Post by schlager7 on Apr 18, 2010 22:01:46 GMT -6
Received from Jaimie Ailshire.
Statshot:
SSCC’s for the 2009-2010 Season consisted of:
The Longhorn Open – October 17-18, 2009, 223 fencers in 8 events
The Eric Wang Memorial SSCC & RYC – November 14-15, 2009 - Approx. 160 fencers in 6 events, exclusive of the RYC competitors and events
Gulf Coast SSCC #3 – April 10-11, 2010 – 92 fencers in 9 events
Oklahoma and Ark-La-Miss declined to host tournaments.
At the beginning of the season, the charter that was given to me when I was handed the reins was amended to address the size and composition of the governing body of the SSCC Commission, reducing the number to four individuals serving two year terms, from different divisions, and including in those four an elected athlete representative with voting power. The athlete advisory group did not at any point notify the Commission that they elected anyone, so to the best of my knowledge, only Justin, Cathy and I were on the commission for this year. The Ops Manual, governing the details of operating the Circuit, was not amended, but neither was it particularly well followed. Current charter and ops manual attached to the email conveying this report.
As a note, this is the last year of my term, which according to the charter ends 31 August 2010. At that point, again according to the current charter, leadership moves to the next most senior person on the Commission, Justin Meehan. Next year’s officers will be responsible for appointing a third member to serve for a period of only two years, for which I would be happy to be considered, and for consulting with Justin with regard to planning matters.
Justin and I have talked about the future of the SSCC, and why it had such a dismal, miserable year. Very few people have said they enjoyed it, many said they missed seeing familiar faces, and almost all who have spoke up were disappointed with the level and quality of competition.
The most important reason for the decline of the SSCC is the decline in attendance – that is to say that people have expressed that they are not willing to travel, and for the SSCC to succeed in a region with the geographic area of ours, fencers must be willing to travel. To get a visual illustration of the size of our section, pull up Google Maps. Try to find a view that includes our entire section (hint: the smallest you can go before you cut off the top and/or bottom is 6 clicks up from the maximum zoom out). San Antonio to OKC is a 7-8 hour drive. Shreveport to Austin is 6-7. Dallas to Houston is 4-5. We play in the 2nd-largest geographic section in the USFA (second to Rocky Mountain Section, and excepting the distance to Alaska from Washington) and we have to deal with that if we want this to be successful. Coaches must encourage their students to travel, they must travel with their students and work to ensure their successes, and they must help parents recognize the importance of varied, quality competition to a competitor’s progress.
The second point of note is that, after anything has gone wrong, a bad weekend has been had by all, a tournament just didn’t meet the standard, everyone looks for a way to “make sure it doesn’t happy that way again.” However, no one wants to be told what to do, and no one wants those rules to apply to them when it’s inconvenient. For example, when it was pointed out to organizers that pools of 6 are better for fencers than pools of 5, the response was “You can’t tell us what to do,” instead of, “We’d rather end early than do what’s right for fencing,” or even, “You’re right, and that’s even in the USFA rulebook, so we’ll do it that way.” The requirement not to counterschedule against the SSCC was in the Charter that everyone agreed to originally, and when one club is hosting they want to make sure no one else has something that weekend, but when they are asked to move/reschedule/cancel tournaments to avoid a conflict, it isn’t fair anymore. When people are asked to give input on how to better direct things, they don’t have time or energy to take any kind of leadership role. When they’re asked what they look for in a tournament, they answer, but when it is observed that they have not met their own ideals, the way things need to be to have those quality events, it’s back to “you’re not the boss of me.”
Another point is that we have run into a number of venue restrictions that make a frustrating experience for people – vendor exclusions, parking issues in spades, size and accessibility questions, and issues of that nature. The commission has been unwilling to take the designation of events away from the divisions, but has received and passed on a lot of feedback on these points.
The point has been raised that the management of the SSCC has been entirely too punitive, too bossy and inclined to punishment, than to facilitative, helping people set up and run good, quality tournaments at a reasonable cost. This is an approach that Justin, Cathy, and I have striven to moderate while still working within the parameters established by the available processes. As a note, between Justin, Cathy, and myself, the current management has had a presence at almost every SSCC for the past three years.
