During the recently held National Operating Committee on Standards for Athletic Equipment (NOCSAE) Winter Board Meeting, the board agreed to allow NOCSAE licensees to once again attend the standards portion of the closed NOCSAE board meeting. Historically, the closed portion of the NOCSAE Board Meeting is when discussions on standards and standards changes take place.
Having NOCSAE licensees be able to attend the closed portion of the board meeting will maintain a transparent process where a licensee can feel free to have an open dialogue among industry peers to put forward the best standards and standards changes, said Gregg Hartley, SFIA Sports Standards Liaison and NOCSAE Board Member.
Also at the meeting, revisions for NOCSAE document 001-11m12 were not approved by the board. The document establishes Quality Assurance/Quality Control (QA/QC) requirements for all NOCSAE standards. A new revision is planned to be presented for approval at the June 2013 board meeting.
The overall NOCSAE QA/QC document still needs revisions and was not ready for approval at the Winter Board Meeting. SFIA will continue to work with NOCSAE to develop separate QA/QC requirements for non-catastrophic protection products such as football gloves and soccer shin guards, said Hartley.
More than 20 individuals representing 17 licensees participated in the meeting which featured the following agenda items: draft youth helmet standard status, revisions of NOCSAE documents, baseball/softball fielders headgear standard, womens lacrosse ball standard and third party certification and market policing.
