ISIA News 2024_02 (link to download newsletter)

Dear ISIA Members, dear Colleagues and Friends,

we are going towards the end of a very hot northern summer and a snowy winter season in the southern hemisphere. We want to give you now some updates about the past and future activities of ISIA.

New ISIA Office Secretary

The ISIA office has a new collaborator, that will be taking care of the ordinary administration and will support the organisation of the ISIA events.
Your contact person will be Mrs. Nadezda Rodionova, some of you already met her in Livigno. Mrs. Rodionova is Latvian and speaks several languages. You will be able to deal with her in German and English.

2024 ISIA Assembly of the Delegates – 14th-17th of June, Livigno, Italy

Last June, 26 Member Nations attended the ISIA Round table and the annual Assembly of the Delegates that were successfully hosted in Livigno, by the Italian Member AMSI. The event, strongly wanted by AMSI to celebrate their reunion to the ISIA community, did show the commitment of the Italian Member to ISIA. The ISIA Board want to express their gratefulness to AMSI and their President Luciano Stampa and Vice President Robert Demetz for the support they gave for the Assembly preparation and for their presence and their contribute in Livigno.

Here you find some notes about the most relevant outcomes of the two days meeting.

ISIA Round table – 15th of June
• Presentation by R. Demetz on AMSI and the Italian bodies ruling Snowsports instructors in Italy. The good presentation from R. Demetz highlighted the different competences of AMSI, Collegio Nazionale, FISI.
• Debate on new associations PSIC/PSIE. The ISIA Member CSIA presented the case of PSIC, new founded Canadian association directly competing against the ISIA Members, that has been followed by the foundation in Europe of PSIE. The discussion has been converging on general disapproval from the Members to such initiatives. Furthermore, we can add that, as per ISIA Code of conduct approved by the AD 2022 in Sexten, the Snowsports instructors “are required… to behave loyally towards the profession and the professional associations” (Par. 1.6). The foundation of such associations claiming to deliver professional qualifications and competing directly against the ISIA Members, is infringing the ISIA Code of conduct, allowing therefore ISIA and its Members to undertake suspension actions against those trainers and instructors that are actively cooperating with such parallel bodies.
• Pilot Project on the Blue Stamp for the Blue level. Dr Blaz Lesnik, President of the Slovenian member ZUTS, presented the project of the Association to introduce an ISIA national Blue Stamp according to the Blue level of the ISIA Pyramid. The project was successful in Slovenia, and it has
been a good basis for the discussion and consequent vote during the AD the next day.

Assembly of the Delegates – 16th of June
The Minutes of the AD are ready and will be online soon and you will be able to have an extended overview of the outcomes of the Assembly.
• The Delegates have agreed about the format of the Stamp for the Blue Level of the ISIA Pyramid. The template has to follow precise requirements that are modelled according to the example already applied in Spain by our Member AEPEDI that is shown here: the ISIA Logo on the blue stamp must be the 50% smaller than the national logo.
• The most important news is Austria rejoining the ISIA Community. The Assembly and the Board welcomed VSLV and their representatives, the President Conner Berchtold, Manfred Meusburger, Charly Schuster. The Delegates approved VSLV as the representative Association of the Austrian
Snowsports Instructors. The Board is pleased with the result achieved that is further strengthening the ISIA community.

ISIA forum and Interski

A first ISIA Regional Forum took place in Japan, last April 2024. Following such event, we have received expression of interest for ISIA Regional Forums in 2025 from Argentina, Italy and USA. Further information to the whole Membership will follow if and when the countries willing to host will
finalise their application. The next ISIA World Forum will be in Vail 2027 in coordination with Interski.

Work of the Technical Commission

Following the outcome of the ISIA AD in Livigno, the ISIA Technical Commission is now working on the calendar for the Controls of the Member Nations for the season 2025. The nations to be inspected will receive soon communication from the TC. Please note that, as per Inspection rules, nations are requested to communicate any change in their education. See inspection rules attached for further details.
The TC has also updated the inspection documents, that are including inspection rules, application forms for inspections, forms to announce the ISIA Tests, the evaluation forms for ISIA Test and courses. The updated documents will be soon available on the website. They can also be requested to the office at any time.
The Technical Test expert group which was already engaged in the change of the reference FIS point for the ISIA Test (approved by the AD in Livigno), will discuss the Technical Test related topics as requested in the AD. If you want to appoint further experts for this group, please write to the TC. We note that the news about the ISIA Tests are always coming very late: we kindly ask those nations willing to organise the ISIA Test to promptly notify the office and the TC, so that the dates could be published in time on the ISIA website.

New ISIA Card format and Digital Card

The new format for the ISIA Card has been presented in Livigno.
ISIA is now taking care of delivering the new Card, with the aim of guaranteeing consistency in terms of appearance and print quality over the Members. The new format is available only through the ISIA Office. If your Members want to have the new Card format, please contact the office, we will give you the instructions about the needed data for printing.
We kindly ask you to coordinate the orders to optimise the print and delivery costs. The new card should be progressively substituted by a digital card. The Board is looking into a first pilot project to be delivered as soon as possible, in cooperation with the Finnish company Cardu and the ISIA DB provider Forty-seven. If you are interested to be part of the pilot project please notify the office as soon as possible and you will be contacted as soon as the involved companies are ready to start.

Data maintenance of the ISIA DB
The ISIA database has now 34’491 registered snowsports instructors. Though, only 9’126 are showing as up to date. We kindly ask all the Members to make sure that they update regularly the info about their instructors and their qualifications. Your cooperation is fundamental to strength the DB credibility around the World. The ISIA DB is indeed a strong asset, that allows to track and validate the Professional Snowsports instructors worldwide: this service is essential for the whole Snowsports community and it is enhancing the credibility of the ISIA Members and their education path. Your collaboration is then crucial and it is of benefit for the whole ISIA Community. Please note, that the future shift from physical to digital card will rely exclusively on the info in the ISIA DB: those instructors that have the right to obtain the ISIA Card but are not UpToDate in the DB, in future will not be able to receive their digital card.

Please do not hesitate to contact us in case you need any further information. We wish you a great end of season and a good start of Fall season for the Northern hemisphere Membersand a fantastic Spring for those in the South.

Thank you and best regards.

Dr. Vittorio Caffi                                        Dr. Valentin Kiedaisch

President                                                  Vicepresident Europe