by Rich McLaughlin, PSIA/AASI Intermountain President

What an interesting winter this was! Great snow in all of our resorts with great participation in our events, and great cooperation between resorts when things fell apart for a week. Records were broken again in some resorts for visitations. It just seems to continue to climb. Amazing!

I want to send out a huge “Thank You” to Brighton Resort for hosting our annual Spring Clinic event. The event was moderately attended. The snow was phenomenal — eighteen inches on Sunday morning! I have heard nothing but great comments for the clinics and their leaders. Kirstie, Vicki, and Kathy pulled off the coordination of the event, taking care of all the small stuff and the big stuff. It is a lot of work and takes special dedication on their part. For that I am truly grateful.

by Kent Lundell

The following are highlights from the spring ASEA Board of Directors meeting.
Chair’s Report
PSIA/AASI’s relationship with industry partners is stronger than ever and continues to be a major focus moving forward. Visitations to divisions last season has helped re-establish trust and fostered better communication, collaboration and consolidation (three Cs).

CEO Update – We must double our commitment to beginner conversion and evaluate ways adventure and fun are delivered at the beginner/novice zone.

Marketing – Podcasts deliver more education to members and received over 12,000 downloads, members prefer information in email form, and new campaigns are meant to recruit members and advertise PSIA/AASI to the public.

by Mark Nakada, PSIA/AASI Intermountain Children’s Manager

Aloha! I hope you’re having a fantastic summer!
Season Recap
Although the Children’s Specialist (CS) program continues to be well-received, the program’s growth was flat this past season compared to previous years. In analyzing trends, we’re still only seeing a 31 percent conversion rate of Level 1 members into CS1. If you are new to PSIA/AASI, and want to increase your earning potential, please consider taking one of our valuable educational programs. For the 2017/18 season, we will continue to offer a number of Children’s clinics and lectures as well as CS events, and can accommodate pop-up events with advance notice. Please contact the office for more details.

by Cookie Hale

Skiing and helping someone learn to ski is a “whole body” experience that encompasses our emotions, our minds, our spirits as well as our bodies. It is an adventure deep into the human soul where you make value connections with another being. Skiing transports us to the “now” entirely, and we share that now with another being. Learning in this magical now, is an experience that transcends the physical, yet is authored by the physical.

“Teaching” skiing is not just about skiing, it’s about learning more about who people are, including ourselves, and how we work, play, explore and learn together. Any system of learning and facilitating learning must be grounded in an understanding of our social and learning context as well as the technical aspects of skiing.

by Charles A. Rodger and Stephen Helfenbein

We are excited to announce that the Ed College event, one of the Intermountain Division’s oldest annual traditions, is scheduled at Solitude Mountain Resort Dec. 9-10. The IMD board, the Alpine certification staff and the Alpine education staff are very, very grateful to the Solitude management group for their active support of this important and valuable IMD activity.

A list and description of the clinics available for Alpine instructors is attached below. The clinics are intended to help you kick-start your season by reviewing the familiar and introducing you to the new, not to mention boosting your educational credit for the year.

by Stephen Helfenbein, Alpine Education Manager

Hello and best wishes to you all for a great summer! Here’s a quick update on relevant education developments in our division and nationally.
Education Leadership Council
I am part of a new national group called the Education Leadership Council and we recently met at the national office in Lakewood, CO for our first face-to-face meeting. The group consists of educational leaders from each of the nine divisions, the coaches of the four National teams (Dave Lawrence, Scott Anfang, Geoff Krill, and Michael Rogan), Dave Schuiling (PSIA Director of Education) and Jeb Boyd (National Teams Manager).

by Charles A. Rodger

It may be summer, and by now your skis and ski equipment are in storage, your thoughts turning to hiking, biking, barbeques around a pool/park/back garden with friends and family, but the work of your elected board representatives, office staff, education staff and discipline managers goes on.

Prior to the recent board meeting, president Rich organized a day of “giving back” where board members assembled various pieces of furniture/ playground equipment and painted equipment for our friends at the NAC. Look for photos on the website.

Searching for a new place to teach? Look no further!

by Evan Ricks

Serving on the board of directors for PSIA-I for the past three years has been a great experience. For the past 25 years I, like many of you, was content to sit back and be part of PSIA-I in membership only. I went to the required events to keep my training and certification current but other than that my participation in the organization was really lacking. I had the opportunity to be elected to the Intermountain Board of Directors three years ago.

I was to represent eastern Idaho and northern Utah resorts (Region II). During the past three years I have learned of the many hours and effort that takes place behind the scenes by the board of directors on behalf of the members to keep the division healthy. I was able to interact with board members and program managers who put a lot of thought into helping members. There is a lot of discussion that goes on in hope of providing members the best possible training for certification and clinics. As a parting member of the board, let me share a few thoughts and experiences I’ve had.

by Charles A. Rodger

At the outset, I will be charitable and point out from my limited experience as a PSIA/AASI Intermountain Board of Directors member, that the activities of the board are very poorly understood. There are perhaps several contributing factors to this inconvenient truth, but less well understood are the activities of the office staff and a very small group known internally as the IMD Executive Committee.

Quick, can anyone (outside the IMD staff) name the IMD Executive Committee members?

I suggest that the president might be a good (correct) guess on the part of most people; as all of you would (should!) know from the recent e-blast and from the web page, Rich McLaughlin was recently reelected to a second term as president.

by Charles A. Rodger

The world may be a dark place if you happen to read some of our newspapers, or listen to the various media presentations. By some accounts the world may be coming to an end if huge bits of Antarctica continue to split (the news of the Antarctica split prompted several FB’ers to respond with “sorry to hear about your split – you OK hon?”).
But in our Intermountain Division ski world, there are lots of reasons to celebrate!

Awards/Recognition
We may be a small division with only 2500 members, but we certainly have some very bright stars!

Instructors of the Year
Membership Milestones

Spring Clinic 2017 Silent Auction Donors

 

All 2016-17 Certifications and Accreditations