NJNJ strives to continually provide quality education to our judges, circuit guards, and circuit instructors.  We encourage all judges to participate in WGI Certify powered by eadjudicate for professional development to ensure industry standards are maintained.

NJNJ offers one free pre-season consultation to the units of MAIN Color Guard Circuit. If you are interested,  contact our Education Coordinator.

Education Team

Purpose
The purpose of the Education Team is to facilitate and distribute information pertaining to the winter guard activity as it is disseminated by Winter Guard International (WGI). It is also the responsibility of the NJNJ Education Team to share any information that may be unique to the MAIN circuit. This information will also be adopted into the training program for current judges, prospective judges and directors/instructors of competing units.

Training

1. Individuals who express an interest to judge by completing an application on our website will be reviewed by the Education Team and contact made.
2. Once an individual is designated as a trainee, personal contact will be made, and all initial training materials sent out.
3. The training process begins with attending the MAIN Preview Show, the judge’s clinic and any other training opportunities provided by the Education Team throughout the year.
4. Training will involve discussion of general philosophy, an exercise in recording and evaluating commentary, analysis of scoring philosophies per caption and then bringing commentary and scoring together.
5. All trainees will receive feedback from their mentor the week following their training exercise. The mentor’s role is to provide guidance throughout the process.
6. When the trainee has completed their training successfully, a recommendation will be made to the Education Coordinator for review.
7. If the Education Team deems the trainee has satisfied all training requirements successfully, the Coordinator will submit the trainee’s name to the Executive Board of NJNJ.
8. The Executive Board will review the trainee’s accomplishment, approve and recognize the trainee as a professional judge ready for assignments.
9. The timeframe for completing the judge’s training program will be dependent upon the trainee’s time, effort and dedication to the training process.

Education

1. Current judges will have the opportunity to attend a training clinic held annually.
2. Judges will receive information as needed for all captions from the Education Team on concepts presented by WGI as well as all criteria and scoring unique to the MAIN.
3. All training materials and education articles will be prominently displayed on the NJNJ website for review by all judges and trainees
4. A mentoring program will be provided to all current judges when weaknesses have been identified. This program will allow participants to be paired with a senior judge in the same caption.
5. Visiting judges will be provided with all criteria and scoring unique to the MAIN circuit prior to their arrival to a show. They will be encouraged to familiarize themselves with prior scoring and use the NJNJ website as a tool.

For Training Materials see “Season Resources”

Feedback

1. During the color guard season, any philosophy or education questions may be directed to the Education Coordinator, NJNJ Liaison, the Judging Coordinator or NJNJ Executive Board members.
2. All judges are encouraged to perform self- evaluation and submit to the Education Coordinator.
3. Judges are expected to share feedback and insight with other judges on the panel in round table discussions.
4. Open communication between the MAIN Executive Board and the Education Coordinator and the NJNJ Liaison will be maintained to ensure a positive experience for instructors and competitors.

Resources

1. Judges who have assignments in the MAIN circuit are required to have attained at least Level 1 of WGI Certify completed
2. The WGI website is an excellent resource for videos and documents relating to color guard adjudication.
3. Documents can also be found on the NJNJ website.

Chief Judges

1. At each show, the Chief Judge has the responsibility to make every judge and trainee feel comfortable and available to answer any questions or concerns.
2. The Chief Judge will review scoring philosophy unique to MAIN and communicate any pertinent information needed for each show.