward the end of the season. This system works only as well as the information that you enter.

ASSIGNMENTS: “Show My Assignments” will be blank. As the assigners complete the assignment process this space will fill. This will begin in October. Check the site on a regular basis. You will receive an email when you are assigned. We are working on trying to have the system email you automatically when you receive an assignment. This may or may not occur this year. In the meantime, if you receive an assignment it will be considered an NAWGJ commitment and you will be expected to honor that commitment.

REFUSALS: Once you have been assigned a meet, if you need to refuse it, you will NOT be assigned another college meet for that weekend.

CONFIRMATION: Please be prompt in answering emails. If an assigner does not hear from you she may need to go on to another judge. If you do not check your email frequently this system may not work well for you.

CONTRACTS: The universities are responsible for sending your contracts in a timely manner. If you do not hear from the school in a timely manner, their information is available on the JAS site. When you receive the assignment you can click on the listing for the school, it should be highlighted in blue. Click on the name of the school to find out the pertinent information you need, the person and number to call, judging fee, etc.

LIMIT OF 4 MEETS: a judge may only see a school twice at home and twice on the road during the regular season. If you notice that you are seeing a school more than the allowable two times (4 total), please notify the assigner. Every effort will be made to make sure this does not occur but it is your responsibility as a judge to follow the NCAA mandate.

FEES: The colleges all have different pay scales. Some of the lower paying schools may be on a four-year plan to bring their fees in line.

FLYING: Some schools can fly judges to their sites while others cannot. You will not be able to select a site where you wish to judge. The schools cannot select their judges except for the case of a non-scoring extra judge such as an additional Meet Referee. You may be contacted by an assigner who does not live in your area. The assigners are delegated to the schools, not the judges.

LIMITS: If you do not wish to fly indicate that you will not fly or go more than xxx miles from your home.

MILEAGE – PER DIEM: will use by NAWGJ guidelines. Judges are expected to share a room if being housed overnight due to travel.

1. The USA Gymnastics (USAG) Level 10 rules are written for a developmental purpose. The collegiate program has different goals and needs than the USAG Level 10 age group program, and modifications of the USAG Level 10 rules are needed to address those differences.

2. USAG changed the Level 10 rules for 2005-06. After reviewing what is known of the new USAG rules, it is apparent that collegiate modifications continue to be necessary.

1. The rules and the collegiate modifications must be applied consistently during both regular and post season competition.

2. The rules and collegiate modifications must be appropriate for Divisions I, II and III.

3. Significant modifications to the USAG Level 10 rules need to be based on a well-understood and consistent philosophy and/or set of goals for the collegiate program. Since adequate discussion by the coaches is critical to consensus building, minimal changes were made for the 2005-06 season.

4. Exceptional routines must include both high-level skills and bonus combinations.

5. The rules should allow for some separation between routines, which meet minimum requirements/difficulty, and those, which exceed the minimum requirements/difficulty.

The “competitive level” referenced in the composition requirements must be defined in order to establish the parameters for this separation between routines. In addition, the “competitive level” was defined to establish the desired consistency throughout the regular season, regionals and championships. Therefore, the committee felt obligated to define the “competitive level,” and defined a “competitive level” benchmark. The committee established the following statement: “The competitive level is defined as the level at the NCAA Women’s Gymnastics Team Championship Day 1 competition.”

The following is an experimental rule for the 2005-06 regular season and will not be used during the NCAA National Collegiate Women’s Gymnastics Regionals or Championships. The video review rule will be evaluated at the conclusion of the 2005-06 season to determine future application.

In the event that an inquiry response is unsatisfactory to the coach, videotape may be used for the purpose of review under the following conditions:

4. All reviews must be specific to the performance or nonperformance of a particular skill, combination of skills or neutral deductions (i.e., out of bounds)

6. The review must be submitted to the meet director within 5 minutes following the conclusion of the meet.

7. The coach requesting the review must provide a signed Video Review Request Form (VRRF), queued video and team camera to the meet director. The meet director will be responsible for delivering this information to the meet referee and event panel for their review. The coaches may not be present during the review.

8. Reviews must be conducted in the presence of the meet referee and the event panel. If the meet referee is on the panel, the next highest rated official must participate. A simple majority of the review panel will determine success or failure of the review. If the review fails, judges may not change their scores, but 0.3 will be deducted from the team score. If the review is successful, the score will be adjusted accordingly.

9. The results of the review will be noted on the VRRF by the meet referee and returned to the meet director who will take the VRRF to the score table. The official score will be adjusted (up or down). Then the judges will sign the official score sheet and the meet director will deliver the VRRF to the coach.

10. Decisions rendered by the judges’ review panel are final and cannot be overturned.

2) Judges should not discuss scores or their impressions of competitors with other judges.

3) Ensure judges are assigned to all events during the season and do not allow judges to request which events they are assigned to.

5) Judges are not to review “unwritten rules” with each other prior to meets.

6) Prohibit judges from having preferences on where they judge or with whom. They are only permitted to give available dates and distance willing to travel.

8) All meets should be judged the same way from the first meet – senior night – NCAA championships.

9) Judges are to judge what they see and not who the person is or how they have performed in past meets.

10) Reinforce that there is a yellow card system for judges to use. Judges shall provide their own yellow cards.

15-minute conference at the conclusion of competition: The committee eliminated the 15-minute conference at the conclusion of a meet, removing the face-to-face contact between coaches and judges. At the conclusion of the meet, coaches can submit a Routine Summary Form (an additional inquiry form for coaches to fill out which will list the start value and all deductions) on up to four routines per meet. Judges will complete it prior to leaving the site and at the time the official score sheet is signed. The individual that is in charge of obtaining the signature on the score sheet from the head judge shall collect it and return a copy to the visiting coaches. Coaches will still receive the desired feedback without face-to-face discussions between coaches and judges. This information will be added to Appendix B of the 2006 NCAA Women’s Gymnastics Championships Handbook “Regular-Season Meet Procedures for Women’s Gymnastics”.

THE NCAA 2006 RULES ARE AVAILABLE ON THE NAWGJ WEBSITE AND THE NCAA WEBSITE. BY ENTERING YOUR NAME IN THE JAS SYSTEM YOU ARE AGREEING THAT YOU WILL CONSCIENTIOUSLY FOLLOW THE INTENT AND PHILOSOPHY OF THE NCAA RULES AND MODIFICATIONS AS CONSISTENTLY AS POSSIBLE.

Should you have difficulties with the system you may email myself, an NAWGJ Director or a collegiate assigner.

Best Regards,
Carole Ide
President, NAWGJ
26 Country Club Court
Hilton Head, SC 29926
CI.Nawgj@adelphia.net