POLICIES AND PROCEDURES
Membership | Assignments | Finances | Safety & Descipline | Development

Effective: January 1, 2001

MISSION STATEMENT
The mission of the MidSouth Rugby Referee Society is to provide the highest quality officiating to rugby clubs and organizations for which we provide referees.

GOALS
In order to achieve its mission, the MidSouth Rugby Referee Society has established the following goals:

1.      To provide qualified referees for each match and event requested of the Society.

2.      To recruit, train, develop, assist and encourage individual members of the Society in their efforts to become the best referees they are able.

STRUCTURE
The MidSouth Rugby Referee Society is an independent and autonomous organization affiliated with the MidSouth Union. The Society is represented by a single voting member to the MidSouth Board of Directors in accordance with the MidSouth Bylaws. The Chairman manages the Society, with the assistance of other officials. Currently, these individuals are:

Chairman                                              David Haines                        Treasurer                                              Marty Bradley                                   

MEMBERSHIP
The Society is open to membership for any individual who is interested in officiating rugby union football. To apply, a New Referee Application should be completed and submitted to the Chairman of the society.

Referee Responsibilities
1.      Each referee must enroll in the National Club and Individual Participant Program (CIPP) administered by the USA Rugby Football Union. CIPP applications are available from the Chairman of the society. Each referee bears the cost of enrollment, including any and all fees to the Rules and Laws committee.
2.      Each referee must complete the training and certification to become Level 1 certified in accordance with the USA Rugby guidelines. The chairmen will schedule at least one clinic per season to allow club and new referees the chance to become certified.
3.      It is the policy of USA Rugby that all participants, including referees, be insured for medical injury in an amount not less than $100,000 per accident. Each individual is responsible for obtaining and maintaining appropriate medical insurance coverage.
4.      Each referee must cover the matches to which they are assigned, providing they are contacted for confirmation as indicated in the Match Assignments section. The only exceptions are when the referee deems that the match cannot be played because of unsafe conditions, or as otherwise provided in the laws of the Game. In the event that a referee has an emergency arise and can not cover the assignment, the referee should first contact the team for which he or she was scheduled, inform them of the problem, and notify the Society Scheduling Secretary so that another referee can try to be scheduled.
5.      Each referee will collect a roster of players from each team before the match, utilizing the USARSU CIPP registration match report. The winning team should mail the report to the USARSU representative within three days. The referee should not officiate any match for which rosters are not provided.
6.      In the event of a player send-off, the referee must complete a written Send-off Report and submit copies to the Chairman of the society and the appropriate union Discipline Chair within three days of the match (see the section on Player Safety and Discipline). These forms are available from the Chairman of the Society, and from the Rugby South web page.
7.      Each referee may want to become a member of the National Association of Sports Officials (NASO). The current cost is $71.00 a year. This membership will provide each referee with $3,000,000.00 of Liability insurance against any claims filed while officiating. It also provides Assault Protection, Game Fee Protection, if injured, and Accident Medical benefits.

Club Referees
1.      In order to insure that all matches are adequately covered, the Society requires that the clubs in the Union supply referees to a pool that can be utilized to cover matches close to home and/or club “B” Side matches.
2.      Division I, II, III men’s clubs will be responsible for assigning two referees to the pool, Women’s and college clubs will be responsible for assigning one referee to the pool. Club referee’s must be identified at the same time as club schedules are submitted to the Chairman.
3.      All club referees must be CIPP registered and Level 1 certified. The MSRRS will help to mitigate the cost of this certification by using a portion of the revenues collected from the clubs to subsidize the clinics.
4.      If a club referee is unable to accept an assignment, the regularly scheduled referee assigned to that club will reassigned to cover the club referee’s scheduled match.
5.      The MSRRS will make all attempts to minimize the burden of traveling.
6.      Regular, full time referees may be considered as meeting the requirements of the club referee provided that they identify themselves as being aligned with that club at the beginning of the year.

