Umpires, Referees, and Other Sports Official Officiate at competitive athletic or sporting events. Detect infractions of rules and decide penalties according to established regulations. Includes all sporting officials, referees, and competition judges.
Umpires, Referees, and Other Sports Official is Also Know as
In different settings, Umpires, Referees, and Other Sports Official is titled as
- Basketball Referee
- Diving Judge
- Dressage Judge
- Football Referee
- Horse Show Judge
- Major League Baseball Umpire (MLB Umpire)
- Referee
- Soccer Referee
- Softball Umpire
- Sports Official
Education and Training of Umpires, Referees, and Other Sports Official
Umpires, Referees, and Other Sports Official is categorized in Job Zone Two: Some Preparation Needed
Experience Required for Umpires, Referees, and Other Sports Official
Some previous work-related skill, knowledge, or experience is usually needed. For example, a teller would benefit from experience working directly with the public.
Education Required for Umpires, Referees, and Other Sports Official
These occupations usually require a high school diploma.
Degrees Related to Umpires, Referees, and Other Sports Official
Training Required for Umpires, Referees, and Other Sports Official
Employees in these occupations need anywhere from a few months to one year of working with experienced employees. A recognized apprenticeship program may be associated with these occupations.
Related Ocuupations
Some Ocuupations related to Umpires, Referees, and Other Sports Official in different industries are
- Athletes and Sports Competitors
- Coaches and Scouts
- Animal Trainers
- Amusement and Recreation Attendants
- First-Line Supervisors of Police and Detectives
- Exercise Trainers and Group Fitness Instructors
- Self-Enrichment Teachers
- First-Line Supervisors of Entertainment and Recreation Workers, Except Gambling Services
- Compliance Officers
- Bailiffs
- Athletic Trainers
- Recreation Workers
- Education Administrators, Kindergarten through Secondary
- Meeting, Convention, and Event Planners
- Training and Development Specialists
- Gambling and Sports Book Writers and Runners
- Police and Sheriff's Patrol Officers
- First-Line Supervisors of Firefighting and Prevention Workers
- Judges, Magistrate Judges, and Magistrates
- Training and Development Managers
What Do Umpires, Referees, and Other Sports Official do?
- Officiate at sporting events, games, or competitions, to maintain standards of play and to ensure that game rules are observed.
- Judge performances in sporting competitions to award points, impose scoring penalties, and determine results.
- Signal participants or other officials to make them aware of infractions or to otherwise regulate play or competition.
- Inspect sporting equipment or examine participants to ensure compliance with event and safety regulations.
- Keep track of event times, including race times and elapsed time during game segments, starting or stopping play when necessary.
- Start races and competitions.
- Resolve claims of rule infractions or complaints by participants and assess any necessary penalties, according to regulations.
- Verify scoring calculations before competition winners are announced.
- Direct participants to assigned areas, such as starting blocks or penalty areas.
- Report to regulating organizations regarding sporting activities, complaints made, and actions taken or needed, such as fines or other disciplinary actions.
- Confer with other sporting officials, coaches, players, and facility managers to provide information, coordinate activities, and discuss problems.
- Teach and explain the rules and regulations governing a specific sport.
- Research and study players and teams to anticipate issues that might arise in future engagements.
- Verify credentials of participants in sporting events, and make other qualifying determinations, such as starting order or handicap number.
- Compile scores and other athletic records.
- Inspect game sites for compliance with regulations or safety requirements.
Qualities of Good Umpires, Referees, and Other Sports Official
- Oral Expression: The ability to communicate information and ideas in speaking so others will understand.
- Far Vision: The ability to see details at a distance.
- Oral Comprehension: The ability to listen to and understand information and ideas presented through spoken words and sentences.
- Near Vision: The ability to see details at close range (within a few feet of the observer).
- Speech Clarity: The ability to speak clearly so others can understand you.
- Problem Sensitivity: The ability to tell when something is wrong or is likely to go wrong. It does not involve solving the problem, only recognizing that there is a problem.
- Speech Recognition: The ability to identify and understand the speech of another person.
- Deductive Reasoning: The ability to apply general rules to specific problems to produce answers that make sense.
- Time Sharing: The ability to shift back and forth between two or more activities or sources of information (such as speech, sounds, touch, or other sources).
- Selective Attention: The ability to concentrate on a task over a period of time without being distracted.
- Perceptual Speed: The ability to quickly and accurately compare similarities and differences among sets of letters, numbers, objects, pictures, or patterns. The things to be compared may be presented at the same time or one after the other. This ability also includes comparing a presented object with a remembered object.
- Flexibility of Closure: The ability to identify or detect a known pattern (a figure, object, word, or sound) that is hidden in other distracting material.
- Written Comprehension: The ability to read and understand information and ideas presented in writing.
- Trunk Strength: The ability to use your abdominal and lower back muscles to support part of the body repeatedly or continuously over time without "giving out" or fatiguing.
- Memorization: The ability to remember information such as words, numbers, pictures, and procedures.
- Speed of Closure: The ability to quickly make sense of, combine, and organize information into meaningful patterns.
