Does WDA still exist and putting on trials/shows? - Page 9

Yeah, I never cared much about WDA as I've always been a USCA member. But that is pretty horrible. Went back and read a few of the threads about WDA and USCA from a few years back...damn this forum used to have some big whigs on it.

nothing will change until the organizations hold up to their standards. The standards are pretty clear and should be universal. NO EXCEPTIONS. What must a dog acquire to be IPO? Then every judge that steps on the field should require the dog qualify. The dog does't cheat or lie. The Judge is the final word and signs off as such. If Judges cheat they should be removed. There are standards put forth by the SV and the judges they send to the competitions are certified by the SV. If they cheat, the organization should remove them. There are criteria in place for IPO, show ratings (who qualifies for) The SV should be held responsible to police the judges that allow the demise of the standard.

And Buba, the judges most often at the events are SV. They should be required to uphold the standard of the SV. Otherwise they should be dismissed.

The SV should be investigating the Judges that place dogs outside of the standards. That would indicate something fishy. The German Government should be watching these guys for money they are not "declaring" and probably not paying taxes on. Good luck.

To be fair, the apparent US experiences with dodgy
grading by SV judges, or anything similar happening
in Germany, does not seem to be a universal problem.
SV judges who come to the UK from any other nation
seem to stick to all the rules, usually. The UK GSD
community does not apparently have much difficulty
with "night trials" and suchlike. Though it is true some
owners have had bad experiences with some German
trainers. Think we as a nation are getting wiser to that
and anyone now daft enough to pay large amounts of
dosh to anyone claiming they will PROPERLY train a
dog in IPO for you in a fortnight almost deserves to be
'had over' !!!

I want to make it clear that those who left WDA are not spreading lies, blaming the organization for why they left. The WDA was a healthy, inclusive organization as was possible before Yee and company took control. I had read all the show rules before attending NASS in Chicago and I was shocked when Dan Yee decided to change the rules on the spot. As Keith said previously, Yee changed the rules to exclude competition for the kennel group. The rules were also changed for the top American bred trophies. The incentive to have your dogs as being declared the top American bred and to use on your advertising that you have the top American kennel as declared by German judges was apparently too great in this case. And Dan Yee was willing to go to great lengths to help, at the expense of the organization. The demise of the WDA was solely due to corruption at the top in my opinion. The board of directors created an environment that was impossible to tolerate as the mass exodus proves. Bavarianwagon, I usually agree with your posts and you may have been making a general point, but in this case you are wrong.

My point wasn’t that the organization will fail due to the leadership, or that people will leave an organization due to the leadership. I was speaking to the training and the sport of Schutzhund in general. If you left WDA and joined USCA…you’re still training and trialing just under a different organization. The people that are blaming USCA or WDA for the reason why they quit training Schutzhund all together...all have other issues that I guarantee you have nothing to do with the organization. You can easily train and title dogs without being a member of either organization. You can easily train while working with a small group of people, that have no affiliation, and just go to a trial in your area when you're ready. To blame the environment set by a couple of people at the highest level, that more than likely doesn't stretch to your local Schutzhund area, is a cover up for other issues you're having with your own training. The national organization has very little to do with most of our decisions to train and doesn’t affect the success or failure of the majority of their members.

Schutzhund and the German Shepherd Dog breed as a whole is not affected by the failure of WDA. Although maybe annoying and disappointing to some, there are guaranteed to be other options to train and to trial. To those that stuck with WDA, they might’ve lost a little bit of time but in the end, the local training clubs don’t NEED an affiliation to train…they only do to trial. If your club lost affiliation (which technically none did due to GSDCA) you could still take your dog and trial elsewhere. To 99% of club members, the failure of the national organization doesn’t make any difference as long as their TD and helper are still showing up to training on the weekends.

@ Bavarian Wagon

But people DO need a parent club, of some kind, for one important reason, in order to maintain a valid scorebook, that is accepted by the venues in which they participate for trialing and titling purposes (GSDCA, SV, DVG, etc.). It is my understanding that a person needs to be a both member of a local club and a national club member, in order to maintain a valid USCA scorebook. So, in this kind of situation, its a high likeyhood that some people whom are WDA members, may not have a nearby local USCA club to latch onto.