So it’s time for a check up on the SSCC. The question I would like to put to the meeting is simple: Do you want to continue the SSCC?
If the answer is “yes,” then it must be redefined and reevaluated. The original intent of the Section Circuit, and the reason that we have attempted to require that hosting clubs meet at least a minimum standard, is that the Circuit events were to be miniature NAC events. The purpose was to provide a National level of fencing competition run at a National level of tournament quality, to give our fencers big, high-pressure tournament experience without having to travel the entire country.
Unfortunately, as the USFA has noticed, this model must be done *effectively* and people must be willing to travel and pay to enter these events in order for them to be successful and profitable. The cycle that we’ve entered into is one of attendance dropping, so cutting costs, so lowering quality, so losing more attendance. It’s a vicious and annoying cycle that we have allowed to perpetuate itself for too long.
The membership will need to consider a number of questions:
1. Level of Tournament
a. Do you want mini-NACs, events that could easily double as ROCs?
b. Do you want small, intimate events, and all the risks implied therein?
c. Do you want them to be standardized? Or are you okay with random event structures (single vs. combined pools, mixed vs. segregated)? How can you compare those to one another for quality?
d. How should the success of competitors be measured? What system should be used to tie this together as a circuit? The Points List can be continued, but if the events are not standardized, how can you be sure you aren’t comparing sabers
and epees?
e. Should they be fenced in accordance with the rulebook, or are house rules sufficient?
2. Level of Regulation
a. Who should be responsible for the management of the circuit? Who makes decisions on format, and scheduling?
b. Who designates tournaments, and on what qualifications? Longevity, such as the Pouj and the Longhorn? Quality, such as the Wang, the Rose, the Oz? Affordability, such as the Yorick? Accessibility, limited to Houston, Dallas, and Austin?
c. Who should provide help to those tournament organizers who want it, who need a name, or a phone number, or a recommendation?
d. What should the scope of these responsibilities be?
e. What should be the penalty for hosting a subpar tournament, or failing to comply with the USFA rules? Is it enough to trust the market not to return to that event, or is more required?
The Circuit, once reevaluated, would need to be modified extensively. History will have to be forgotten – no one should be sanctioned for past mistakes, no one should assume that the past patterns will repeat themselves, etc. The process for doing that is not actually HARD, but it requires that EVERYONE involved in the decision making process actually PARTICIPATE. I cannot stress this enough – Division Chairs, Division Executive Committees, the Commissioners, the Section Officers must ALL PARTICIPATE in proposing changes by the deadlines already specified, wording those changes as carefully as possible to avoid the law of unintended consequences (which, being unintended, cannot wholly be avoided, but it can be treated for in the preparation), and voting to modify or pass those changes. One cannot simply throw the
rules out the window, but continue the program anyway – down that road lies chaos. Consider well what you are committing your division officers, section officers, and fellow fencers to if you vote to continue the SSCC.
I recommend the answer to the question of continuing the SSCC be a RESOUNDING “NO.”
1. I do not feel that the members of the various divisions support the SSCC any longer, despite the best efforts of its leaders to make everyone as happy with it as possible.
2. Due to the increasing pressure at the National level to remove the Section as an administrative sublevel of the USFA, the removal of the need to qualify Juniors through Sectionals in the future, and the shift of qualifying path for Div IA from Sectionals to the ROC program, I strongly feel it is in the best interests of the Section to disband the SSCC entirely, absorb any and all related funds to the treasury of the Section, and invest all of our efforts in ensuring that the ROC program is well-represented, well-attended, and strongly supported in the region.
3. I feel that attempting to continue the SSCC in its present incarnation will continue to stir up old resentments, perceived slights and insults, and generally continue the downward trend that all have noticed but few have had suggestions to halt.
With that in mind, please let me know what the opinion of the membership is with regard to the future of the Section Circuit. During my remaining time as Head of the Commission, I will undertake to ensure that planning goes smoothly if it must go on, and that all involved will have a better experience in 10-11 than they had in 09-10.
BE AWARE THAT TO CONTINUE THE SECTION CIRCUIT, 4 of 7 DIVISION EXECUTIVE COMMITTEES MUST VOTE TO RE-RATIFY THE ATTACHED CHARTER. ABSTENTION, or failure to communicate the results of a vote, HAS IN THE PASSED COUNTED AS RATIFICATION.
