What’s in this Issue:

• View from the Chair
• ONZ Committee Vacancies- Round 2 – application deadline extended
• Years 5-8 Orienteering Camp – Registrations Open
• 2018 Council Elections – Applications Open
• High Performance Update
• Event Liaison Update
• ONZ Policy Updates
• Orienteering Photos

 

---

View from the Chair –

It was wonderful to catch up with many old friends and great to see plenty of first time participants at our Nationals. Despite several major events and associated expense during the earlier part of the year and the recent Australian Champs, it was so encouraging to see strong support despite the Nationals being held at the unusual time of Labour Weekend.

Hawkes Bay put on a magnificent event, ranging from a rapid fire Sprint in the Hastings CBD, to a very technical Middle criss crossing a small enclosed forest at Philips Field to the Long and exciting Relay on the rolling hills of Hautope. The weather held good, the warmth of reception from the Hawkes Bay Club volunteers was all too obvious which all made for a successful event.

We put aside the Friday evening at the Nationals for a Club Forum where ONZ took the opportunity to explain some of the initiatives underway to key representatives of our clubs. Our GM, Catriona McBean highlighted the future acquisition of a membership database system which could also handle competition entries; recent anti match fixing policies; forthcoming Council elections; Partnership Strategies and more Volunteer Training programmes.

Russell Higham, our Event Liaison Personnel, explained ONZ’s new template for risk management covering health and safety at events; outlined a possible future model for holding major events and provided initial feedback for the recent survey seeking views on the appropriateness and timing of major events.

Malcolm Ingham, ONZ’s Performance Leader, gave his personal views on what our international athletes need to do in the sense of training so as to be able to perform to expectation at the top level.

Feedback and discussion from the floor was good and positive and ONZ took away some immediate actions. Comments following the Forum was that it was very beneficial to clubs and we intend to integrate this and make it part of our agenda over Nationals weekend.

I’ll finish with another plea for members to consider if they could help our sport through offering to take a position on Council. At the AGM at Easter 2018, we could be seeking to fill three vacancies and we need to get these positions filled to allow us to govern and progress with our initiatives.

Elsewhere in this communication, you’ll be able to find a link to a recent description of what is Council’s function and what the position entails. Take a look – I say this seriously – governance of ONZ is not just an honour it is FUN – see if this is you.

David Turner
Chair ONZ Council

---

ONZ Committee Vacancies – Round 2

The first term of the ONZ Committee members are now up for renewal.

Each committee has slightly different appointment criteria and member numbers.  We have replaced some committee members in the last year, so these are not up for renewal.

We are now inviting applications for the second round for the Selection Panels, Technical and Mapping committees.

• Junior Selectors
• Senior Selectors
• Technical Committee
• Mapping Committee

Full position descriptions for all these roles are available on the Orienteering NZ website.

Applications close 26 November 2017.  Deadline Extended

Please forward your application to gm@orienteering.org.nz

---

Years 5-8 Orienteering Camp – Registrations Open

The 2017 Years 5-8 Orienteering camp will be held in Rotorua this year from the 19-22 December.

Information about the camp including the registration form are available from:
http://www.obop.org.nz/junior-camp-2017.html

Closing date for registration is 15 November. The camp is limited to 60 participants and registration will close before this date if this limit is reached.

 

---

2018 Council Elections – Applications Open

3 vacancies for Council Members are now open and will close on 31 January 2018.

For more information on these roles click here

The election will be via Postal Vote in February/March with the announcement made before the 2018 AGM at Easter.

---

2017 Auckland Champs

Challenge yourself on Counties Manukau’s unique karst terrain at the 2017 Auckland Orienteering Championships 18-19 November. Middle and Spring distances will be held among the rocky outcrops on Saturday 18 November. The Long distance takes place the following day (Sunday 19 November) on adjacent gully spur terrain.

Entries are open and more information can be found at www.cmoc.co.nz. Entries close Friday 3 November.
Enter here: https://entero.co.nz/evento.php?eventName=ac-2017

---

High Performance Update

The High Performance presentation at the ONZ Club Forum about revision of the High Performance Plan generated some lively and useful discussion. To a large extent this focussed on what can be done to improve the realization at junior level of the large step-up that is involved in going from being a top junior in New Zealand or Australia to performing with distinction at JWOC and, further into the future, at WOC. In particular it was widely agreed that there should be no imperative that a full team of 6 men and 6 women should be selected for JWOC, but that, instead, specific selection criteria should be applied.

Additionally, there was considerable agreement that there should probably be two JWOC trials in the period March-May, leading into the Pinestars-Bushrangers Test Match at Queen’s Birthday, and then on into JWOC in July. This would provide a solid programme around which JWOC aspirants could build sensible and appropriate ytraining programmes to ensure that they are ready for the high level of competition. the ready availability of cheaper airfares over the web makes this a realistic proposal, rather than assuming that travel needs to be booked several months in advance.

Some revision of the criteria for selction in National Squads is also under consideration. This arises from the realisation that with the vagaries of depth and strength of fields, some of the present criteria are actually relatively easy to achieve and do not necessaily give a realistic indication of standard.

More information on these revisions will appear in due course.

---

Event Liaison Update

Health and Safety.

The ONZ Safety Management Plan (SMP) has been produced. At its core is a Hazard and Risk Management (HARM) form which was presented briefly at the Club Presidents forum where the concept was broadly accepted. Hazards in our sport have been identified, assessed and  management strategies documented in a national Hazard register. Where hazards are significant they are listed on the Harm form, along with event data.

We are going to have the plan audited, and are conducting that process now.

Major Event Survey

Thanks to those who took the time to do the survey. We had about 300 responses from approximately 2000 email requests.
The general trends were;

• Most are in favour of a bias towards good areas for National champs, rather than a clubs’ ability to hold them.
• Event timing – no clear winner here. But holiday weekends got the thumbs up.
• Most are in favour of ONZ event managing (in some form) Major events to ease the burden on clubs.
• Broad ambivalence on NI and SI Champs, however comments suggest 3 area champs may have more support.
• Secondary School Champs. Most in support of leaving the timing as it is.

We will take a little time to analyse the results and consult widely if changes to the status quo are to be made.

---

ONZ Policy Updates

In 2014 ONZ introduced a new policy manual covering all aspects of orienteering business.  These policies were developed in consultation with members.  Each policy has a review date.  While some of these dates have passed, ONZ is now commencing an ongoing rolling review process of policies to ensure they are accurate, current and represent best practice while achieving the outcomes originally intended.

Because this process is going to be ongoing, ONZ is now providing notice to all clubs if they have any feedback, suggestions or comments on policies being reviewed, to please forward them to the General Manager in a timely manner.

A list of the policies to be reviewed first can be found on the ONZ website.

This list will be regularly updated so please ensure you continue to check out what is being reviewed.

---

Still Wanted … Orienteering Photos  …. we saw a few photographers at the recent National Champsionships

We are wanting good looking images that reflects orienteering in NZ to update our website.  We know lots of you do take photos of events etc and we’d love to use your photos on our webste.

To fit the ONZ website banner we need images which will fit the narrow band size 1366px x 304px. (or better e.g.  2732px x 600px or  5464px x 1200px)

If you have any images you are willing to share please send them to webmaster@orienteering.org.nz

---

Keeping you more informed

ONZ has updated its enewsletter database which now allows you to chose which areas are of special interest to you – such as High Performance, Technical, Mapping.

To update your email list Preferences, please Click Here.

We welcome your feedback at any time.

Our mailing address is:
gm@orienteering.org.nz