Friday, October 07, 2016

Wake Up And Smell The Coffee--You May Still Have More To Do!


You mean there is more I need to do to be certified?

This is yet another wake up call to all officials--you need to be absolutely sure that you have completed ALL the requirements to be certified in 2017--or you may not make it...

Here are things you must do:

*  Click on "Becoming An Official" on the right hand side of this page to view all the requirements.
*  Be sure you are an up-to-date member of the USTA.
*  Be absolutely sure you have done the background check (click on "Background Check" on the right hand side of this page.
*  Be absolutely sure you have watched the video "Safe Play/Safe Sport" and have the certificate of completion that they give you.
*  If you are a previously certified official, remember you have to watch a supplement to the "Safe Play/Safe Sport" video.  Without this you cannot be certified in 2017.
*  Be sure you have a Nucula account.  This is where it gets real difficult so be prepared!!!  Once you have watched the video and passed the background check, you can then take the required tests for your level of certification.  THEN--your Sectional Chairman should be notified and open you up a Nucula account.  The Section Chairman in Texas is Bruce Sampley and his email is:  bruce-tnsref@charter.net
*  Once you have a Nucula account, you MUST go in and tell them to recertify you or it won't be done.  If you don't know how to do this, email us and we will tell you how (rmtennis@yahoo.com).


Once you have met all the requirements listed above AND HAVE A NUCULA ACCOUNT, then you can become a certified ITA official.  Without a Nucula account you cannot take the ITA tests and participate in the required webinar.

The DEADLINE for USTA certification is October 12, 2016, so be sure you get it all done.  You may be too late to do the ITA certification and you may have to apply as a new and provisional ITA official.

2 comments:

a.t.h. 2.0 said...

Please note there are 3 different classifications of SafeSport training.
The September 30 email from USTA says to complete the 30 minute SafeSport Refresher module. When you access the SafeSport site you want to be sure that you get that course. The other 2 courses are SafeSport Training, the full blown edition and USTA JTT and Officials SafeSport Training. If you were certified in the last 2 years, our good friend Julio E says to take the Refresher course. It is shorter than the full blown course and it is almost exactly the same as the JTT and Officials version. The Refresher course is designated in the upper left hand corner of the screen and has a orange border around the screen (guess Randy will like that). I have been in many meetings when folks have said that they have done the training but it doesn't show up on their record, they probably took the wrong course. Be aware.

RM said...

My email has been full and my phone has been ringing as people are discovering they haven't done everything and don't even know how to fix it.

Needless to say, the USTA needs to find a solution to this mess they have created or we are going to be losing experienced officials left and right and those that we recruit will quit before they even get started. Whenever you implement a bunch of changes like this you need to be sure that you have worked all the bugs out of it before you make it a requirement.

God help them as they try to fix this...