[toby]

Looks like a drive to Houston might be the only choice other than the NHC.

Paul may or may not be willing to do another that quickly since he already has the May one scheduled, but Houston or Austin would be options (although Austin would require at least a one night stay).  My plan was to ping Mike, Doak, and Jeff if NHC doesn't work out.

[MDixon]

Austin is a heck of a lot more fun IMO than Houston.

[toby]

I tend to agree, but it's an extra 4-5 hours of travel in a week where I'll be heading to Asheville 3 days later.

[MDixon]

Head to Asheville early. It's a heck of a lot easier to find a National judge there.

[toby]

Unrealistic.  I'm already stretching my travel days to the bone over the summer for beer related things.

[ram5ey]

Got my score last month from the Atlanta area exam last November.  Got a 76 which I was pleased with.  Phil Ferrell did great on the exam and prep courses.  We were able to spend time talking more about the exam beers after the exam concluded and the proctoring judges gave decently detailed notes of their sheets/scores so we had a pretty good clue how were were going to scored.

[klickitat jim]

Got my score last month from the Atlanta area exam last November.  Got a 76 which I was pleased with.  Phil Ferrell did great on the exam and prep courses.  We were able to spend time talking more about the exam beers after the exam concluded and the proctoring judges gave decently detailed notes of their sheets/scores so we had a pretty good clue how were were going to scored.

Congrats!

[bonjour]

As an exam administrator I was surprised to find out that the exams are seriously reviewed and at times, scores are adjusted.

There was a question about a beer I served based on my remarks on the beer and an score sheet comments  on the beer. 

To my knowledge the score on that beer was adjusted either Mike or one of his senior assistants.

Point is the exam results are seriously reviewed and scores adjusted as needed.  They really do a great job.

[Herminator]

Good job Mort and ram5ey!

[toby]

Got my score last month from the Atlanta area exam last November.  Got a 76 which I was pleased with.  Phil Ferrell did great on the exam and prep courses.  We were able to spend time talking more about the exam beers after the exam concluded and the proctoring judges gave decently detailed notes of their sheets/scores so we had a pretty good clue how were were going to scored.

Congrats!

I had great admins at both my exams that spent a lot of time with us discussing the beers, but proctors at one took a lot of extra time so didn't discuss anything with us, and the proctors at the other were in a snarky mood, so you had to really read between the lines to know, for example, that no they didn't really give the commercial IPA a 13.  Thankfully, I don't plan to take the tasting again for a while.

[noblesquirrel]

As an exam administrator I was surprised to find out that the exams are seriously reviewed and at times, scores are adjusted.

There was a question about a beer I served based on my remarks on the beer and an score sheet comments  on the beer. 

To my knowledge the score on that beer was adjusted either Mike or one of his senior assistants.

Point is the exam results are seriously reviewed and scores adjusted as needed.  They really do a great job.

Always good to hear positive feedback! I'm a recently appointed Associate Exam Director and graded about 110 individual exams last year. It's a lot of work but it's rewarding. We do take it very seriously and try not to cheat anybody out of points. It's been fun seeing all the new judges over the past few years at competitions and advancing through the ranks! I judge around 17-18 competitions/year and it's been great seeing the number of National and higher judges increase by over 100%. It seems that nearly every table has a National or higher judge these days.

[dsmitch19]

Always good to hear positive feedback! I'm a recently appointed Associate Exam Director and graded about 110 individual exams last year. It's a lot of work but it's rewarding. We do take it very seriously and try not to cheat anybody out of points. It's been fun seeing all the new judges over the past few years at competitions and advancing through the ranks! I judge around 17-18 competitions/year and it's been great seeing the number of National and higher judges increase by over 100%. It seems that nearly every table has a National or higher judge these days.

I think that depends on where you are judging since the BJCP tends to have very strong representation in certain areas and much weaker representation in others. In AZ, we only have 1 master and 6 national. Of those seven higher ranking judges, we might get 3-4 of them to show up on a good day. Two of them are pretty much retired from judging. Now when I've traveled to San Diego or even Denver to judge, it's a much different story.

[MDixon]

When I became National (number 304 in the program, 2004), it was difficult to find more than a handful of higher ranking judges at any comp and we only had 50 judges in the entire state of NC. Now we have 117 active judges and enough Masters that I must advance my rank or risk not sitting on the BOS round.

[toby]

I think that depends on where you are judging since the BJCP tends to have very strong representation in certain areas and much weaker representation in others. In AZ, we only have 1 master and 6 national. Of those seven higher ranking judges, we might get 3-4 of them to show up on a good day. Two of them are pretty much retired from judging. Now when I've traveled to San Diego or even Denver to judge, it's a much different story.

You have no idea.  LA has 2 National judges and somewhere around 22 total active judges (IIRC from my last database lookup).  And those two National judges are loooong time judges (including judge A0001) who are fairly selective about what they judge (one is a pro brewer and neither are spring chickens any more).  The biggest hurdle has always been lack of competitions and travel required to even take an exam.  There's been a fair amount of movement this past year to address both, though.  Hopefully I can help before I'm in their shoes.  lol

[noblesquirrel]

Always good to hear positive feedback! I'm a recently appointed Associate Exam Director and graded about 110 individual exams last year. It's a lot of work but it's rewarding. We do take it very seriously and try not to cheat anybody out of points. It's been fun seeing all the new judges over the past few years at competitions and advancing through the ranks! I judge around 17-18 competitions/year and it's been great seeing the number of National and higher judges increase by over 100%. It seems that nearly every table has a National or higher judge these days.

I think that depends on where you are judging since the BJCP tends to have very strong representation in certain areas and much weaker representation in others. In AZ, we only have 1 master and 6 national. Of those seven higher ranking judges, we might get 3-4 of them to show up on a good day. Two of them are pretty much retired from judging. Now when I've traveled to San Diego or even Denver to judge, it's a much different story.

Right, I was speaking more of the competitions here in the Midwest. Between Chicago, Minneapolis, Milwaukee and Indianapolis, there are tons of judges. Finally getting some Grand Masters in the region as well after a long period of only having one (who passed away).