Director Requirements

One club (in NSW, Australia) inquired as to the requirements to use accredited directors for their events.

It is a good question that needs to be addressed at two levels:

• Any formal requirements from the affiliated state and national bridge bodies, including those for masterpointing
• Any common sense reasons beyond the formal requirements

Formal Requirements

The NSWBA provides a number of requirements for the accreditation of directors and for the minimum grade requirements for congresses, but do not appear to explicitly state the need to use an accredited  director for club sessions, though it notes that the lowest accredited level director "...will be competent to direct normal single session events at club level".

The ABF Masterpoints Scheme imposes requirements on club sessions for them to be recognised under the masterpoint scheme. This includes Director Requirements (clause 1.5.2) which states:

"The scheme recognizes 6 levels of Director's accreditation:

• Club - Congress - State (under the jurisdiction of the State Associations).
• National levels 3, 2, and 1 (under the direct control of the ABF).

All Congresses (apart from Bridge Tours and Cruises), State Championships and National Championships must be run under the control of a non-playing accredited director, approved for the relevant level of tournament.

Clubs may elect to run the following events under the control of a playing director:

• GNOT qualifying rounds.
• State Championship qualifying rounds (unless the State Association has ruled otherwise).
• All grade B5i, B4c, B4s (qualifying rounds only), C, D, E, and F events.

GNOT Regional and State Finals must be conducted by accredited Congress directors."

This suggests that ABF masterpoint recognition requires NSW clubs to use a NSWBA accredited director.

Other Reasons

Apart from any formal requirements, the use of an accredited director has the following advantages:

• Greater likelihood of competent choice and execution of movements for the sessions
• Greater likelihood of fair and skilled application of the Laws of Bridge (including any director discretion) consistent with Australian and international best practice
• Greater likelihood of competent scoring and masterpointing of the sessions

Different clubs will have different arrangements for procuring and retaining directors, including different expectations of the additional tasks they might be expected to perform. At the base level, the costs of putting volunteers through a directing course and exam are relatively minor.