Subject: Digest for the period 3/11/2004 - 3/12/2004 Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2004 01:00:25 -0500 Table of contents ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 1. Alternate path to Master (Scott Bickham) 2. 1. Paying judges 2. Master judges (Bob Paolino) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Scott Bickham Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2004 07:41:43 -0500 Subject: Alternate path to Master I think there has been some good discussion here about an alternate "Master Taster" level. It it is based upon a tasting exam, the concept has the most value to those who are consistently judging at the Master level, but are unable to make the time or travel commitment needed to retake the BJCP exam. It would also have value for some members of the brewing industry who might want some sort of recognition but are again not able to commit to taking the entire exam. Finally, it could be integrated into a program that can either periodically re-evaluate current judges or re-activate judges who may have lapsed. Unfortunately, some of the "poster childs" for this new level are looking for a quick and dirty path to the Master level because they do not *want* to retake the exam (rather than being unable to retake the exam due to other issues), or have been unable to produce a sufficient number of correct answers or adequate scoresheets on the current BJCP exam. For example, one member of the former camp had the arrogance to not score a beer at the finals of a recent National competition, while writing the comment that the beer was "unevaluatable" (his word, not mine). This person is a strong proponent of the alternate path to Master, but I honestly cannot find any motivation to reward such arrogance and inconsideration. He is not worthy of sharing the same judging rank as the Master judges who have taught and mentored us throughout our judging careers. Scott ********************************************************************** * JudgeNet - the beer judge digest * * Send plain text only, no HTML, MIME, encoded text or attachments * * Send subscription requests & changes to judge-request`at`synchro.com * ********************************************************************** ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Bob Paolino Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2004 10:13:03 -0500 Subject: 1. Paying judges 2. Master judges I've just started to catch up on several recent digests and the threads on paying judges and "alternate paths" to Master judge. 1. Like most judges, I've found that the competition that pays its judges is a rare thing, indeed, and that's fine. The first time I received a check for judging was an Oregon State Fair homebrew competition in the early 1990s. I was en route to BC, but decided to fly to Portland, OR, well, yes, for beer enjoyment purposes (and to visit a friend in Seattle along the way). I read the competition listing in ZYMURGY on the plane and called the organiser to offer to judge. It set back my original itinerary by only a day and it was enjoyable. The offer of $50 ($25 honorarium plus up to $25 in expenses) was a complete surprise. The only other competition that has paid me (a $20 thank you)is part of a local festival at the county fairgrounds in the next county from me. The common element of both is that the competition is part of some larger (non-beer) event for which they have revenues and a budget to do it. I see it as a desirable sign that the larger event values having t he homebrew competition as part of it. (Some competitions--both professional and homebrew club--I've done didn't pay cash, but have offered hotel rooms for judges.) It's a nice little bonus if you run into that sort of thing, but I don't expect a homebrew club, especially one running on a tight budget, to do that sort of thing. I judge because I enjoy doing it, and homebrew clubs can attract judges for their competitions by offering a good experience and by their own members going out and helping other clubs with their competitions in a reciprocal manner. Isn't this a big part of why many of us got into it? That said, it does cost not only leisure time (which we're obviously willing to give if we do it) but also money to travel to competitions. Those expenses can be reduced significantly if members from the same club carpool to competitions. Another way for clubs to encourage participation among their members, if they have the resources to do it, is to offer to reimburse judges for their travel expenses. This doesn't have to be a lot of money. Most host clubs offer "Beds for Brewers" if an overnight stay is needed, so the home club doesn't need to worry about hotel room expenses to send their judges out. But the judge's home club providing the judge with reimbursement for motor fuel used is a reasonable thing to do, a fairly inexpensive way to generate goodwill for the club (at the very least, important when the club hosts _its_ competition and needs to recruit out-of-town judges from the clubs it helped with their competitions), and demonstrates the club's support for disc iplined beer evaluation. 