“Calling the Game: Developing Quality Officiating” is the national framework for developing sports officials. This provides the underlying structure for delivering education to officials of all levels in New Zealand. The framework is generic, and has been structured to allow sports organisations to deliver officials education that:

• Aligns with athlete and coach development pathways
• Fits within and supports a sports organisation’s own direction, goals and objectives.

The framework identifies five core principles for implementing the development of sports officials:

• The opportunity to learn and develop as an official is ongoing
• The purpose of training and development programmes is to bring about effective officiating practice
• Observation of practical officiating is the main means of assessing progress and checking understanding and effectiveness
• Ownership of officials training and development rests with national sporting organisations (NSO’s)
• There is acceptance that officials help to provide high quality performance and participation opportunities for athletes.

The framework targets the delivery of learning opportunities predominantly through the National Sport Organisations (NSO’s), National Recreational Organisations (NRO’s) and the Club network.  Other providers such as Regional Sports Trusts (RST’s) or education providers may also deliver officials education. The framework proposes 12 learning areas for officials:

1. Rules and laws of the game
2. Decision making
3. Practical officiating
4. Legal responsibilities and risk management
5. Communication skills
6. Conflict management
7. Report writing
8. Performance management
9. Developing physical fitness
10. Developing mental skills
11. Self reflection
12. Roles of the official.

The Phase One rollout of the Officials site consists of the following learning areas, which were deemed as high priority by officials as the result of SPARC analysis:

• Rules and laws of the game
• Communication skills
• Conflict management
• Legal responsibilities and risk management – eLearning module
• Roles of the official
• Physical fitness