REFEREE BENEFITS

1.      Members of the Society are automatically covered by the liability insurance policy maintained by USA Rugby. However, it should be noted that participant injury is specifically excluded from the present policy,  but is covered under NASOs program.
2.      Society members will receive the Society newsletter, and copies of the national Referees newsletter “communiqué” and the “beak”. At each years AGM every Society member will receive Law books.

MATCH ASSIGNMENTS

It is the MSRFU policy that individual clubs must be a member in good standing of their Union in order to request referees from the Society.All clubs and organizations requiring referees must submit a written schedule of their matches and events to the Scheduling Secretary. It is the MSRRS policy that no referee will be assigned until a written schedule is received. The schedule should include the number of games (A,B,C, etc.) , time and location. Spring schedules need to be in by December 15^th, and fall schedules need to be in by August 1^st. All colleges need to have their fall schedules in before they break for summer.The assignments made by the Society will be distributed to referees, clubs and union officials in the MSRRS Newsletter, or by e-mail. Each club is responsible for contacting the assigned referee(s) by 10:00pm the Wednesday prior to the match to confirm time and location. Failure to reach the referee will result in elimination of the requirement that the referee cover the match. If the referee cannot be reached, the MSRRS Scheduling Secretary must be called by the 10:00pm Wednesday deadline.In the event of a no-show by a team or a cancellation after the referee has left for a scheduled match, the home team will be charged the Society fee, and the team that no-showed or cancelled will be turned into the Union Disciplinary Chairman for appropriate action. If there are any changes after a team has talked to the scheduled referee, the referee needs to be notified of the changes immediately.Referees will be assigned in following order. League matches will be covered first. Referees will then be assigned to teams who have had their schedules received by the society in the order in which they where received, first to last.  Any matches rescheduled will be put at the bottom of the list including League matches that were changed. And finally, there will be some occasions in which no referees live in a close proximity to a club asking for a ref, in these cases the society will try to find a ref from another society to cover that match.Clubs are reminded that the Laws of the Game now require goal post pads and sideline restraining ropes for all matches, and that the referee is prohibited from starting the match until they are in place.

FINANCES

Revenue
The sources of revenue for the MidSouth Rugby Referee Society are:

1) Through assessment of fees to the clubs and organizations for which we provide referees. The current fee schedule is $75.00 for all College and women’s clubs, and $100 for all men’s clubs.

2) Through referee dues, every full time referee will be billed $20.00 for membership dues at the first of the year.

3) All club referees will be billed $10.00 for membership dues at the first of the year.

Organizations running tournaments or other such events will be charged $50.00 per referee per day. It is the responsibility of the host club or organization to provide event shirts, and food and drinks during the event for the referees. If it is a two-day tournament then the host club or organization needs to provide at least lodging and an evening dinner for Saturday night. Depending on the tournaments needs, each tournament may have different charges. For each tournament a head referee will be appointed. He or she will be the contact for the tournament chairman. The head referees duties will include, handling all match assignments for the tournament, being the contact referee for the tournament chairman, and answering any Law questions ask by the tournament chairman only.

The Society Treasurer will bill each club and referee at the beginning of each year. Tournament and event fees will be collected prior to, or at the event by the referees.

Expenses
Expenses for the Society are for administration, such as materials and postage for newsletter distribution, referee dues to territorial and national entitles, and expenses related to referee development. These include participation in the territorial exchange program, ongoing exchanges with other local societies, Level 1 certification clinics, occasional clinics, and so forth.Referees in all sports are paid, from the NFL referee to the church softball league umpire. MSRRS referees will also be paid in the form of match fees from the clubs on the day of, and prior to the match. These fees are based on the present grade of the referee. The break down of fees are:

