USAPA Referee and Instructor Certification Meetings at Nationals VII
October 2015 Training Update
By Linda & Lynn Laymon, USAPA Training Chairs
Phase II Beta testing of the Referee Training/Certification program will soon be completed and we are currently analyzing the feedback and updating the training materials as needed. The finalized USAPA Referee Handbook and Referee Trainer Guide will be available to USAPA members by the end of November. To bring Ambassadors up to speed on the program, we will be presenting a brief status report at the Thursday evening Ambassador dinner at Nationals VII. For those attending Nationals VII who won’t be at the Ambassador dinner, we will be presenting similar Referee Training/Certification program updates in Palm Creek Resort’s Ocotillo Room on Thursday, November 12 (Clinic Day) at 11:30-12:20 and 12:40-1:30. With USAPA Referee Certification on its way to becoming reality, we are beginning to look at pickleball instruction and the need for and feasibility of a USAPA Instructor Training/Certification program. To that end, we also will be holding two Instructor Certification roundtable discussion sessions on Clinic Day.
Due to time constraints the instruction roundtable discussions will be dovetailed with the two Referee Training/Certification update meetings described previously. We hope to devote the latter portion of each update session to an open exchange of ideas regarding a USAPA Instructor Training/Certification program. This subject will not be presented at the Ambassador dinner, so if you have thoughts on instructor certification, plan to attend one of Thursday’s sessions.
The combined Referee Training/Certification update and Instructor Training/Certification roundtable meetings have been scheduled so attendees can participate in one of these sessions as well as either of the Ratings seminars, which run concurrently. Feel free to bring your lunch.