- Inductive Reasoning: The ability to combine pieces of information to form general rules or conclusions (includes finding a relationship among seemingly unrelated events).
- Written Expression: The ability to communicate information and ideas in writing so others will understand.
- Stamina: The ability to exert yourself physically over long periods of time without getting winded or out of breath.
- Information Ordering: The ability to arrange things or actions in a certain order or pattern according to a specific rule or set of rules (e.g., patterns of numbers, letters, words, pictures, mathematical operations).
- Category Flexibility: The ability to generate or use different sets of rules for combining or grouping things in different ways.
- Auditory Attention: The ability to focus on a single source of sound in the presence of other distracting sounds.
- Visual Color Discrimination: The ability to match or detect differences between colors, including shades of color and brightness.
- Gross Body Coordination: The ability to coordinate the movement of your arms, legs, and torso together when the whole body is in motion.
- Visualization: The ability to imagine how something will look after it is moved around or when its parts are moved or rearranged.
- Hearing Sensitivity: The ability to detect or tell the differences between sounds that vary in pitch and loudness.
- Spatial Orientation: The ability to know your location in relation to the environment or to know where other objects are in relation to you.
- Extent Flexibility: The ability to bend, stretch, twist, or reach with your body, arms, and/or legs.
- Number Facility: The ability to add, subtract, multiply, or divide quickly and correctly.
- Mathematical Reasoning: The ability to choose the right mathematical methods or formulas to solve a problem.
- Dynamic Strength: The ability to exert muscle force repeatedly or continuously over time. This involves muscular endurance and resistance to muscle fatigue.
- Static Strength: The ability to exert maximum muscle force to lift, push, pull, or carry objects.
- Reaction Time: The ability to quickly respond (with the hand, finger, or foot) to a signal (sound, light, picture) when it appears.
- Response Orientation: The ability to choose quickly between two or more movements in response to two or more different signals (lights, sounds, pictures). It includes the speed with which the correct response is started with the hand, foot, or other body part.
- Multilimb Coordination: The ability to coordinate two or more limbs (for example, two arms, two legs, or one leg and one arm) while sitting, standing, or lying down. It does not involve performing the activities while the whole body is in motion.
- Explosive Strength: The ability to use short bursts of muscle force to propel oneself (as in jumping or sprinting), or to throw an object.
- Speed of Limb Movement: The ability to quickly move the arms and legs.
- Gross Body Equilibrium: The ability to keep or regain your body balance or stay upright when in an unstable position.
- Depth Perception: The ability to judge which of several objects is closer or farther away from you, or to judge the distance between you and an object.
- Peripheral Vision: The ability to see objects or movement of objects to one's side when the eyes are looking ahead.
- Arm-Hand Steadiness: The ability to keep your hand and arm steady while moving your arm or while holding your arm and hand in one position.
- Fluency of Ideas: The ability to come up with a number of ideas about a topic (the number of ideas is important, not their quality, correctness, or creativity).
- Finger Dexterity: The ability to make precisely coordinated movements of the fingers of one or both hands to grasp, manipulate, or assemble very small objects.
- Originality: The ability to come up with unusual or clever ideas about a given topic or situation, or to develop creative ways to solve a problem.
- Glare Sensitivity: The ability to see objects in the presence of a glare or bright lighting.
- Manual Dexterity: The ability to quickly move your hand, your hand together with your arm, or your two hands to grasp, manipulate, or assemble objects.
- Sound Localization: The ability to tell the direction from which a sound originated.
- Rate Control: The ability to time your movements or the movement of a piece of equipment in anticipation of changes in the speed and/or direction of a moving object or scene.
- Wrist-Finger Speed: The ability to make fast, simple, repeated movements of the fingers, hands, and wrists.
- Dynamic Flexibility: The ability to quickly and repeatedly bend, stretch, twist, or reach out with your body, arms, and/or legs.
- Night Vision: The ability to see under low-light conditions.
- Control Precision: The ability to quickly and repeatedly adjust the controls of a machine or a vehicle to exact positions.
Tools Used by Umpires, Referees, and Other Sports Official
- Air gauges
- Announcement systems
- Ball inflators
- Communications headsets
- Countdown timers
- Digital video disk DVD players
- Elbow pads
- Electronic display boards
- Elliptical trainers
- Equipment scales
- Exercise bicycles
- Fitness treadmills
- Hockey girdles
- Hockey skates
- Laptop computers
- Leg guards
- Measuring tapes
- Outside chest protectors
- Penalty flags
- Personal computers
- Protective sports helmets
- Referee whistles
- Shin guards
- Sports flip coins
- Stability balls
- Tablet computers
- Umpire chest protectors
- Umpire masks
- Weight training equipment
Technology Skills required for Umpires, Referees, and Other Sports Official
- Adobe Acrobat
- Database software
- Email software
- Microsoft Excel
- Microsoft Office software
- Microsoft Outlook
- Microsoft PowerPoint
- Microsoft Word
- Video editing software
- Web browser software
- Word processing software