PLAYER SAFETY AND DISCIPLINE

Player safety is the primary concern of any MidSouth referee. Referees believe in the game and the players, but realize that unfortunately, rugby players occasionally do something on the pitch that is contrary to the spirit of good sportsmanship, and the referee is obligated to respond accordingly. Depending on the players actions, the context of the match, and the skill of the referee, this response may range from as little as a look or a quiet word to as much as dispatching the player to the Sin Bin or the player being Sent–Off the pitch.Anytime a referee sends a player to the Sin Bin or sends him or her off, regardless of whether the match is A-side, B-side, old boys, social or whatever, the referee must complete a Player Send-Off Report. Forms are available from the Chairman or the Society, or from the Rugby South’s web page. Copies of the report should be mailed as soon as possible, but not later than three days after the match, to the Society and the union Discipline Chair. Under current territorial and local Discipline Guidelines, any send-off results in a minimum, mandatory, unappealable suspension for the player of the next match or eight days, whichever is longer. Thus, a send-off in a tournament means the player is out for the tournament. The Discipline Committee of the union with jurisdiction over the match in which the send-off occurred will review the send-off report to determine if additional penalties fare warranted.Mandatory Send-Offs. Actually, there is no such thing as a mandatory send-off. Each referee must make his or her own decision in any given situation.However, the MSRRS believes that two situations definitively warrant a send-off. The first is any deliberate boot to another players head, and the second is the “third man in” who throws a punch or kicks a player.

REFEREE DEVELOPMENT

Each referee is ultimately responsible for his or her own development. The study of the laws and coaching materials, viewing of other referees on videotape and in person, obtaining constructive criticism from players, coaches, other referees, etc.about ones performance, and fitness maintenance are things that no one else can do.However, it is one of the goals of the Society to do everything it can to assist a referees quest for improvement. While occasional clinics are held, Lawbooks and coaching information are distributed, and critique sheets are made available to the referees, the primary focus is the individual coaching of the referee by the members of the MSRRS Development Committee. This Committee consists of the Chairman of the Society, A & B Panel referees (currently, this would include Jerry McLemore and Bob Toomy), and any person the  Chairman nominates as a coach for referees.Referee GradesThere are three separate types of coaching and evaluation opportunities for referees within the Society. They are marked on the schedule as C=Coaching (informal, oral only post match follow-up), I=Informal (informal, oral report followed by brief written report), and F=Formal (the traditional extensive oral and written reports).In addition to providing as many opportunities for coaching and evaluation within the Society, the MSRRS also sends referees through its exchange programs to other areas for outside evaluation, and occasionally brings territorial and national evaluators to the area.As a local Society, the MSRRS is responsible for determining the grade of all junior referees from D (entry level) through C-3, C-2, C-1, which is the highest grade a local Society may bestow. Senior referees and B-panel grades (B-3, B-2, and B-1) are the responsibility of the territorial referee committee. A-panel grades (A-2, A-1) are the responsibility of the national referee committee.Administrators in the MSRRS have attempted to comply with current efforts nationally for establishing and maintaining very high standards for local grades particularly that of C-1. No referee may carry the grade of C-1 unless they are a full time, fit, experienced, Level 2 certified by USA Rugby and a committed rugby referee. Similar national standards may soon be coming to the C-2 grade.Following are standards and descriptions of the various grade levels, adopted and modified from standards published by the USARFU Referees and Laws Committee:

