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2008 Rules Education & Special Events Report
By Craig Winter, Manager of Rules Education & Special Events
Of all the services we provide, area golfers, Member Clubs and golf professionals have come to appreciate the OGA as their local go-to resource for answers on the Rules of Golf. While we’re fortunate to have one of the foremost authorities on the Rules of Golf as our Chief Executive, her time is focused on running our Association. Knowing the importance of our role in helping you with the Rules of Golf along with an understanding that additional staff resources were necessary to expand our programs and services to golfers of all levels, abilities and interests, CEO Barb Trammell made the decision to create a department for Rules Education & Special Events.
With the Championship season fast approaching, our first project was updating the OGA Hard Card (our Local Rules and Conditions of Competition) to ensure we were up-to-date with the quadrennial changes in the Rules of Golf. In addition to Rule changes, the Hard Card now also clearly defines scoring and starting areas and includes the Local Rule allowing distance measuring devices. At each competition dedication by our staff, veteran and new Rules Officials ensured all OGA competitions were conducted in a fair and equitable manner.
Historically, stories on the Rules of Golf have proven to be the most popular on our website or in emails. With our desire to increase knowledge on the Rules in our region, we launched Outside Agency, a Rules of Golf blog. We also added an OGA Rules of Golf Newsletter that provided more in-depth explanations on the Rules. In addition to our in-house discussions, we’re also regularly communicating with members of the Leith Society, an international group of Rules enthusiasts.
At the conclusion of the season, we began the process of developing our Rules Education programs. First, we introduced a comprehensive training program for our TAG Volunteers to provide a path for them to become certified. Each volunteer may chose how much time and effort they wish to invest by gaining certification in positions ranging from forecaddie to tournament director.
Education programming is a major focal point of our efforts including presentations and clinics for High School and College golfers, OGA Member Clubs and golf courses. In addition to presentation, we’ll expand programming in 2009 to include a full day of hands on learning (on-course Rules Clinics) and three-day Rules of Golf Workshops. We also plan on introducing web-based Rules education. With an excellent cost-efficient solution now in place, webinars are being created and will hopefully debut sometime in early 2009.
Possibly the most noticeable and tangible strides were in Special Events areas. It’s been a goal for many of the staff to expand services and be more relevant to all golfers. In 2006 as a partnership between regional golf courses and the OGA, we created the OGA Net Series. The series provides a schedule of handicapped events that offers competitive golfers, regardless of skill, more playing opportunities. This year we enhanced the program by adding a year-long Net Series Points list. This off season we began in earnest to increase the geographic reach and number of events on the schedule and look to have nearly 30 events listed in 2009.
In late summer we began talking with regional courses about a new initiative, at the time called Member Days – a concept that has seen success in many other markets. The goal was to create fun, non-competitive, casual golf outings that grant OGA Members access to courses throughout our region at a nominal fee. The name has since changed to the OGA Tour and, in 2009, we are very excited to offer OGA Members the opportunity to play a wide selection of some of the finest daily fee, resort and private courses throughout our region.
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