They actually want me back

An Article about Ski School Staffing

October 2008 By Clark Williams

Every year usually around September when it has started to get cool, the letter announcing my mountain’s instructor rehiring clinic arrives. This is a good sign for two reasons, first and foremost it is tangible evidence that the season is approaching, second that my mountain has forgotten/forgiven my transgressions of last year and is giving me another shot.

 I think most mountains have rehire clinics in the fall. The idea is to get all the instructors together (not necessarily a good idea) to make sure they are all still capable of, standing, talking , nobody has violated their parole, most can form whole sentences…The off- season can be hard on some instructors. Many of them seem to just wander off after the last run. What happens to them during the off season is often a mystery, and we have learned not to ask a lot of questions. That is not to say that all instructors are short a couple of chromosomes, it’s just that they are an eclectic group brought together by their common love of skiing and the quest for a semi-free (as in you have to work here to get it) season pass.

Now a few points about ski instructors.  Trying to get them all going in the same direction is not unlike trying to herd cats. They are often very individualistic, and much more interested in hearing what they have to say then what anybody else has to say. Keep in mind that we are talking about a group of over 250 instructors. Things must be done quickly and for short periods of time. Not to say that everyone’s attention span is short, it’s just that they are at a ski area for the first time in five months and all thoughts are on skiing, not on things like how to fill out an accident report or a W4, or where the fire extinguishers are. Instructors come in all shapes and sizes as well as at least two genders and ages from 14 to 80+. That’s right 80+, one fellow from my mountain is 80+ years old, and the son of a gun skis better then me. I have to admit that every year I’m eager to see if he’s back, because if he is I know I have 20+ years of skiing left. On the other end of the spectrum we have the 14/15 year old junior instructors. These hormone riddled critters are much more interested in one another than anything else. Add it all to the mix and the Director and crew have their day cut out for them.

So here we all are, sitting in our places, having been freshly deloused and fingerprinted, eagerly awaiting the end of this event and the beginning of winter. You will notice that this is a RE-hire clinic which means that we have all been through this before and pretty much know the routine. So once everybody has done their social networking we are ready to have lunch, get our company jackets, and leave. However that’s not how it works. In the morning there are all the updates, policy changes, parking rules (very important) commitment reminders etc. In the afternoon is the semi-dreaded chair evac drill. I say semi-dreaded because a lot depends on the weather. If it is a reasonably nice day people will volunteer to ride the lift up a few feet so they may be gently lowered to the ground via a rope attached to a tiny swing seat. However, if the weather is what it usually is, rainy, windy (remember this is October/November) getting people on the lifts takes a little more effort. Especially the more experienced folks. Setting on a hard plank seat without the reward of skiing or the comfort of at least moving through the scenery, is not all that fun. For those of you lucky enough to not have been involved in or witnessed a chair evac it can look a little scary. A modern lift can cost millions of dollars, has backup power and many safety systems, but if it all goes wrong the process of getting your butt off the chair can look amazingly primitive. It starts with a hockey puck. Someone throws a hockey puck with a string attached to it over the lift cable. That process sounds simple enough, but this can end up being the longest part of the whole evac.  I have seen these pucks end up in trees, tangled around the wrong wire, fall short a dozen or so times. It can be very frustrating for everybody, and the poor shmuck trying to throw this thing in just the right spot can get pulled faster then a major league pitcher in a playoff game. I should mention that the regular patrollers are much more adept at this. It’s us once-a-year folks that seem to have all the trouble. Once the puck and string actually make it over the lift cable the rope can be drawn up and the actual getting off of the chair part can begin. It takes a bit of faith to slide your butt off a structurally sound, albeit immobile, chair 20+ feet in the air, onto a little platter sized device attached to a rope which is attached to two or three people who may or may not like you, people who have not done this since last year. I should note here that we have never dropped or otherwise harmed anyone during this exercise. I have, however, heard stories of a two hundred+ pound man being lowered by a much lighter man causing the lighter to become airborne, but due to the semi-quick actions of other instructors adding their ballast to the mix no one was harmed.

 Once the last cold and wet volunteer is semi-gently lowered to the ground we all stagger back inside. All that is left to do is pick up our company jacket (assuming you have the deposit money). After that we start wandering to the parking lot, maybe with a little glance back at our mountain, wondering how long it will be ‘til it’s covered in white.