Student Athlete Officials Program
Take a look what being a Student Athlete Official Entails and watch a video from a Big 10 officials point of view.
What does a Student Athlete Official Entail?
The Salem Football Officials Association (SFOA), in cooperation with local high schools, work toward finding, training and equipping student athletes who have an interest in officiating Fall Saturday youth football games.
This is intended for high school student athletes who have a passion for the game of football and would enjoy pursuing refereeing during / after their playing days are over.
Basic Idea
These student officials assists the SFOA’s veteran and rookie officials by providing at least two additional officials to work these games, usually on the Wing positions, and adds to the Association’s numbers of overall officials.
How they start
These student athletes are first trained in the class room, then out on the field for a minimum of five sessions. Once trained, they work positions during youth scrimmages with veteran officials behind them to assist and to give them points of emphasis to help them get up to a level of confidence to work games, starting in September.
Cost / Other Information
During the season, veteran officials working the Referee and Umpire positions, also assist and comment during games to help improve the skills of the youth officials. Uniforms are provided for these juvenile officials to help reduce their costs and to help maximize their earning potential at $50 per game and mileage during the Fall campaign.
Requirements
These student officials have the same requirements for games, but due to practices, do not attend the normal Rookie and general meetings for the association on Tuesday nights, but use the same assigning system. In the two most recent years, we have seen an increase in growth of 25% from year 1 to year 2, and are hoping for a similar increase for 2018.
Number of Participants
Ideally, we would like to have up to 30 youth officials working with the association, and when they graduate from high school, we encourage them to join our association as Rookie officials. Over the past two seasons, veteran officials have commented on how much they enjoy working with and improving the mechanics and training of these student officials.
End of Season
At season’s end the juvenile officials and their parents are treated to an end-of-season party to meet Board members and to further discover the possibilities in officiating football after high school.
Want to find out more?
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