Greetings From the Chair
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The world
of swimming certainly mirrors the unpredictable nature of our daily
lives right now as pools begin to open and the date for sanctioning
meets draws closer. If you participated in the short survey
regarding your plans to return to officiating, I thank you. The
results measured your willingness to return to volunteer work as
officials on the deck. Just over 5500 of more than 15,000 officials
across the country answered the questionnaire, and 92% reported
favorably to returning as local environments dictate. Many claimed
they would even be willing to drive a few hours to help out teams
in their LSC. Your dedication to this sport is
astounding!
On a more
somber note, Gina Mensay, USA Swimming staff liaison passed away
earlier this month creating an empty place in our collective heart.
Please keep her family in your thoughts and prayers. She often
mentioned that working with the officials brought her joy. After
just one conversation with Gina, you knew that her single desire
was to provide you with an answer that gave direction to your
request. She was patient and kind-hearted, and worked tirelessly to
ensure our success. Gina also had a great sense of humor; I say
this because she always laughed at my jokes and tolerated my
endless use of movie quotes. Many of you will be able to recall and
rest in fond memories of your interaction with this woman of
unmatched character.
Stay
well.
Kathleen
Scandary
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Announcements
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New USA
Swimming Website launced TODAY! View the website at usaswimming.org.
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Fall and
Winter Meets - Formats of these meets may be altered to accommodate
public health concerns. Please note the addition of
the PSS meet in Irvine.
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Virtual Meets
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LSC OCs
will be taking a webinar on Virtual Meets on June 24th. We hope to
have the webinar recorded and available for the OCs to bring it to
their LSC Referees. Watch for the link to the recorded webinar and
accompanying materials on the Officials Page.
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Tech Suit Information For Officials
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The
following rule, proposed by the Age Group Development Committee,
will take effect September 1, 2020.
Please take a moment to read the Tech Suit FAQ document linked
below.
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Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
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USA
Swimming is committed to a culture of inclusion and opportunity for
all. We are dedicated to not only have our sport reflect the
demographics of our country, but to intentionally create
environments where differences are embraced and everyone feels
welcome, respected, supported, and valued to fully participate.
Equity is how we look to increase fairness through the policies and
procedures our organization adopts.
To fully understand what USA Swimming’s Diversity, Equity,
and Inclusion (DEI) efforts are about, it is
important that we know what these terms encompass. Diversity is
often readily associated with race and ethnicity. Although both
fall under the Diversity umbrella, other areas such as
socioeconomic status, age, gender, ability/disability, expression,
identity, and religion are also protected categories within our
Code of Conduct that also fall under the broad definition of
Diversity. We often refer to our Diversity efforts as the
“Invitation to the Party”. Who are we inviting and who
are we missing?
Inclusion
is where a bulk of our educational efforts reside. From education
comes the awareness and ability to create these inclusive
environments for one another. A large part of being able to do this
is understanding yourself and the level of awareness you have about
what you bring to the environment. Inclusion is “being asked
to dance” once you are at the party. It is being involved in
the experience and not just a passive
participant.
Finally, equity (very different from equality) is what we refer to
as “requesting a song to dance to” at the party. You
now get to experience our sport in a way that really speaks and
connects with you and your needs. At USA Swimming, equity
is looking at our policies and procedures and the things
that govern our sport. It helps to make sure we are structured in
such a way that members get what they need to be successful.
Below are just some resources that are available to our
membership.
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Athletes:
leadership summits, diversity camp opportunities, transgender
inclusion recommended best practices, virtual and in-person visits
from DEI staff
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Coaches:
culturally inclusive resource guides, educational training and
workshops both virtually and in-person, mentorship programs
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Volunteers:
scripts for Meet Directors, Officials, and Volunteers when hosting
a swim meet, educational training and workshops both virtually and
in-person
Other
programs and partnerships that exist are our Community Swim
Programs and Swim1922 Sigma Gamma Rho initiative. For more
information and for a comprehensive list of what we have to offer,
please visit our website below.
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Open Water Happenings!
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The 10k
race at World Championships is the Olympic qualifying event. You
must finish in the top-10 to be invited to compete at the Olympics.
