Welcome Home, Lapsed Judges

Here’s one frequent question we’ve received since we announced Judge Foundry:

(Okay, that might not be exactly how it’s always phrased, but we hope you forgive us some liberties.)

The short answer is: yes, just demonstrate that you can still judge at that level.

The long answer is the rest of this article.

Philosophy

We know that the last few years haven’t been easy for judges, and some folks decided to focus on other activities. But with organized play providing more exciting opportunities again, you might get the itch to pull out that black button-down from the closet (please iron it!) and get back on the event floor.

It was important to us to have a process rather than just accepting everyone back with no questions asked, because we put a great deal of emphasis on maintaining judge quality, at all levels. To not evaluate lapsed judges before reinstating them wouldn’t be fair to judges who’ve been judging consistently through the Judge Academy era without expecting some demonstration of readiness.

As we discussed in our articles on the qualities of a judge, game knowledge is only one part of what makes a successful tournament official. Players and tournament organizers know that there’s more to being a good judge than just taking a rules test, and that when you became a judge you also had to demonstrate that you had the event skills, leadership skills, and personal skills to be someone who makes events better for every participant.

It’s our belief that, for most judges, leadership and personal skills don’t fade. Indeed, those skills may have grown in interesting new directions that will give you new outlooks and techniques to share with other judges. Event skills may fade a little bit, especially as the tools we use in judging evolve. But part of the reason we determined that logistics philosophy is a critical skill is that we believe that judges can adapt to new methods if they understand the reasons those methods are employed.

That just leaves game knowledge. Rules and policy are an area where we felt that it’s important to ensure that returning judges are up to date. We just can’t have situations where judges take a call and exclaim, “Wait, there’s a back face to these cards too?!” or issue game losses for drawing extra cards (or worse: a disqualification with prize).

That’s how we arrived at our policy for lapsed judges rejoining with the advent of Judge Foundry: show us you’ve still got it, and we’ll welcome you back at your old level. We think that almost everyone who goes through this remediation process will either demonstrate that they never lost it, or they’ll rebuild their atrophied judge muscles along the way.

Additional Remedy

These processes are going to look suspiciously similar to our maintenance processes. That’s because they fill a similar philosophical gap – demonstrate that you still meet the quality bar for this level. There are some options omitted, mostly because they don’t make sense – we don’t have three update quizzes for sets predating Judge Foundry for you to take.

Four last big notes before we dive in:

First, these requirements can include retroactive activity from the last twelve months. That is, if you’ve spent your summer judging events, we’re counting those events as fulfilling the requirement… we’re not going to make you start from scratch. But if you don’t fulfill the requirement with solely retroactive activity, you can start now and just apply for lapsed acceptance when you’re done.

Second, we’re guaranteeing this process from Judge Foundry’s launch until September 30, 2024. That’s not saying that it won’t be extended longer, just that we want to put some limit on it, because we reserve the right to evaluate results and make changes (or let the new board make changes without us locking them in).

Third, this is the process to recertify and regain your level as someone who was a judge in a previous era (Judge Program or Judge Academy) and who wants to come back. We haven’t settled on a process for people who lapse from Judge Foundry, because… something really weird is happening if there’s anyone currently in that category who doesn’t have a copy of “Grays Sports Almanac 1950-2000.” We’ll come up with a plan for this and announce it later once it starts applying to judges.

Fourth, as with everything we’re announcing in the run up to launch, we’re listening to your feedback and might make changes based on that. If we do, we’ll update this article.

Level One

To recertify as a Level One Judge in Judge Foundry, a candidate must:

• Have been at least a Level One Judge in the Magic Judge Program or Judge Academy, in good standing, as of October 13, 2023.
• Pass the L1 rules refresh test
• Choose one:
  • Work three events
  • Play in six events and work one event
  • Write or receive a short review about their involvement in events or the judging community
• Maintain membership in Judge Foundry by being up-to-date on their membership dues

Level Two

To recertify as a Level Two Judge in Judge Foundry, a candidate must:

• Have been at least a Level Two Judge in the Magic Judge Program or Judge Academy, in good standing, as of October 13, 2023.
• Pass the L2/L3 rules refresh test
• Pass the L2/L3 policy refresh test
• Choose one:
  • Work two competitive events
  • Work six events
  • Write or receive a short review about their involvement in events or the judging community
• Maintain membership in Judge Foundry by being up-to-date on their membership dues

Level Three

To recertify as a Level Three Judge in Judge Foundry, a candidate must:

• Have been at least a Level Three Judge (Or L3 Emeritus) in the Magic Judge Program or Judge Academy, in good standing, as of October 13, 2023.
• Pass the L2/L3 rules refresh test
• Pass the L2/L3 policy refresh test
• Choose two —
  • Work at least eight local competitive events
  • Work at least four large events
  • Team lead at a large event
  • Create content that provides educational value to the community, subject to the approval of an L5 (ex: article, conference presentation, video, etc.)
• Choose one —
  • Write a self review
  • Receive an in-depth review, covering multiple events, from an L4+
• Maintain membership in Judge Foundry by being up-to-date on their membership dues

The maintenance equivalent of these requirements will see more detail in next week’s article on the new Level Three, so we won’t go into them in detail here.

Upgrade:

If you used to be a judge, then you stopped judging, and now you want to judge again, there’s never been a better time to do so. We miss you and we want you back, and we bet that you have a lot to offer the community and newer judges. We think that these requirements do a good job of providing a welcoming path back for you, but as with everything else we’ve presented, we want your feedback. Please share your comments on JudgeApps or Reddit, comment on Facebook or Twitter, or email us. We look forward to seeing you on the event floor again.