Ready to Apply For Your License to Judge? Here Are a Few Things to Consider…

Click here to read the complete article

194 – October, 2014

By William Given

Some of you may be considering applying to the American Kennel Club to become a licensed judge of your breed. The American Kennel Club has certain requirements for initial applicants. The requirements include: complete six stewarding assignments and six judging assignments at sanctioned or specialty matches, sweepstakes, futurities or open shows. You must meet the AKC’s occupational eligibility requirements and attend a Basic Judging Institute. You must also successfully complete the Anatomy, Procedural and Junior Showmanship “open book” written exams. There are other requirements based on whether you apply using the traditional 12-5-5 Method or the New Breed Alternative Method. Some of the requirements include, for example, a minimum of 12 years experience exhibiting dogs in conformation competition, bred and raised a certain number of litters – of which a certain number of offspring completed their championships, and have been interviewed by an AKC field representative. But beyond these formal requirements, there are other questions that you should ask yourself.

Beyond your textbook knowledge of the standard and its application, have you attended breed seminars in which poor, average and excellent examples of your breed were available for hands-on examination? Were these seminars presented by highly successful breeders with many years of experience or by persons wishing to establish themselves as breed experts at the expense of the breed? Also, have you siezed every opportunity available to sit ringside with a well-versed breeder or a multiple breed judge who could instruct and coach you on judging the overall dog? Before such a ringside observation, did you study the breed standard sufficiently to ask your tutor some well thought through questions? And ideally, you will have had a long-time mentor in your breed who has guided you over the years.

Do you have what it takes to fairly and honestly evaluate exhibits without prejudice, including the dogs owned or shown by individuals with whom you have competed against in the past and perhaps have disliked for any number of reasons? From your first assignment to your last, will you have the fortitude to withhold ribbons from dogs that clearly lack merit, or will you be of a mindset that, as a new judge, withholding would be too drastic an action and adversely impact future assignments. The AKC field representative will back you up on your decision to withhold. Withholding will almost certainly make the breeder or handler of the dog resent your decision and even cause them to dislike you personally, but the vast majority of successful breeders will herald your action.

What are your thoughts concerning judging dogs that are not being presented to their best credit by novice owners? If a particular exhibit is far superior to the other dogs being shown by experienced owners and professional handlers, will you be able to look past poor handling?

Most importantly, will you have rock solid confidence in the application of the breed standard to justify your placements? At times, those who fail to win under you may berate your selections, even citing previous wins under judges esteemed by all. They may even feel that it is just not right that you would deny a big win for their dog that has been highly and expensively advertised. Your response has to be that you judge the dogs entered under you as you see them on the day and can give no credit to how those dogs were evaluated by other judges on another day. In your own mind you will know you fairly evaluated the dogs made the correct placements.

And there is another side to the coin. The time will come when you put up a dog owned or shown by a close friend. Talk will likely generate that you only gave the Best of Breed win to “that” dog because your friend owns the dog, or your friend showed the dog. If you put the dog up because it was the best on there, do you have what it takes to just let that kind of talk roll off your back. You will, of course, know full well that friendship had nothing to do with your placements? After all, were you supposed to “dump” the best dog in the ring because it might start the gossipers talking? These things happen, you know they do, and you had better get used to it.

Once you have met the AKC’s initial requirements and have been approved on a provisional basis to judge your breed, are you prepared to adjudicate the dogs owned by acquaintances and longtime friends without any consideration for personal ties? On a certain level there will be some hope or expectation that friendship weighs into your evaluation. If they are truly your friends, they will accept your selections without reservation or resentment. They will know that you came prepared to judge fairly and honestly.

When you begin getting your first invitations to judge, you should not be surprised if some kennel clubs request that you pay your own way. They may offer one night’s lodging or may propose to pay three dollars per dog. You may only have a handful of dogs entered under you, and it may cost you $500 or more to fly half-way across the country to get from your home town to the show city you’re traveling to. It is something many judges have to go through in the beginning of their judging career. Your only other option is to wait for invitations from show giving clubs that are within driving distance.

Is your personal situation such that you will easily be able to get away from your job or from your family for three days, for what may only be a one-day judging assignment? The assignment may be a great distance and require flying. You will find that airlines are offering fewer, if any, evening flights. That will make it more difficult if you want to get back to your job the next day. Consider this, if your judging assignment is on a Sunday and your breed is scheduled for judging at 3:00 p.m. and probably finishing about 3:30 p.m., and the show grounds are an hour or more away from the airport. You may very well be unable to catch the last flight out that departs at 5:30 p.m. Remember, passing through security at the airport takes some added time, and if the city you are judging in is a large metropolitan area you could be faced with traffic back-ups for twenty miles or more during rush hour. You may have to resign yourself to the fact that you will just have to take a Monday morning flight. Will that be possible with your job?

Will you be willing to ask others for what could only be called a fiercely candid assessment of your judging from the perspective of exhibitors, especially longtime, highly successful breeders who did not win under you? The feedback can be invaluable. You will also receive an evaluation by the AKC field representative whose opinion, which may not be as a breeder of your breed, you may disagree. If you feel his or her evaluation is inaccurate, you will have the right to submit a rebuttal of the critique. Remember, AKC field reps are thoroughly familiar with ring procedure but they are not always in the know on breed type of all breeds. You will be on solid ground if you are able to justify your placements.

And, are you willing to continually study, not only your breed but also any other breeds you may want to apply to judge in the coming years? Judging is a life-long learning process, but one that you will undoubtedly come to enjoy as the years pass.

Short URL: http://caninechronicle.com/?p=61283

Posted by ralbee on Oct 17 2014. Filed under Current Articles, Editorial. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. Both comments and pings are currently closed.