Statshot:
SSCC’s for the 2009-2010 Season consisted of:
The Longhorn Open – October 17-18, 2009, 223 fencers in 8 events
The Eric Wang Memorial SSCC & RYC – November 14-15, 2009 - Approx. 160 fencers in 6 events, exclusive of the RYC competitors and events
Gulf Coast SSCC #3 – April 10-11, 2010 – 92 fencers in 9 events
Oklahoma and Ark-La-Miss declined to host tournaments.
At the beginning of the season, the charter that was given to me when I was handed the reins was amended to address the size and composition of the governing body of the SSCC Commission, reducing the number to four individuals serving two year terms, from different divisions, and including in those four an elected athlete representative with voting power. The athlete advisory group did not at any point notify the Commission that they elected anyone, so to the best of my knowledge, only Justin, Cathy and I were on the commission for this year. The Ops Manual, governing the details of operating the Circuit, was not amended, but neither was it particularly well followed. Current charter and ops manual attached to the email conveying this report.
As a note, this is the last year of my term, which according to the charter ends 31 August 2010. At that point, again according to the current charter, leadership moves to the next most senior person on the Commission, Justin Meehan. Next year’s officers will be responsible for appointing a third member to serve for a period of only two years, for which I would be happy to be considered, and for consulting with Justin with regard to planning matters.
Justin and I have talked about the future of the SSCC, and why it had such a dismal, miserable year. Very few people have said they enjoyed it, many said they missed seeing familiar faces, and almost all who have spoke up were disappointed with the level and quality of competition.
The most important reason for the decline of the SSCC is the decline in attendance – that is to say that people have expressed that they are not willing to travel, and for the SSCC to succeed in a region with the geographic area of ours, fencers must be willing to travel. To get a visual illustration of the size of our section, pull up Google Maps. Try to find a view that includes our entire section (hint: the smallest you can go before you cut off the top and/or bottom is 6 clicks up from the maximum zoom out). San Antonio to OKC is a 7-8 hour drive. Shreveport to Austin is 6-7. Dallas to Houston is 4-5. We play in the 2nd-largest geographic section in the USFA (second to Rocky Mountain Section, and excepting the distance to Alaska from Washington) and we have to deal with that if we want this to be successful. Coaches must encourage their students to travel, they must travel with their students and work to ensure their successes, and they must help parents recognize the importance of varied, quality competition to a competitor’s progress.
The second point of note is that, after anything has gone wrong, a bad weekend has been had by all, a tournament just didn’t meet the standard, everyone looks for a way to “make sure it doesn’t happy that way again.” However, no one wants to be told what to do, and no one wants those rules to apply to them when it’s inconvenient. For example, when it was pointed out to organizers that pools of 6 are better for fencers than pools of 5, the response was “You can’t tell us what to do,” instead of, “We’d rather end early than do what’s right for fencing,” or even, “You’re right, and that’s even in the USFA rulebook, so we’ll do it that way.” The requirement not to counterschedule against the SSCC was in the Charter that everyone agreed to originally, and when one club is hosting they want to make sure no one else has something that weekend, but when they are asked to move/reschedule/cancel tournaments to avoid a conflict, it isn’t fair anymore. When people are asked to give input on how to better direct things, they don’t have time or energy to take any kind of leadership role. When they’re asked what they look for in a tournament, they answer, but when it is observed that they have not met their own ideals, the way things need to be to have those quality events, it’s back to “you’re not the boss of me.”
Another point is that we have run into a number of venue restrictions that make a frustrating experience for people – vendor exclusions, parking issues in spades, size and accessibility questions, and issues of that nature. The commission has been unwilling to take the designation of events away from the divisions, but has received and passed on a lot of feedback on these points.
The point has been raised that the management of the SSCC has been entirely too punitive, too bossy and inclined to punishment, than to facilitative, helping people set up and run good, quality tournaments at a reasonable cost. This is an approach that Justin, Cathy, and I have striven to moderate while still working within the parameters established by the available processes. As a note, between Justin, Cathy, and myself, the current management has had a presence at almost every SSCC for the past three years.
So it’s time for a check up on the SSCC. The question I would like to put to the meeting is simple: Do you want to continue the SSCC?
