World Schools Selection

[Guest]

Aggregating the times from the two races (ISQ & BSOC)establishes the consistency required in the BSOA ISSFOC selections

but how can you do that when lots of the kifds in the same Qualification race run different classes in the schools comp - the senior class covers 3 distinct school years y11,12 and 13 - no dirrect correlation possible QED!

[mharky]

quite

[Guest]

but how can you do that

Of course you can only compare like with like, but suficient comparisons within year groups can be made.

the point is that

The point is made at Aire National event on 10th September and the Regional event on 6th Nov in the New Forest

[Jaydeal]

no i believe i paid approx £400 for my daughter to go to Belgium.



Also be aware the scrawny aneamic looking Czech and Slovak kids will be putting out there best team and as in the Junior European Championship will kick arse and win everything. So we will be foolish to send kids who have had the minimum experience and o training.

Are you saying to these kids selected that they have minimum experience and O training By the look of the teams the majority if not all have been on tours and have run internationally. It seems to me you are saying that your daughter whoever she is is not upto scratch and that you don't want to pay for her to go. Poor girl, if my siblings were selected I'd be thrilled and would scrape around to find the money.

[jasper]

No my daughter is perfectly capable of winning gold medals out there and I wasn't talking about her. I was talking about the select kids who had a team of 3 or more from their school and thats why they were selected.

[rocky]

some thoughts on selection (in general):

there are always going to be borderline cases, some go for you, some go against you. sometimes it can feel that they all go against you, but more often than not this is just your imagination playing up.

the people who select teams, esp for international representation, do not make descisions without lengthy discussion, debate and thought. and from what i hear of selection meetings most of this effort goes into deciding the borderline cases.

ultimately if you want to get selected for something you have to go out and get the results that mean the selectors can't not select you. if you can only pull out results which put you in a borderline position then you have to accept you might not get selected.

there are plenty more opportunities out there, and for ref: if world schools is costing £500+, well i got 6 weeks, 8 countries and 250 controls in for a similar figure this summer!

[Guest]

ultimately if you want to get selected for something you have to go out and get the results that mean the selectors can't not select you.

I would have thought that 2nd place in a special selection race was good enough for that - how can the selectors ignore it?

[mharky]

I don't know

[Guest]

ultimately if you want to get selected for something you have to go out and get the results that mean the selectors can't not select you.

I would have thought that 2nd place in a special selection race was good enough for that - how can the selectors ignore it?

i]Selection will be based on two events: the British Schools Orienteering Championships (BSOC), and a Special Qualification Event (SQE), to be held the day before the BSOC.

[awk]

Still don't understand how CH wasn't picked in the junior girls tho'

I have to agree for once with you I cant understand the reason why CH was not selected for the junior girls.

Speaking as one of CH's club members, and one of her most avid supporters, I can see quite easily why, given the selection criteria. CB and CH were running for one of two places, as neither had teams in. Julia B fairly easily gets one of those places, so that in fact makes them fighting for the only other place.
On the weekend, CH beat CB in the selection race by 39 seconds. Next day, CB beat CH by almost 3 minutes. So, probably select CB. As double check, go back to the 2 'known form' races. CB wins one, and comes second in the other.

Much as I hate to say it, from a selection point of view it's a pretty straightforward decision in the circumstances.

CH has attended nearly every major event this year including the British Schools Score Champs where she finished on the podium whereas CB has hardly attended any of the major events this year and has shown poor form at the events she did attend.

Most of this is irrelevant - not part of the criteria (which were admirably precise). I think CB's form in these races belies that last statement.

My last point is that we should send the best team that we have to win GOLD. I don't agree with these namby pamby left wingers who always winge about competition, competitive spirit and will to win.

Well, there we have to part company again. Maybe I'm a namby pamby left winger - I prefer to think that the World Schools team does an admirable job in trying to balance having a decent enough team out to be competitive, and yet playing a developmental role. By taking the line it has, I have long felt it has successfully maintained that difficult balance maintaining a schools-orientated flavour, and as a selector for the previous two World Schools events, was very happy to work within the criteria set by the BSOA committee.

This year, I know that I can be accused of having a vested interest (my son has benefited from the presence of the Guiseley team that Mrs H has so lambasted - in my opinion she did so unfairly, although I can understand given the information she had immediately to hand), but at the end of the day I also know the amount of effort and thought that has gone into thinking through the selection criteria, the amount of effort the selectors put into this, and the amount of effort that went into trying to get a school team out this year. I'm glad that the school students at least managed an age class team - it would be nice to go at least one better next time, although the loss of the teacher with a strong interest in orienteering at the end of the summer term was a big blow.

It's easy to criticise here (and boy, I've done so often enough!), but these criteria and selections were much more carefully thought out than people appear to give credit for. The World Schools is NOT just another BOF squad event, with an importantly different emphasis, and long may it continue so.

I also think that when publicly criticising selectors, particularly junior ones, you have to be extremely careful - nothing like marring a youngster's joy at being selected for a big competition after a lot of hard work.

(BTW I was the Guest who responded to Mrs H's diatribe about the Guiseley team - was in a big hurry at the time and didn't realise was logged out by offspring).

[mharky]

Although this debate has been wonderfully interesting, has anyone actually stopped to see what the people it really affects think???

There just seem to be lots of wound up parents going back and forth at each other, along with several other non World Shools candidates.

If they have an opinion about the selection then it should be then commenting, not us on their behalf. All the talk about people who shouldn't have been selected is very disrespectful. How would you feel if you had got into a World Schools team and then people were saying how you shouldn't be in?

It is unfair on the people on the team and it is unfair on the people who just missed out on the team.

Please can we bring an end to this.

Good luck to those in the team. Commiserations to those who didn't make it, better luck next time.

The End.

[PKJ]

Finally some sense - this isn't a World Cup squad or the test team - I also find some of this disrespectful to those selected. As someone with no axe to grind (despite my club) it seems pretty obvious that there were selection criteria and that time and trouble was taken over the selections.
Anyway, don't some of you people have any work to do during the day?

[rocky]

as mharky said, the end.

[mharky]

The End

[eddie]

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