We launched a number of changes to JudgeApps today, on account of the Magic Judge Program sunsetting, and to prepare for the launch of Judge Academy.

These changes were announced previously as part of our FAQ, but we wanted to explicitly let you know what has changed.

These changes include:

• Each user’s profile will now show the certifying body that is supporting their judge level — either the Historical Judge Program, the Legacy Program, or Judge Academy. This information will also appear on other areas of the site.
• Users can still certify new judges and level up other judges, but only if the target judge is in a country supported by the Legacy Program. Attempting to certify or level up a judge in a country not supported by the Legacy Program will show a warning.
• Regional Coordinators have been updated. Many regions no longer have a Regional Coordinator.
• At present, we have elected to leave the existing Regions in place.
  • This allows users to retain access to the regional forums they already have, and ensures their notification settings (for event creation) do not change.
  • As a consequence, two regions (Europe – East and UKISA) currently contain a mix of countries supported by the Legacy Program and by Judge Academy. This does not impact which judges can be certified or advanced, which will still work correctly (because participation in the Legacy Program and Judge Academy is checked on a country-by-country basis, not region).
  • We will evaluate this moving forward and may make tweaks.

If you have any questions, please let us know in the comments or by using our feedback/bug report form!