Catching up with the NIRSA Championship Series

Howdy y’all,

This year has flown by and the NIRSA Championship Series has been accomplishing great work, so I wanted to take this opportunity to update y’all on all the happenings.

After volunteering for the Champ Series for nearly 15 years, I can easily say my journey on the Executive Team has been super impactful. It’s also come with some surprises.

Year one: The world flipped upside down when COVID hit. As the country shut down, we cancelled all in-person Champ Series events then pivoted to work on our behind-the-scenes procedures and offered a few virtual activities.

Year two: Our goal was to just get tournaments back up and running safely. We did that and then in the season’s second half I unexpectedly stepped into an Interim Chair role.

Year three: An Exec Team member stepped down and we found a great replacement in Oscee Wheatfall, Facility Operations Director at Texas A&M University, College Station and prior Champ Series Chair. Thank you, good sir, for coming back to serve.

If I’ve learned anything during my time on the Exec Team, it’s being able to pivot quickly. I’ve also learned the value of resiliency.

I’m sure though by now y’all are all here for the highlights and updates, so let’s get to it.

Coming out of the summer Champ Series Leadership Summit, we decided to focus on three areas this year: the volunteer experience, the participant experience, and social justice. As we’ve moved further away from the pandemic, we knew providing a premier experience would be important to athletes returning to play and to staff returning to volunteer. Additionally, we continue to put social justice at the forefront of what we do. Our Social Justice Work Team—steered by Jasmine Holmes, Associate Director for Sport Programs at Syracuse University, and Mirum Washington-White, Director of Athletics & Intramural Sports and Curriculum Chair for P.E, Faculty at St Cyril of Alexandria School—is leading these efforts, which contribute heavily to the culture of inclusion within the volunteer and participant experience.

I like bullets so that’s where I’m headed next:

• Participant experience
  • Soccer introduced a juggling contest which saw one student athlete touch the ball over 4,000 times and last for just over 45 minutes
  • At the National Basketball Championships, we will introduce a reimagined All-Tournament Committee as the Tournament Experience Committee
  • At national tournaments, teams are guaranteed at least three games
• Volunteer experience
  • Provide more communication up front about what to expect at a tournament
  • Highlight staff and officials on social media
  • Introducing a ten-year volunteer pin at the 2023 NIRSA Annual Conference and Campus Rec & Wellness Expo
• Social Justice
  • Introduced a bias reporting form at the National Soccer Championships and the Flag Football National Championships
  • At each national tournament, a social justice education and activity was facilitated with the volunteer staff
  • Developed a best practice guide for tournaments
• National Soccer Highlights
  • 96 teams
  • Introduced spectator day and weekend passes
  • Largest volunteer rookie class at 18
• National Flag Football Highlights
  • 42 teams
  • Largest Unified Division with eight teams

Speaking of National Flag Football, over the last few years there have been conversations around changing the date of the national tournament. The Flag Football Work Team led by Stephanie Calhoun (Chair) and Lane Goodwin (Vice Chair) reached out to stakeholders via survey and held two Zoom forums to get direct feedback about how this change would impact them and us. After reviewing the feedback and recommendation, the NIRSA Services Corporation Board and the Executive Team approved the national tournament to be hosted in the third week of December starting in 2023.

Top main things we considered:

1. It avoids both Christmas, New Year’s, and winter breaks supporting valuable downtime for students and volunteers alike.
2. It is after final exams for several university campuses.
3. Will help with tournament registration requirements around university registrar office and campus rec professional staff approvals as universities are more than likely still open.
4. Avoids teams struggling with keeping player interest as all regionals and campus leagues would have just recently ended.

Wrapping up, by the time this blog post comes out we will have hosted our third National Esports Tournament. Then, we’ll wish our National Planning Committee (led by Sean Butler and Michael Castaneda) good luck as they round out what has been a great year for the NIRSA Championship Series.

I look forward to seeing many of you at the 2023 NIRSA Annual Conference in Pittsburgh. We’d love to have you at the Series Thank You Social, where we announce and honor the Sarah Fain Distinguished Service Award. The Executive Team will then give a presentation celebrating this past year as well as looking to the future. You don’t want to miss out!

Be well and be kind.