Based on personal experience, I know these people would need to go on a pretty wild "goose chase" to solve this problem in a satisfactory manner.  Your recomendation to "stay off the grid" is actually much tougher than I think you realize, IF, that indivduals ultimate goal is to eventually trial and earn titles, while maintaining a valid scorebook, even if, its only at the noncompetitive, local level.  Contrary to belief, few people deeply involved in the sport, currently, are able to give advice on how to proceed, BEYOND A BASIC LEVEL, because they simply do not know the various nuances of what is allowed versus what is not, within the overlapping rules and agreements between the SV, VDH, WUSV, FCI, GSDCA and the AWDF .

Well…the scorebooks are still valid as long as GSDCA is alive and well. The club can turn from GSDCA/WDA to USCA or DVG or whatever else they want. If the people at the lowest level are still willing to train, then they can definitely find a way to do it. The failure of the organization doesn’t remove the knowledge and experience of the people that are running the individual local clubs. For a while, there would be (if the organization completely folded) some issues with trialing due to the lack of (in theory) certified judges and helpers, but that would work itself out.

There are countless people that today don’t train in an affiliated club at all. “Pay for play” is all the rage and a lot of helpers lean that way rather than being part of a club. The money is just better.

What we see constantly on this forum and everywhere else is how experience is all that matters and actual accomplishments and affiliation is constantly being diminished as an important thing to look for. Those that need the help to train, can find it if they look hard enough. Those that claim to know what they’re doing, shouldn’t have the need to search out affiliated people to work with. If you know what you want, you should be able to explain it to a half way competent helper and make it work. If you know what you’re doing with tracking/obedience…you don’t actually need anyone else.

Yes…to find training it might be difficult because clubs are far apart, full, don’t advertise, ect. But I’m going off the assumption that there is already an established club there. If you have a group of people you’re already training with, the national club affiliation means little. You are correct that in order to achieve some of the more intricate things within an organization it can be confusing, but that’s when you need to just read the rules yourself and not rely on other people.

@Bavarian Wagon, yes, what remains of the WDA can become affiliated with the GSDCA, USCA or DVG, etc. (I actually talked a little about the WDA's other options earlier in this thread), BUT, the transferring of a scorebook and its validity across IPO clubs is dependent, in many cases, on an individuals concurrent local and national club membership. Its possible that WDA scorebooks may not even be valid WUSV scorebooks at this time, so recording recently earned titles in those scorebooks, post break up with the GSDCA, is risky and is not something that I would recommend anyone do, whom has a WDA scorebook. No one from the WUSV nor the GSDCA has made any public statement regarding the matter.  So, as it stands now, WDA members may need to transfer the existing titles, noted in their dogs WDA scorebook, to a GSDCA, DVG, USCA or other AWDF scorebook.  USCA is the most expensive option because it requires someone to pay both local and national club memerbship dues to maintain a valid scorebook.

 

To Susie and Hundmutter, my earlier comment about the WDA joining the IRO, in order to preserve judge and helper certifications, is based upon the IRO having an agreement with FCI and the SV.  If the WDA had officially joined the IRO and gotten their IPO judges certified by both FCI and the IRO, their judging and helper certifications would have been preserved, in some manner, through FCI, at the very least.  I will admit, it is unclear how the SV and WUSV would have handled such an occurance, BUT, the precedent for cross certified IPO/FCI/IRO judges exists already.  Making such a strategic move would have forced the SV and the WUSV, at the very least, to have a board meeting in order to create a new policy specifying how they would deal with the WDA's newly certifed FCI/IRO judges, that previosly only had WUSV certification.  Under such circumstances, simply ignoring it and pretending that those judges and helpers no longer existed would not have been an option for the SV/WUSV and an official policy statement would have to be made.  In my opinon thats a better gamble to take, than any of the other ideas that the WDA board has come up with so far.