Judge Advisor

The Judge Advisor leads the judging team, and has many responsibilities. He or she does not judge teams, but rather oversees the judging process and judging quality for the tournament. The Judge Advisor also ensures that FLL Global Standards for Judging and Awards are followed.

Before a tournament, the Judge Advisor is responsible for doing or overseeing for the following:

Recruiting judges
Training judges
Confirming judging assignments
Coordinating schedules for judging sessions
Ensuring that plenty of judging supplies are available

At the start of a tournament and during the evaluation portion of the judging process, the Judge Advisor is responsible for the following:

Reviewing expectations for the day and the schedule with judges
Reviewing the philosophy of FLL with all the judges
Identifying any conflicts of interest on the judging panel, and ensuring that judges with a relationship with a certain team do not take part in deliberations and award determinations for that team
Facilitating a pre-tournament meeting
Answering any last minute questions from judges or teams
Acting as a liaison between teams and judges when questions arise
Overseeing all judging areas
Confirming award winner determination deadline with the Event Manager
Collecting rubric sheets from judges, and checking them for appropriate comments and feedback

For the Deliberations and Awards portion of the process, the Judge Advisor is responsible for the following:

Coordinating with Head Judges (when assigned) for each category to monitor their activities and progress

-Head Judges supervise deliberations for the awards in that category and coordinate their judging group’s activities with the Judge Advisor

Checking with the Volunteer Coordinator and Head Referee for additional input on teams that may be helpful during award deliberations
Working with judges to determine which teams are called back, if call-backs are used

- Working with Event Manager to schedule call-back interviews

Moderating the judging panel's Champion's Award determination and all final award Deliberations
Overseeing equitable award distribution
Receiving the final Robot Performance ranking from the scorekeeper

Entering the team name and number into Awards Ceremony script for the Robot Performance awards

With Robot Design judges, assessing final performance rankings for Robot Design awards, and questioning if Robot Performance results contradict results from the interview process
Preparing list of award winners for Event Manager and Emcee, including full award description, judges’ comments, and team name and number
Presenting final awards list for Awards Ceremony script to Event Manager
Discussing Awards Ceremony presentation procedures with judges
Directing and coordinating judge participation in presentation of awards

At the conclusion of the event, the Judge Advisor is responsible for providing feedback from the judges to all the teams. Feedback must be provided using the FLL Rubrics. Judges use these forms to evaluate teams and annotate them with any additional constructive feedback. The Judge Advisor would then review the forms for appropriate comments, and then provide these forms to the teams. It is suggested that the Judge Advisor retain a copy of these completed evaluations in case any questions arise at a later date.