Are you ready for an exciting ride of statistics, recapping, and future planning? \u00a0I\u2019ve done several different presentations of similar info at conferences, this is going to rehash a little of what those covered, plus lay out some plans and a road map for next year.<\/span><\/p>\n On February 10th, 2016 (the date that USA-Midwest was broken up), we had the following judge stats:<\/span><\/p>\n 196 certified judges, broken down into:<\/span><\/p>\n As of January 3, 2017, we have changed to the following numbers:<\/span> That\u2019s an overall growth of 17%, an L1 growth of 13%, and an L2 growth of 37%. \u00a0That matches up well with one of the goals I\u2019ve been talking about at conferences: skill building and consolidation. \u00a0We are doing a pretty impressive job of building the skill level of the judges we have and retaining skill among our core judges.<\/span><\/p>\n This segues really well into a discussion of how well 2016 went.<\/span><\/p>\n The big goals of 2016 were:<\/span><\/p>\n As a region, we did a handful of things that worked really well for this, and some things that worked not so well.<\/span><\/p>\n USA-North Identity<\/b><\/p>\n Overall, our identity building has been going quite well, with some hiccups.<\/span><\/p>\n USA-North Judge Building<\/b><\/p>\n Skill building<\/b><\/p>\n We did a great job building the middle up. \u00a0I want us to raise the bottom and the top this year. \u00a0So new judges getting training, and our top performers getting the real polish they need.<\/span><\/p>\n To this end, I want to run 14 miniconferences in 2017, focused mainly on local judging. \u00a0Topics like running great weeknight events, diplomacy with local players, helping TOs run successful PPTQs, and many others focused on making local communities better are things I\u2019m pushing to see at these miniconferences. Given the well received response to these, I am looking forward to ramping things up here!<\/span><\/p>\n North Investment<\/b><\/p>\n So, I mentioned that the blog kind of faded out, and I blame myself, because I don\u2019t have the time or the right kind of enthusiasm to make it work. The blog has not succeeded in the way I have wanted in its original iteration. I am looking forward to rectifying this so I\u2019m bringing in someone that has time and enthusiasm! \u00a0Welcome Lee Henderson<\/a> [cets_callout_box style=’blue’ align=’full’ title=’Message From The Editor’]Howdy Folks! As mentioned above, my name is Lee. I am an L2 out of the Bloomington area and a reasonably active judge in the area. I am sort of new at this editing role but I\u2019d thought I\u2019d give it a try. I have some very ambitious goals for the blog. Our current goal is 2 articles a month with a special Exemplar highlight article done by me personally. We currently have a few articles primed and ready to go thanks to our awesome North judges. My personal goal is to stick to deadlines and make sure we all keep to our goals. I also am holding myself to writing the two articles I have had knocking around and publising them on our blog. I am super excited to be working with you all. Go North![\/cets_callout_box]<\/p>\n Projects<\/b><\/p>\n I want to get some of our top performers to step up to the next level. \u00a0To that end, I\u2019m trying to encourage project engagement. \u00a0We have a number of people involved in things like Judge of the Week or the Player Experience blog, but we have some space to improve here.<\/span><\/p>\n One thing that I\u2019m starting up is a fortnightly judge stream – an hour and a half of content, every other Tuesday is the current goal. \u00a0On the other weeks I\u2019ll be exploring some deep rules diving with some L3 candidates. \u00a0Expect the first week of general judge topics like this on January 17th, streamed on my Twitch, <\/span>http:\/\/twitch.tv\/robbit_mn<\/span><\/a> – we have a number of North judges interested in this, so expect a rotating guest cast as we settle into a plan.<\/span><\/p>\n Exemplar<\/b><\/p>\n We have average engagement in the Exemplar program, and I think we can be better. \u00a0Part of Lee\u2019s goal as Content Manager is to publish Exemplar callout articles for each wave. He also plans to write an article on his exemplar process to flesh out and encourage exemplars in the region.\u00a0<\/span>I also have a cool idea in store for the next Exemplar mailing – I\u2019ll publish a post on that once I have the cool idea nailed down more, I don\u2019t want to ruin it by spoiling something I then can\u2019t fulfill. But I promise it will be great!<\/span><\/p>\n L2 Growth<\/b><\/p>\nJudge Growth<\/span><\/h2>\n
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\n<\/span>230 certified judges, broken down into:<\/span><\/p>\n\n
Successes and Failures of 2016<\/span><\/h2>\n
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Goals for 2017<\/span><\/h2>\n
<\/span><\/span>, the new content manager for the USA-North blog. I will give him a few sentences to introduce himself. <\/span><\/p>\n