The 2019 Open Water Nationals at Biscayne Bay, Florida were the
Open Water Olympic Trials for the US, with the top-2 finishers
earning an invitation to the World Championships in South Korea and
a chance to qualify for the Olympics. For the U.S., those swimmers
were Haley Anderson and Ashley Twichell for the women, and Jordan
Wilimovsky and David Heron for the men.
By
finishing 2nd and 6th respectively at Worlds, both Haley Anderson
and Ashley Twichell qualified for the women and Jordan Wilimovsky
qualified for the men with a 5th place finish. This will be the
third Olympics for Haley, the second for Jordan, and the first for
Ashley.
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Open Water Nationals
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Mike
Murphy is the head referee for the 2020 OW Nationals. For the first
time ever, there were too many applications and officials had to be
turned away. People have discovered how exciting Open Water
swimming can be!
The Open
Water Nationals scheduled for April in Ft. Myers, FL were
postponed. We’re looking at re-scheduling in October. Be on
the lookout for updates on the USA Swim Officials Facebook page as
well as the USA Swimming website.
If you have
not attended an Open Water event, put it on your bucket list.
You’re always at a body of water (lake, river, ocean) with
beautiful surroundings. Open Water swimming is never the same. We
always say prepare for the unexpected and be flexible. If
you’ve never seen an Open Water race, think of NASCAR racing.
Seriously, it’s that exciting, especially the sprint down the
chute after swimming a 10k.
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FINA Open Water News
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FINA has
decided to cancel all International competition through the end of
September. They had a task force that recommended doing this
because of safety of the athletes, lack of training, and
restrictions in travel. Crossing fingers, the event in Hong Kong
will happen late October for our athletes.
FINA has
asked the Federations to nominate four people to list #14.
Currently for list #13, USA Swimming is represented by Matt Wilson,
Pam Wilson, and Sandy Drake. Their appointment runs from January
2019 through December 31, 2022. For the new list #14, USA Swimming
will be nominating Mark McCaw (currently on list #12 expires
12/31/2020), Mike Murphy (currently on list #12), Tom Lombardo
(new), and John Fox (new). Congrats to you all! You will represent
USA Swimming well.
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New Evaluation Templates
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In
response to feedback received from officials via surveys, new
evaluation material was created for mentors to help streamline the
process and bring consistency and common understanding for both
mentors and mentees. The Evaluation Templates mimic verbatim the
Professional Documents for each position. Reviewing the
Professional Documents are now the best resources for guidance and
preparation.
The templates were introduced and distributed to all N3 Evaluators
via webinar this past Spring. There was tremendous participation,
comments/questions, and feedback. Using the webinar allowed us to
reach the intended evaluators and gives us the ability to bring new
ones on board seamlessly.
Educational Evaluations are no longer offered unless it was a
specific action item of a previous evaluation. For
instance, “Kathleen needs to work in this position at one or
more Sectional level meets to gain experience before requesting
another evaluation”. The Educational Evaluation must be
requested prior to the evaluation. Once an evaluation
has begun it cannot be changed to Educational.
All future OQMs will use these templates for evaluation. Plans are
being developed to educate the N2 Evaluators, who are designated at
the LSC level by the Officials Chair. Please be patient with us as
we look to find the best time for a scheduled webinar for this
group.
Thank you for your voice and active participation in improving
mentoring at all levels.
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Officials Excellence Award
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Dean
Scheeler - North Dakota
Dean
Scheeler has been a stroke and turn official for the Fargo Moorhead
Gators for just over ten years. Throughout that time, Dean has
developed into a leader within the North Dakota LSC, becoming a top
trainer and mentoring dozens of new officials. The apprentices that
train under him have had nothing but rave reviews for his patience
and wealth of knowledge. Dean began officiating when his children
were involved in USA swimming, but has continued to volunteer his
time, officiating meets even after his children were no longer
involved in the sport. Dean always offers to work in any position
on the deck and is willing to lend a hand wherever he is needed.
Even though Dean could have chosen to work his way up through the
ranks of officiating, he chose to perfect the craft of a stroke and
turn official. Dean is a joy to be around on deck and won the
"Official's Dance-Off" at a swim meet in 2016. In 2018, Dean was
named North Dakota's Official
of The Year. Dean is very deserving of this award and North Dakota
Swimming is thankful for all of his hard work and dedication to
swimming.
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