2. Long ago (back when I was "Recognised Forever" by virtue of a low initial exam score ;-) ), I posted a suggestion to JudgeNet about the possibility of coming up with a grid combining experience and exam score for advancement rather than relying solely on the current linear path. (Our club eventually hosted another exam, so I re-took and am now National... disclaimer now out of the way.) The grid would be, in effect, similar to what many have proposed recently (i.e., some "exchange" of experience points to compensate for exam score), but I wouldn't limit it to only the advancement from National to Master. Why not Certified to National, et cetera? The current National Rank requires a score >=80 and >=20 experience points, but why not consider, say, >=70 and >=40 experience points. Figure out all the desired trade-offs of exam and experience in an x-y space and make that the ground rule for advancement in the BJCP. (Hey, you could even make it an exam question ;-) ) Some have expressed concern about it "cheapening" the rankings. I wouldn't consider my National rank to be diminished by judging alongside another competent judge who may have scored lower on an exam long ago, but has been judging frequently and developing his/her skills. Perhaps you might want either to design the grid such that it is, in a sense, much harder to advance via the experience trade-off than by re-taking, or to introduce an element of time into it such that it's not just the accumulation of points over time (thereby making promotion inevitable if you just wait long enough) but that they be earned by regular and frequent judging. In other words, someone who judges only once or twice a year isn't necessarily becoming a better judge but is accumulating points (slowly, but accumulating them nonetheless) and might eventually reach some threshold at which s/he could advance without re-taking the exam. Requiring a large difference in experience points between the c urrent path and the "alternate" path would accomplish the same thing as an explicit time requirement. Now go have a beer, Bob Paolino "Homer, why don't you get one of those hands-free phones? It's the next best thing to paying attention to the road." --Barney, The Simpsons ( ) ASCII ribbon campaign X against HTML e-mail: / \ Friends don't send friends HTML-bloated messages! A: Because it reverses the logical flow of conversation. Q: Why is top posting frowned upon? ********************************************************************** * JudgeNet - the beer judge digest * * Send plain text only, no HTML, MIME, encoded text or attachments * * Send subscription requests & changes to judge-request`at`synchro.com * ********************************************************************** Subject: Digest for the period 3/11/2004 - 3/12/2004 Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2004 01:00:25 -0500 Table of contents ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 1. Alternate path to Master (Scott Bickham) 2. 1. Paying judges 2. Master judges (Bob Paolino) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Scott Bickham Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2004 07:41:43 -0500 Subject: Alternate path to Master I think there has been some good discussion here about an alternate "Master Taster" level. It it is based upon a tasting exam, the concept has the most value to those who are consistently judging at the Master level, but are unable to make the time or travel commitment needed to retake the BJCP exam. It would also have value for some members of the brewing industry who might want some sort of recognition but are again not able to commit to taking the entire exam. Finally, it could be integrated into a program that can either periodically re-evaluate current judges or re-activate judges who may have lapsed. Unfortunately, some of the "poster childs" for this new level are looking for a quick and dirty path to the Master level because they do not *want* to retake the exam (rather than being unable to retake the exam due to other issues), or have been unable to produce a sufficient number of correct answers or adequate scoresheets on the current BJCP exam. For example, one member of the former camp had the arrogance to not score a beer at the finals of a recent National competition, while writing the comment that the beer was "unevaluatable" (his word, not mine). This person is a strong proponent of the alternate path to Master, but I honestly cannot find any motivation to reward such arrogance and inconsideration. He is not worthy of sharing the same judging rank as the Master judges who have taught and mentored us throughout our judging careers. Scott ********************************************************************** * JudgeNet - the beer judge digest * * Send plain text only, no HTML, MIME, encoded text or attachments * * Send subscription requests & changes to judge-request`at`synchro.com * ********************************************************************** ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Bob Paolino Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2004 10:13:03 -0500 Subject: 1. Paying judges 2. Master judges I've just started to catch up on several recent digests and the threads on paying judges and "alternate paths" to Master judge. 