British Fencing (BF) undertook a review of the domestic Level 3 refereeing exams in 2017. Following this review, a pilot of the new examination system took place at the Cadet and Junior National Championships held in Nottingham, September 2018. This pilot highlighted a gap in the current knowledge between level 2 and being able to successfully pass the new Level 3 assessment.

BF wanted to address this knowledge gap and support the up-skilling of level 2 referees as part of their ongoing development work, towards achieving level 3 and  improve the competition experience for all participants from Regional to British Championships level.

Consequently, BF held  an invitation-only referee development event on June 21st-22nd 2019 at The David Ross Sports Village, Nottingham for nominated Level 2 referees (a total of 20 referees across the Regions and Home Nations) that were looking to progress through the new Level 3 referee assessment process within the next 2 seasons.

The development event consisted of a seminar on the Friday evening before The GB Cup 2019, followed by a day of feedback and support as the participants referee the competition on Saturday.

Places were available as follows:

• Regional nominations: For every region that sent referees to the GB Cup a free place for up to 2 referees.
• Home Nation nominations: Each Home Nation was able to nominate an additional referee they felt would benefit from the seminar, if spaces were not used by the Regions. This was in addition to the regions referee quota for attending the GB Cup.

The Home Nations/Regions covered all the costs (including travel, accommodation) of the individual referees attending the referee seminar.  BF & EF subsidised the costs of running the seminar  with an additional nominal fee of £10 per participant, paid by the referee, but Home Nations/Regions could choose to cover this.

The seminar was run by our current senior active FIE referees and the course covered a general overview of current refereeing standards including phrasing and interpretations, updated rules, correct use of hand signals and penalty awarded.  The FIE referees also mentored and observed the participants during the GB Cup providing feedback on areas of improvement and share their experiences of FIE refereeing.

It is planned to continue this collaboration with the Home Countries and run this on an annual basis.

If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to contact Nickie Bailey, [email protected]