If the answer is “yes,” then it must be redefined and reevaluated. The original intent of the Section Circuit, and the reason that we have attempted to require that hosting clubs meet at least a minimum standard, is that the Circuit events were to be miniature NAC events. The purpose was to provide a National level of fencing competition run at a National level of tournament quality, to give our fencers big, high-pressure tournament experience without having to travel the entire country.
Unfortunately, as the USFA has noticed, this model must be done *effectively* and people must be willing to travel and pay to enter these events in order for them to be successful and profitable. The cycle that we’ve entered into is one of attendance dropping, so cutting costs, so lowering quality, so losing more attendance. It’s a vicious and annoying cycle that we have allowed to perpetuate itself for too long.
The membership will need to consider a number of questions:
1. Level of Tournament
a. Do you want mini-NACs, events that could easily double as ROCs?
b. Do you want small, intimate events, and all the risks implied therein?
c. Do you want them to be standardized? Or are you okay with random event structures (single vs. combined pools, mixed vs. segregated)? How can you compare those to one another for quality?
d. How should the success of competitors be measured? What system should be used to tie this together as a circuit? The Points List can be continued, but if the events are not standardized, how can you be sure you aren’t comparing sabers
and epees?
e. Should they be fenced in accordance with the rulebook, or are house rules sufficient?
2. Level of Regulation
a. Who should be responsible for the management of the circuit? Who makes decisions on format, and scheduling?
b. Who designates tournaments, and on what qualifications? Longevity, such as the Pouj and the Longhorn? Quality, such as the Wang, the Rose, the Oz? Affordability, such as the Yorick? Accessibility, limited to Houston, Dallas, and Austin?
c. Who should provide help to those tournament organizers who want it, who need a name, or a phone number, or a recommendation?
d. What should the scope of these responsibilities be?
e. What should be the penalty for hosting a subpar tournament, or failing to comply with the USFA rules? Is it enough to trust the market not to return to that event, or is more required?
The Circuit, once reevaluated, would need to be modified extensively. History will have to be forgotten – no one should be sanctioned for past mistakes, no one should assume that the past patterns will repeat themselves, etc. The process for doing that is not actually HARD, but it requires that EVERYONE involved in the decision making process actually PARTICIPATE. I cannot stress this enough – Division Chairs, Division Executive Committees, the Commissioners, the Section Officers must ALL PARTICIPATE in proposing changes by the deadlines already specified, wording those changes as carefully as possible to avoid the law of unintended consequences (which, being unintended, cannot wholly be avoided, but it can be treated for in the preparation), and voting to modify or pass those changes. One cannot simply throw the
rules out the window, but continue the program anyway – down that road lies chaos. Consider well what you are committing your division officers, section officers, and fellow fencers to if you vote to continue the SSCC.
I recommend the answer to the question of continuing the SSCC be a RESOUNDING “NO.”
1. I do not feel that the members of the various divisions support the SSCC any longer, despite the best efforts of its leaders to make everyone as happy with it as possible.
2. Due to the increasing pressure at the National level to remove the Section as an administrative sublevel of the USFA, the removal of the need to qualify Juniors through Sectionals in the future, and the shift of qualifying path for Div IA from Sectionals to the ROC program, I strongly feel it is in the best interests of the Section to disband the SSCC entirely, absorb any and all related funds to the treasury of the Section, and invest all of our efforts in ensuring that the ROC program is well-represented, well-attended, and strongly supported in the region.
3. I feel that attempting to continue the SSCC in its present incarnation will continue to stir up old resentments, perceived slights and insults, and generally continue the downward trend that all have noticed but few have had suggestions to halt.
With that in mind, please let me know what the opinion of the membership is with regard to the future of the Section Circuit. During my remaining time as Head of the Commission, I will undertake to ensure that planning goes smoothly if it must go on, and that all involved will have a better experience in 10-11 than they had in 09-10.
BE AWARE THAT TO CONTINUE THE SECTION CIRCUIT, 4 of 7 DIVISION EXECUTIVE COMMITTEES MUST VOTE TO RE-RATIFY THE ATTACHED CHARTER. ABSTENTION, or failure to communicate the results of a vote, HAS IN THE PASSED COUNTED AS RATIFICATION.