The USATF National Officials Committee (NOC) requires that evaluations of officials be done at major meets every year. Evaluations help officials improve their skills and assist the USATF Officials Selection Committee choose officials for major meets the following season. The goal of the evaluations program is to ensure USATF has the most competent and respected track and field officials in the world. The evaluations process is guided by and overseen by the NOC Evaluations Subcommittee comprised of six officials, including the Chair. The Chair is appointed by the NOC Chair, and that person, in turn, appoints the other members of the Subcommittee. The Subcommittee is assisted in its duties by the Chair of the NOC Technology Subcommittee. Each year, the NOC decides at which major USATF-sponsored meets officials evaluations will be conducted. Currently, evaluations are conducted at the Senior Indoor and Outdoor Championships, the Masters Indoor and Outdoor Championships, the Indoor Combined Event Championships, the U20 Outdoor Championships, the Junior Olympics, and the Youth Outdoor Championships. The World Championships will be added for 2022. The USATF Officials Selection Committee chooses the officials (excluding referees) for the Senior Indoor and Outdoor Championships, the U20 Outdoor Championships, and the Indoor Combined Event Championships. Referees are chosen by the Men’s and Women’s Track and Field Competition Committees. Officials for other major USATF-sponsored meets are chosen, for the most part, by Local Organizing Committees (LOCs).
Once Referees, Heads of Events, and Crew Members are selected for national championships, the Evaluations Subcommittee begins making assignments. Referees are asked to evaluate event heads they will be overseeing at meets; event heads are required to evaluate the members of their respective crews. Selected crew members are given the responsibility to evaluate the Head of their event. If a crew is made up of only one or two members, a crew member is not selected to evaluate the head (the head will be evaluated solely by the referee). A crew with three or four members will have one crew member appointed to evaluate their head. If the crew size is five or more, two crew members will be assigned to evaluate their head official. The names of those crew members selected to evaluate head officials are not disclosed to the head officials. Lists of officials for meets chosen by the Selections Committee are provided immediately following the USATF Annual Meeting. The officials coordinators of LOCs are asked to provide lists of selected officials, including contact information and USATF membership numbers, a month in advance of their meets. As the meet date nears, the LOC officials coordinators are asked for updated officials lists since there are likely several changes from the first list provided. The first list is used to validate that officials are in the USATF database, and the second list is used for the selection of evaluators. Crew members selected to evaluate the heads of events are generally more experienced officials at the Master or National certification levels. A database is created to track which crew members are selected to evaluate heads of events. This database is used to limit the number of times a crew member is given this task, if possible, and to allow others to gain the experience.
A minimum of a week prior to the meet, an email is sent to the selected evaluators. Included in the email is a notification of the recipients’ responsibility to complete one or more evaluations, instructions on how to complete and return evaluations, an explanation of the two parts of the online evaluation instrument (see details below), and the deadline for submitting the evaluations after the conclusion of the meet. Heads of events receive an additional item in their email entitled, “Guidelines for Crew Chiefs for Conducting Evaluations” with further instructions regarding their responsibilities for evaluations (See Attachment A). All officials selected to complete evaluations also receive a document entitled, “Guidelines for Writing Evaluation Comments for USATF Officials Selection Committee” (See Attachment B). For security purposes, an individual pin number is assigned to each evaluator to allow that person access to the evaluation database and to protect confidentiality of the information. The deadline for submitting completed evaluations electronically is 7 days after the conclusion of the meet. The actual date is provided in the email to the evaluator. An official who has missed the deadline for submitting a required evaluation(s) will be sent a reminder on the 10th day following the meet conclusion to submit the required evaluation by the 15th day after the meet. If the evaluation is still not received by the second deadline, a final reminder is sent with a deadline of another 7 days for a maximum submission date of 25 days after the meet conclusion. Immediately upon electronic submission of an evaluation, two notifications are generated. These are sent simultaneously to the official who has been evaluated and the other to the evaluator. The evaluations are kept for 3 years so that the USATF Officials Selection Committee has access to 3 years of information about an official. If there are extenuating circumstances that prevent an evaluator from submitting an evaluation by the deadline described above, an extension of time may be granted with a revised deadline. The NOC Technology Subcommittee creates a lengthy report for use by the USATF Officials Selection Committee, including information from the recommendation portion of the evaluations completed for officials who have applied to work at major meets the following season. This report is provided to the Selection Committee members at least two weeks before their meeting in early December. Association Certification Chairs are also asked to write recommendations to the USATF Selection Committee on all their local officials who have applied for major USATF-sponsored meets.
Beginning in 2022, the consequence for officials who fail to complete the evaluations by the final deadline (25 days from meet conclusion) is that they will not be eligible to be selected for the major championships during the following calendar year. Officials subject to the above penalty will be notified before the Selection Committee meeting and given an opportunity to timely appeal the decision to the NOC Chair.
All evaluations are completed online and submitted electronically. Three standard evaluation instruments are used: one for referees to evaluate event heads, one for crew members to evaluate event heads, and a third one for event heads to evaluate crew members. Below are links to the three instruments:
Each evaluation instrument is comprised of two distinct parts, as follows:
This first section of the evaluation provides feedback to the official being evaluated regarding his/her overall performance at that meet as well as their performance in specific areas. Raters are asked to provide comments on strengths, weaknesses, and areas for improvement. The information in this section is seen only by the individual official who was evaluated. This information is not provided to the USATF Officials Selection Committee. Evaluators provide a rating on each criterion below, plus optional comments, using the following scale: Excellent, Good, Fair, or Not Observed.
The above criteria differ in the two instruments used to evaluate head officials.
This section of the evaluation is the evaluator’s recommendation, with comments, to the USATF Officials Selection Committee regarding the rated official’s suitability for selection for future major USATF-sponsored championship meets. The information in this section is seen only by the Selection Committee members and the individual official who was evaluated. Evaluators provide a rating using the following scale plus required comments to support the rating: Please rate this official compared to all officials across the country in this event:
If an official disagrees with the rater’s recommendation or comments to the USATF Officials Selection Committee, a statement of dispute can be submitted to the Evaluations Subcommittee Chair using a form provided by the committee chair. Disputes must be completed within 90 days from the last date of the meet. The dispute statement is sent to the rater who can either change or affirm the original evaluation. If the original evaluation is changed, the person who filed the dispute can either agree or disagree with the revised evaluation. If there is agreement, the matter is closed. If disagreement remains, or the rater elects not to change the original evaluation, the rated official may submit a rebuttal. In that case, both the original or the revised evaluation and the rebuttal are sent to the Selection Committee for consideration in making assignments for the following year’s major meets. Ratings and comments in the Performance Appraisal section of the evaluations are for the rated official’s review only; they are not used or distributed to any other persons. Consequently, they are not subject to the dispute resolution process. Nevertheless, officials are encouraged to discuss evaluations and any disagreements with the respective raters, if applicable. For information and guidance to begin the dispute process, please email official.evaluations@usatf.org.
For questions, contact the Evaluations Subcommittee Chair, Carolyn Hill, at Official.Evaluations@usatf.org. Last Updated: 3/4/2024