- Pay the Northland LOA membership fee
Please pay your $50 annual membership fee via Venmo to @northlandloa. If you need to pay by check, contact Damon Kocina at damonkocina@gmail.com.
- Join USA Lacrosse or the MSHSL
You can get insurance via USA Lacrosse or the MSHSL. If you plan to work spring MSHSL games, registering with the MSHSL will save you the $55 USA Lacrosse membership fee.MSHSL: Join or renew your membership as a boys lacrosse official at https://www.mshsl.org/officials-judges/officiating (registration link at bottom) for the 2021–22 school year. The MSHSL will inform you about their requirements, some of which satisfy Northland requirements below.USA Lacrosse: Join or renew your membership at https://www.usalacrosse.com/membership as a boys lacrosse official with Northland LOA. Please be sure to use the same email address with US Lacrosse as you use for all lacrosse-related activities. You must have an expiration date of 6/30/22 or later. To have full USA Lacrosse certification, you must complete several e-learning requirements on their website.
- Complete annual training
Training can be completed in-person (when available) or via live or recorded Zoom sessions. If you opt for a recorded Zoom session, you may need to complete a quiz on the session to get credit. See below for the training schedule. Training requirements depend on your years of experience working high school games:-
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- All returning officials must complete the “2022 HS and Youth Rule Changes” and “2022 Northland Rules and Mechanics Points of Emphasis” sessions (roughly 2 hours)
- First-year MSHSL officials (0 years varsity experience) must complete the “Three-Person Mechanics” course (2 hours) and do an on-field training (1 hour).
- Officials with 1–4 years of prior varsity experience must complete training sessions on “Multiple-Minute Penalties,” “Effective use of Play-On,” and “Calling Offside and Sub Infractions.”
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Be sure to put classroom sessions on your personal calendar and block the time of those sessions in ArbiterSports.com (so you don’t get assigned games that conflict with your classroom sessions). A full listing of the training schedule is posted on the Training Schedule page as well as in the PDF linked below.
- Check uniform and equipment
See https://www.northlandloa.org/uniforms-equipment/ for information about uniform expectations and requirements. Please check your gear and replace any worn, stained, or damaged items. You can order your gear from anywhere, but our official supplier is https://zebrawear.com/
- Complete concussion training (must be done before on-field training or working games)
By state law, officials must complete concussion training. If you are an MSHSL official, you will do this through your MSHSL ArbiterSports.com account. If you are not an MSHSL official, you must take the course at https://nfhslearn.com/courses/concussion-in-sports-2
- Read and sign the independent contractor agreement
Please read and sign the independent contractor agreement.
- Set up your Arbiter account
You should already have an Arbiter account. If you do not, contact lacrosse@yourassignment.net immediately. Make sure you have blocks set for any time you could not or would not accept a game if one were assigned (e.g., when you will be sleeping, at work, at school, on vacation, in Northland training classes). See https://www.northlandloa.org/arbiter/ for full instructions on setting up your account.
- Disclose conflicts
Send an email to lacrosse@yourassignment.net with the names of any teams (e.g., Springfield HS varsity) for which someone might think you have a conflict of interest (e.g., you played or coached in that team’s system in the past 5 years) or for which you have a definite conflict of interest (e.g., you or a close relative work for the team’s school, you have a relative playing on or coaching the team).
- USA Lacrosse professional development
USA Lacrosse now requires that all officials complete a short course on rules changes. Log into your US Lacrosse account and click https://tinyurl.com/USAL-Prof-Dev to complete it.
- Study rules and mechanics (prior to exams)
You will receive am NFHS rule book (from USAL or MSHSL), the 2022 youth rules, and 2-person and/or 3-person mechanics manuals. Use these resources to help you prepare for your exams.
- MSHSL or USA Lacrosse HS rules exam
You must pass the MSHSL Rules Exam to work varsity MSHSL games. You will take that exam through your MSHSL Central Hub account in ArbiterSports.com in late March/early April.
If you do not intend to work varsity MSHSL games, you can complete the USA Lacrosse exam instead. Go to https://myaccount.usalacrosse.com/user/profile and click “Login,” then click the “Menu” on the top right and select “E-Learning.” Click “Catalog,” then “Official Education and Development,” then choose the “Exams” option and click “2022 Boys’ High School Rules Exam.”
- Youth rules exam
If you are a USA Lacrosse member, you can take the youth rules test (follow the same instructions as for the HS test to find that exam). Remember this test uses USA Lacrosse rules and not any MN variations. If you are not a USA Lacrosse member, take the Northland LOA Youth Rules Test at
https://tinyurl.com/NorthlandYouthTest2022 (this test will not be available until sometime in January, as USA Lacrosse has not yet published its 2022 youth rules).
- Final steps
When you have completed all the above steps, email russhunt@frontier.com with the subject line
“Returning Adult Training Completed.” Send the email from the same account you are using for your USL membership/Arbiter account and include your full name in the body of the email.