I. General Comments
A.     There will always be differences in style and ability between two referees, even those with the same grade. However, there are some general characteristics, which are expected to accompany each grade. These expectations become greater as a referee moves up through the ranks, as do the rewards.
B.     Consistency becomes more and more important as the desired grade goes up. This is one of the most notable characteristics associated with higher levels of refereeing. To obtain higher grades a referee must be observed by more evaluators, at more matches, over a longer period of time. One good match in front of the evaluator is not going to be enough.
C.     Experience goes hand-in-hand with on-field performance and consistency. The number of games a referee has done, and the period of time he has performed at the level above his current grade, will be considerations for his or her promotion to the next grade. At the higher grades, this time frame could be measured in years, rather than weeks, so ambition must usually be tempered with considerable patience. There is no substitute for experience.
D.     Commitment becomes more noticeable as a referee moves up the ranks. It takes an effort on the part of an individual to improve his or her own game, learn the laws, watch and draw from senior referees. The referee will need to learn from those who observe him or her without always debating, get fitter, discuss the game with players, discuss “Grey areas” with other referees, attend clinics, and so on. Commitment means taking all assignments, and not just the choice ones. You should also be prepared to put something back into your local society in the form of administrative elbow grease, although this will not get you a better grade. In addition to the characteristics listed for each grade below, improvement of certain intangible qualities that a referee might possess may make the final difference in his promotion to the next level. This could simply be a matter of style, or it may involve some other subtle factor that an evaluator will recognize when he sees it, but be unable to define easily in so many words. Grades are not lifetime awards. They are meant to indicate the current level or standard of one’s refereeing. If a referee goes inactive for an extended period of time, or does not maintain his standard of refereeing (including fitness), his grade may be adjusted accordingly.

II. Local Society Grades
Grade D
Grade D referees may be part time, or in their first year of full time refereeing (less than 15 full matches). He may still be an active player or coach. He may or may not attend meetings or clinics, although it is encouraged. The standard or refereeing for the D Grade can vary widely, depending on accumulated past playing or coaching experience.
Grade C-3
C-3 is the first “true” grade. This referee may be just beginning to gain a feel for the laws of the game, and may still play or coach in addition to refereeing. On the other hand, he may be a full time referee who is content to do games at this level, and remain unburdened with the commitments required to maintain a higher grade.A referee remaining at C-3 might indicate a lack of mastery of the laws, or a fitness problem caused by chronic injury, a weight problem, or simply a lack of commitment. His or her whistle can be very monotonous, signals spotty, and explanations too involved, or nonexistent.General match standard is Collegiate, Division II A/B, or less competitive Division I C-side games.
Grade C-2
The C-2 has acquired a basic understanding of the laws, and has shown an interest in improving his or her performance with the help of counseling from evaluators and senior referees. The referees primary focus should be shifting in favor of refereeing, as opposed to playing or coaching. He is beginning to signal, and make his or her whistle work.An advantage signal should be in evidence, although may be used inconsistently. He or she is communicating better on the pitch. This referee should be improving every time he or she does a match. His or her mistakes are often easily correctable, once they are pointed out by a more experienced observer. Fitness will be a requirement if the C-2 wants to advance to C-1. It is one of the tests of commitment that will distinguish a serious referee from the rest.A C-2 is capable of handling Collegiate and Division II A-side matches, less competitive Division I B-side games, competitive Division I C-side matches, and lower division semis and finals in local tournaments.
Grade C-1
The C-1 grade represents a major jump in a referees development. He or she is now becoming very comfortable with the laws of the game, and makes few errors. He or she must train enough so that conditioning will not affect his or her choice of positioning, nor his or her ability to make the proper call in open play.The referee has now acquired a consistent whistle/signal/talk sequence, and the explanatory signals are clearer, with the players picking them up faster. The referees advantage is well signaled, and he runs it fairly well. His or her options are for the most part correct, but do have the odd foul-up from time to time. The referee is beginning to focus correctly on offsides, and understands the sequence of responsibilities in the tackle situation under law 15.The game the referee produces should flow, exhibiting a proper understanding of the encouragement of constructive play and management of negative or destructive play. There should be a low incidence of undesirable incidents, and the match should be generally pleasing to both player and spectator.The C-1 should now be concentrating on his or her control of the tough matches. To advance to B-3, the referee will be tested with difficult tournament matches, or competitive league matches between rival clubs.The C-1 is generally capable of refereeing all but the more competitive Division I A-side matches, including local tournament finals. Advancing C-1’s may be given an occasional territorial appointment, as well.