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The Gymnastics East Conference Opts Out of The SCORE Board Judging Pilot Program

The Gymnastics East Conference (GEC) confirmed to GymCastic on Friday that it will not participate in “The SCORE Board” pilot program, an oversight committee aimed at standardization of judging accuracy and fairness in NCAA competitions. 

GymCastic reached out to the GEC but the organization declined to provide comment at this time. “The SCORE Board” evaluates judges using a point system, awarding more points to judges whose evaluations align closely with a target score determined by a “The SCORE Board” panel. Judges must also submit the start value and “up to the level” deductions for each routine. Judges who accumulate the most points throughout the regular season will have a higher likelihood of receiving assignments to judge postseason meets.  

Schools that have opted out of the program have not provided reasons for their decision, however since “The SCORE Board” is a pilot program, participation can only be strongly recommended said Kasey Crawford, co-chair of a committee on judging issues and head coach of the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse’s gymnastics program. Currently about 85% of college teams participated in the program during the first three weeks of the 2025 season.

Crawford also clarified that because this is a pilot program, there will be no official judge ranking for postseason selection this season. “The focus for this year is data collection and we are going to collect as much data as we can,” Crawford said. “But this is an example of how teams refusing to participate can actually put a judge at a disadvantage and reduce accountability.”

“The SCORE Board” pilot system relies on schools providing competition routine videos for evaluation. Crawford clarified that if a school opts out of the program, judges are not permitted to upload their own competition video, but said in the future it could become a possibility.

Many other sports including baseball and football have a supervisory panel of officials to regulate referee oversight. In FIG Gymnastics, the Technical Committee regulates judging education, control, and supervision. “The move to bring forward a supervisory panel is to help bring forth something we should have always had,” Crawford said. “We also know this is a long-term project. It is not going to be perfect in year one.”

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