The Ref Stop

RA...To join or not to join.....

RegalRef

RegalRef

Politically Incorrect
Couple of questions regarding joining my local RA.........

1.What is the approximate cost?
2.What are the benefits?
3.What percentage of refs join? (Roughly, I understand it is difficult to know truly)

Of course, I wouldn't join just because everybody else does, but if the uptake rate was quite high that would speak for itself.....

What kind of thing happens at the meetings?

Although always up for a bit of banter I would imagine there is more to it than that.........
 
The Ref Stop
Cost wise I'm not 100% but joining for the insurance is as good a reason as any.
 
What puts me off is that it has become somewhat of an old men's club and the advice isn't always in keeping with the modern game
 
I joined a couple of weeks ago, only a fiver due to an incentive from Essex FA (I know, I crossed the border). Decent session on dissent, even if I was the youngest there.
 
Ours is £25 , been to one meeting in 8 years and will probably never attend another .....its worth joining just for the insurance as you get your money back through the FAMOA scheme

No brainer really !!!!
 
RAs are like a Parson's Egg. My own RA has helped produce 2 PGMOL referees and one Championship referee in the last 10 years. We typically have 35 members attend meetings. Minutes, correspondence and all the boring paperwork stuff is sent out by email before the meeting and rarely discussed. Every meeting involves some form of training and we have our own Youth Section to represent the number of members below the age of 25. We have 2 L3 tutors and 3(4?) L2 tutors, as well as 2 Contrib assessors, 3 Supply League assessors and 6 County assessors. So there's plenty of help and support in the room. The total cost of local and National membership is less than one open aged match fee per season and 1 1/2 fees if you include the physio cover.

I have been to other RAs meetings and there was a training session for an hour and then business and slagging off other referees for an hour - not conducive to attendance.

As for benefits, I pulled this off an email from Sheffield RA

For an annual national RA subscription of £12 for an adult, the potential gains are:
  • RAFA Incentive Scheme potential profit to member: £55.50
  • RA Conference non-member cost: £25.00
  • Accident Management non-member cost: £30.00 (minimum)
  • Constant legal helpline non-member cost: £45.00 (minimum)
Total member benefit / profit: could be £155.50

And don’t forget the added bonuses that are there:
  • Benevolent Fund membership
  • RAshop discounts for your supplies
  • Paris Smith legal fees discounts
 
I would say yes, and with the remark of it being an old mens club, unless 'youngsters' attend, that would never change would it? It is each to their own if you want to put aside a few hours a month to attend meetings.

We have had very good guest speakers at ours, which include Football League Referees, next month Steve Bennett is the guest speaker.

The cost for me is £25 a year and as Brian advised, you do get a lot of benefits.

I personally like the support network at mine, and due to being a part of my society I was able to get on the line in some pre season games involving Isthmian League sides. Great experience and in addition from a training perspective our society will be attending Combined Counties Premier fixtures to assess the referee then have a training session on it, great idea for referees who want to learn.
 
Not sure what you class as a youngster but I'm certainly not old and can assure you that the attitude of many is that of an old men's club and the younger members that do turn up get ignored. You may be lucky where you are but I think it needs redesigning to be worth it as a development source.

As others have said though well worth for the insurance alone
 
Joined this year and has been nothing but a help. The benefits as mentioned above as well as being able to discuss matches helps a lot! Well worth joining and attending meetings helps. My RA just had a talk on managing dissent, one of my pet hates. Learnt a lot and got to use techniques learned in my match recently. Its only a good thing! As one of the younger members in my RA I have to disagree with the old men's club comments because there are a range of ages! As has been pointed out, if younger people don't join it will become a old men's club!
 
When I say 'youngsters' I mean in comparsion to someone that has one foot in the grave! Saying that, if it wasnt for the older members then there probably wouldnt be a society at all.

I have only good things to say about it, I am sure all societies have their pro's and con's! I enjoy getting out the house for a few hours!
 
Funnily enough, I got sent this today by the chairman of my local RA. Hope this helps with the list of benefits. I personally can't fault the RA. I started going in January this year and have been to every meeting since, met some great people and learned an awful lot.image.jpg
 
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