The SFMA Conference Education Committee has put together an exciting and informative education program for the 2024 Conference in Daytona Beach, Florida. Each month, speakers will be featured to highlight a sample of what will be offered to attendees at the conference. This month’s featured speakers are Brad Jakubowski and Derek Hollanitsch.
Brad Jakubowski has been in the Green Industry for over 30 years and has been active with the SFMA for over 20 years. He currently teaches for Penn State University and enjoys working with sports field managers at all levels. He is excited to see how much the association has grown and treasures the opportunities to see it continue.
Brad will be presenting two presentations at the SFMA Daytona Beach Conference:
Back to Basics: Understanding Weather Concepts and Making Weather-Based Decisions
This interactive seminar will help sports field managers to understand basic meteorological concepts and usefully apply them to their own situations when trying to make the best day-to-day management decisions possible. They will learn how to maximize labor and resources and how to handle the stress of impending weather on game-time decisions.
Learning Outcomes
- To identify and utilize critical weather information impacting their facility.
- To maximize labor and resources by learning how to schedule projects and daily work.
- Learn how to handle the stress of making game-time decisions based on impending weather impacting games at that moment.
Total Toolbox Troubleshooting for Irrigation: Sights, Sounds, Shovels and Circuits!
How many of you have been stuck in a muddy hole trying to put things together when you realize the part doesn’t fit or is just the wrong part? Or a portion of your system simply won’t operate? In this hands-on and interactive workshop, attendees will learn the fundamentals of troubleshooting an irrigation system before and after we start digging! Attendees will learn the fundamentals of irrigation fittings and parts and use multimeters to identify electrical problems with controllers, solenoids, and wiring. You are also encouraged to bring your own scenarios we can discuss in an open forum!
Learning Outcomes
- The fundamentals of troubleshooting an irrigation system before and after they start digging!
- The fundamentals of irrigation fittings and parts and how to best utilize them.
- To use multimeters to identify electrical problems with controllers, solenoids, and wiring to minimize system down time.
Derek Hollanitsch is a 36-year employee of the City of Saint Paul Parks and Recreation Division. He is currently a maintenance crew leader for the Municipal Athletics Department where he oversees the maintenance of various sporting facilities for youth and adult programming. The City of Saint Paul has a combination of natural and synthetic surfaces used for baseball, softball, soccer, football, lacrosse, ice hockey and broomball. Saint Paul has diversified recreational offerings to include futsal, top spin and takraw. Derek has been an active member in Minnesota’s Parks Sports Field Management Association. He just completed his chapter presidency in 2023.
Parks and Recreation: An Overview of Situational Maintenance Activities
The presentation will highlight situations encountered in facility maintenance. This will include videos and pictures with narration related to challenges hosting a large-scale event. The attendees will see the before, during, and aftereffects of the event.
Learning Outcomes
* Challenges related to maintaining facilities in a Northern climate.
* Showing how proper maintenance techniques can ensure safe playing surfaces.
* Importance of providing equitable recreational opportunities for a diverse community.
2024 Conference Education Recordings
Can’t make it to the 2024 SFMA Conference in person? We have your continuing education needs covered. Recorded education sessions will be available for viewing the same day as the live presentation through an Online Library. Sessions will be audio recorded and synchronized with PowerPoint presentations. The Library will be accessible on portable devices such as iPad, iPhone, and other tablet devices.
The full conference package is $149. Single sessions are $20.
Conference attendees have free, unlimited, lifetime access to the Online Library of recorded sessions. Qualifying attendees will receive a link in a separate email from SFMA with access information.