| Thanks Brett.
To field a couple of questions:
1) the President's meeting was held at a regional show because
a) it is within the territory of Southern Koi Association, a ZNA chapter.
b) it is a well attended show by many in the East Coast ZNA chapters who have traveled to the west coast to attend the meetings there for the last 20 plus years. It seemed only fair to rotate once in a while.
c) the annual International ZNA meeting and testing of judges is held, not at the ZNA All Japan but rather the Shinkokai All Japan as it is also a gathering palce for many members. So this is a normal thing to meet at gathering points and not always at ZNA shows.
2) To be a ZNA candidate, one must:
a) be in the zna in a local chapter for five years.
b) own a koi pond and show koi.
c) no be a professional.
d) be a member in good standing and show a history and ability to teach about koi
e) be willing to travel at personal expense outside the immediate area to judge other chapter shows.
f) be recommended by the local chapter president to the board.
g) be considered a good representative/ambassador for the organization.
h) be approved by the Regional District chairman, ZNA board and home office.
There is indeed a waiting list. The 'movement upwards' on this waiting list is determined by number of existing judges from any one chapter along with the membership numbers of that chapter. Some chapters, for instance, might have less than 50 members and say, 6- 7 judges and other chapters might have 50 plus members and no judges. This represents an imbalance. On another level, the overall number of judges is to be a ratio of National membership and the number of shows that are being put on in any given year.
So we have 8 chapters with an estimated 300-400 members in any given year. If we use 10% as a judging population, then that would be 30-35 judges. Even though there are 8 chapters, there are only 6 shows at the moment and each show will have one to three teams of judges. Some of these shows rotate between all ZNA and all AKCA show years. So that effectively reduces zna shows to as few as three a year. So there is not enough work for 35 judges. Not to remain sharp and accumulating experience. So the waiting list of those interested is a very necessary thing. Still, we try and have at least one trainee in the program at all times. And we try hard not to loose valuable members as candidates.
JR |