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Over the last few months, you have no doubt become
aware through the dog press and other avenues that an announcement from
the Kennel
Club has been imminent regarding the way breed show judges are
trained and developed in this country. I am very pleased to
advise you that this announcement is being made later today – hence my
writing to you now so that Breed Club Secretaries are among the first
group of people to receive this news.
A new system has been developed for the education,
approval and listing of every level of judge, from those who aspire to
judge, right through to open show judges and those who go on to award
Challenge Certificates and judge championship show groups, and Best in
Show.
The Judges Competency Framework will be launched in
January 2019, run alongside the current system for a three-year
transition period, and be fully operational from January 2022. This
education will involve mentoring and ringside observation by breed
experts and be supported by a network of Breed Education Coordinators
who will help facilitate learning. More information about this role
will be released in the coming months.
For some time now the Kennel Club has indicated that
the way dog show judges are educated needs to change. It is
generally accepted that change is necessary due to a range of
deficiencies in the current process – problems for show societies
identifying available and competent judges, open shows being poorly
supported, and lack of seminar opportunities and transparency in the
approval processes. The Judges Working Party changes introduced
as far back as 1999 were a step in the right direction as far as formalising
training for established judges was concerned, but now the time has
come to make changes of a more far-reaching nature – changes which
involve every level of judge.
The new Framework will provide a logical sequence of
learning, practising, peer observation and examination and will cater
for all judges at every level – it outlines a judge’s career path
providing clear criteria for each stage. Each level will also
confirm judging privileges, again making it clear to the judge and the
show society who is eligible to judge which breed, and the number and
the type of classes which may be judged.
The Kennel Club’s established online Find
A Judge facility will be extended to provide lists of all eligible
judges across all breeds and for all types of show.
The Framework will be administered through the
Kennel Club’s modern online education platform – The
Kennel Club Academy. The Academy is easy to access, available 24
hours a day and requires only a small annual subscription. As far as possible
this provides for an efficient and ‘paperless’ way for judges to record
their experience on their personal KC Academy page whether this be
judging appointments or details of seminars attended, breed assessments
passed and other education undertaken.
All judges will be required to remain up to date
with their general dog show knowledge with a mandatory online exam to
be passed every five years.
Breed clubs will remain responsible for providing
breed-specific education, and the Framework will also require judges to
undergo mentoring and ringside observation. Breed clubs will be
required to support this activity and to work with the Kennel Club to
facilitate organising breed-specific assessments.
A small pilot scheme involving clubs from all seven
groups and all five Stud Book bands will run from the summer of 2017,
which will enable the Kennel Club to make any refinements to its
proposals before the Framework comes fully into force.
Breed clubs will no longer be required to maintain
judging lists as the Kennel Club will be publishing lists of judges,
across all breeds and all levels of show, via its online Find A Judge
facility.
The Framework starts at entry level, before a person
steps into the ring for their very first appointment, and goes all the
way through to the rare position of an all-breeds judge – seven levels
in all. Judges can remain at any one of the levels if they so wish and
can also be at different levels dependent on their knowledge and
experience of a range of different breeds at any given time.
The requirement for judges to wait to be nominated
to award CCs will no longer be applicable, as they will be listed as a
championship show judge as soon as they have undertaken all the
required education and assessment. This will open up what many see as a
bottleneck preventing many suitably knowledgeable judges from awarding
CCs.
These changes to the judges education and approval
system are all about raising standards of judging across all levels,
starting with the person who is thinking of taking their first few
tentative steps towards becoming a judge of their own breed at open
shows, right through to the vastly experienced breeder who has attained
the status of an all-breeds judge at championship show level.
Society is changing and these changes reflect this
situation. The dog show scene has changed dramatically over the last 40
years or so. Whereas in the ‘60s and ‘70s, it was relatively easy for
aspiring judges to accumulate numbers as a part of learning their craft
at open shows where entries were plentiful, the reality is this is no
longer the case, which has made learning more difficult.
The Kennel Club was very mindful of this fact when
it developed this new system, as it was keen to take modern lifestyles
into account – dog shows these days compete with so many other pastimes
for our attention and people work longer hours. A system which promotes
efficiency while at the same time encouraging quality learning – based
not on the number of dogs judged but on the judge demonstrating their
competency to their peers – has to be very good news indeed for anyone
who wishes either to become a dog judge or to progress further up the
judging ladder.
Taken out of context, the previous two paragraphs
could easily be misconstrued to mean that the Kennel Club has given up
on general canine open shows, but nothing could be further from the
truth. There have already been some initiatives announced
emerging from the Dog Show Promotion working party. Further initiatives
will be announced over the coming months, some of which have been
designed to fit hand-in-glove with the Framework’s system of mentoring
and observed judging at open shows, which will no doubt ensure that
these events remain absolutely essential in the education and
progression of breed show judges in the UK.
Further details of the Judges Competency Framework
can be found on the Kennel Club website by clicking
here, along with an outline of the recommendations affecting breed
clubs and general canine societies. You will also find an FAQ document
which aims to cover questions that may arise. If you have a question
which is not yet covered please email your question to jcf@thekennelclub.org.uk
where we will update the FAQ document with your question and the
answer.
There is no question that the education of breed
show judges is entering a new chapter in this country, one which I am
sure will succeed if we – the Kennel Club, breed clubs, open show
societies, breeders, exhibitors and judges – all work together in our
common aim of making our pastime better and securing its continuance
for future generations of dog show enthusiasts.
With all good wishes,
Kathryn Symns
Canine Activities Executive
The Kennel Club
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