1. Like most judges, I've found that the competition that pays its judges is a rare thing, indeed, and that's fine. The first time I received a check for judging was an Oregon State Fair homebrew competition in the early 1990s. I was en route to BC, but decided to fly to Portland, OR, well, yes, for beer enjoyment purposes (and to visit a friend in Seattle along the way). I read the competition listing in ZYMURGY on the plane and called the organiser to offer to judge. It set back my original itinerary by only a day and it was enjoyable. The offer of $50 ($25 honorarium plus up to $25 in expenses) was a complete surprise. The only other competition that has paid me (a $20 thank you)is part of a local festival at the county fairgrounds in the next county from me. The common element of both is that the competition is part of some larger (non-beer) event for which they have revenues and a budget to do it. I see it as a desirable sign that the larger event values having t he homebrew competition as part of it. (Some competitions--both professional and homebrew club--I've done didn't pay cash, but have offered hotel rooms for judges.) It's a nice little bonus if you run into that sort of thing, but I don't expect a homebrew club, especially one running on a tight budget, to do that sort of thing. I judge because I enjoy doing it, and homebrew clubs can attract judges for their competitions by offering a good experience and by their own members going out and helping other clubs with their competitions in a reciprocal manner. Isn't this a big part of why many of us got into it? That said, it does cost not only leisure time (which we're obviously willing to give if we do it) but also money to travel to competitions. Those expenses can be reduced significantly if members from the same club carpool to competitions. Another way for clubs to encourage participation among their members, if they have the resources to do it, is to offer to reimburse judges for their travel expenses. This doesn't have to be a lot of money. Most host clubs offer "Beds for Brewers" if an overnight stay is needed, so the home club doesn't need to worry about hotel room expenses to send their judges out. But the judge's home club providing the judge with reimbursement for motor fuel used is a reasonable thing to do, a fairly inexpensive way to generate goodwill for the club (at the very least, important when the club hosts _its_ competition and needs to recruit out-of-town judges from the clubs it helped with their competitions), and demonstrates the club's support for disc iplined beer evaluation. 2. Long ago (back when I was "Recognised Forever" by virtue of a low initial exam score ;-) ), I posted a suggestion to JudgeNet about the possibility of coming up with a grid combining experience and exam score for advancement rather than relying solely on the current linear path. (Our club eventually hosted another exam, so I re-took and am now National... disclaimer now out of the way.) The grid would be, in effect, similar to what many have proposed recently (i.e., some "exchange" of experience points to compensate for exam score), but I wouldn't limit it to only the advancement from National to Master. Why not Certified to National, et cetera? The current National Rank requires a score >=80 and >=20 experience points, but why not consider, say, >=70 and >=40 experience points. Figure out all the desired trade-offs of exam and experience in an x-y space and make that the ground rule for advancement in the BJCP. (Hey, you could even make it an exam question ;-) ) Some have expressed concern about it "cheapening" the rankings. I wouldn't consider my National rank to be diminished by judging alongside another competent judge who may have scored lower on an exam long ago, but has been judging frequently and developing his/her skills. Perhaps you might want either to design the grid such that it is, in a sense, much harder to advance via the experience trade-off than by re-taking, or to introduce an element of time into it such that it's not just the accumulation of points over time (thereby making promotion inevitable if you just wait long enough) but that they be earned by regular and frequent judging. In other words, someone who judges only once or twice a year isn't necessarily becoming a better judge but is accumulating points (slowly, but accumulating them nonetheless) and might eventually reach some threshold at which s/he could advance without re-taking the exam. Requiring a large difference in experience points between the c urrent path and the "alternate" path would accomplish the same thing as an explicit time requirement. Now go have a beer, Bob Paolino "Homer, why don't you get one of those hands-free phones? It's the next best thing to paying attention to the road." --Barney, The Simpsons ( ) ASCII ribbon campaign X against HTML e-mail: / \ Friends don't send friends HTML-bloated messages! A: Because it reverses the logical flow of conversation. Q: Why is top posting frowned upon? ********************************************************************** * JudgeNet - the beer judge digest * * Send plain text only, no HTML, MIME, encoded text or attachments * * Send subscription requests & changes to judge-request`at`synchro.com * **********************************************************************