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Make your voice heard by taking a minute to vote online at uspa.org/election or fill out and mail in the paper ballot in the October issue of Parachutist! USPA Headquarters must receive all paper ballots or electronic votes no later than 5 p.m. EST, Friday October 29, 2021. 

Members may vote one time only. Vote for the Future of Your USPA! 

Voting has begun for the 2022-2024 USPA Board of Directors general election. All 22 seats on the board are up for election, with 19 members vying for the eight USPA National Director slots and 17 members total running for USPA Regional Director in 14 different regions. The election for your board of directors runs October 1-29, 2021. 
 
Visit uspa.org/election and log in to review candidate bios and vote! All USPA members with an email address on file with Headquarters will also receive reminder emails through the end of October or until a vote is registered. Members may vote one time only. USPA Headquarters must receive all paper ballots or electronic votes no later than 5 p.m. EST, Friday, October 29, 2021. 
 
Have your voice heard and vote today! 

In 1952, PCA issued the very first A license to Lew Sanborn of Massachusetts. Almost 70 years and 100,000 licenses later, Jeff Huang of Wainan, China, has earned A-100000. Huang made his first jump in November 2018 and jumps at a drop zone in Inner Mongolia.

With 47 jumps under his belt, Jeff is happy to enjoy fun jumping. He's working toward 100 skydives at the moment, but has his sights set on freeflying and wingsuiting. His favorite part of the sport is the fun and supportive community, both at his home DZ and worldwide. When he’s not skydiving, Jeff enjoys playing computer games.

The USPA Membership Services Committee is currently seeking nominations for three of its service awards: the Lifetime Achievement Award (a maximum of one recipient annually), the Gold Medal for Meritorious Service (up to three recipients annually) and the Regional Achievement Award (up to five recipients annually).

Nominations may be completed online at uspa.org/nominate.

Award criteria and complete nomination instructions are in the Skydiver’s Information Manual Section 8-1. When submitting nominations, nominators must:

a. Identify the nominee, including address and telephone number and the nominator name, phone and email. (The latter is helpful to the committee if questions arise during the review process.)

b. Prepare the citation using 30 words or fewer, capturing the essence of the achievement for which the nominee’s name has been submitted.

c. In 100 words or fewer, give complete, concise details justifying the award to the nominee, with pertinent background information to assist the committee.

Please complete nominations by August 13 so that USPA Headquarters staff has a chance to organize them prior to the summer USPA Board of Directors meeting that starts on August 27 in Cincinnati, Ohio.

The USPA Membership Services Committee is currently seeking nominations for three of its service awards: the Lifetime Achievement Award (a maximum of one recipient annually), the Gold Medal for Meritorious Service (up to three recipients annually) and the Regional Achievement Award (up to five recipients annually).

Members can download the award criteria and complete nomination instructions in the Skydiver’s Information Manual Section 8-1. According to the SIM, when submitting nominations, nominators must:

A. Identify the nominee, including address and telephone number.

B. Prepare the citation in 30 words or less capturing the essence of the achievement for which the nominee’s name hasbeen submitted.

C. In 100 words or less, give complete, concise details justifying the award to the nominee, with pertinent background information to assist the committee.”

Please submit nominations by June 30 so that USPA Headquarters staff has a chance to organize them prior to the summer USPA Board of Directors meeting that starts on July 10 in Nashville, Tennessee. Achievement and Service Awards Nomination Form is available for download at uspa.org under the Awards section of the Membership tab. Members may send nominations either via email to Director of Membership Services Stephanie Seidel at sseidel@uspa.org or by mail to USPA Director of Membership Services, 5401 Southpoint Centre Blvd., Fredericksburg, VA 22407.

You asked, we listened! Finally, you can now renew your membership and ratings online at the same time with one payment! Although USPA will continue to accept the paper renewal forms for some time, you now have another option at your fingertips, accessible even on your smartphone! USPA released the online rating renewal functionality this past month, and several members have already enjoyed this new feature. Here’s how it works:

Part One: Verification and Tracking of Individual Requirements

For each rating, there are several requirements a rating holder must meet each year. Rating renewal requirements are now verified individually and can be tracked as they happen. According to the rating they hold, current S&TAs, instructors, examiners and judges are now able to log in and verify other rating holders for the following: PRO; coach; and AFF, static-line, IAD and tandem instructor. (You cannot verify your own ratings.) This part of online rating renewals is the first step for members to renew online with their membership. Each requirement is verified and tracked separately so that members can get requirements verified as they happen and collect all of them for when they are ready to renew.

Managing their ratings from the Credentials tab of the user profile, verifiers can view the individual requirements they have verified for others. Likewise, members can view renewal requirements with valid dates that have been verified for their ratings. When they have all of the requirements collected for a specific rating, a “Requirements Complete” indication is present in their profile. They will be able to add the ratings that are ready for renewal to their cart when they renew their membership.

Tandem medicals are included in the requirements tracking portion. Tandem instructors (expired and current) are now able to upload a copy of their medical directly to USPA Headquarters from their profile. They can use a button on their credentials tab, or this link:
uspa.org/me/Credentials/TI-MED.

The member will be able to see that this was accepted, along with the expiration date, in their profile within two business days.

Ratings that have been expired less than two years are also eligible for verification, and the requirements necessary are indicated for you.

Part Two: Paying for Your Ratings With Your Membership or Renewing Later

Once you have met all requirements and have had each one verified for the ratings you want to renew, you will be able to select those ratings when you renew your membership. This interface for renewing membership has one added step for rating holders that lists out ratings that are ready to renew that they can add to their cart. Once the member completes the checkout process and pays for their membership and rating renewal, within a few minutes, their ratings will automatically renew alongside their membership expiration and be visible in their profile and on their digital card:
uspa.org/mycard.

There is an annual fee for rating renewals that you only have to pay once per membership cycle. So, for example, if you want to renew your membership before it expires but you did not get all of your requirements met for one of your ratings, you can still renew just the ratings that are ready to renew. Then later, after you get the requirements for the last rating verified, you can get it renewed as well without having to pay the annual rating renewal fee again. This means you are able to renew expired ratings at any time of the year, as long as the verified renewal requirements are valid.

Note for Examiners

In order to renew an examiner rating, you must renew the associated instructor rating (or any instructor rating for coach examiners), plus conduct a rating course for each discipline within the last two years, and—for tandem, AFF and coach examiners only—attend a standardization meeting. USPA Headquarters can track and automatically verify these two examiner-specific requirements. In your profile, you can see if these requirements have been recorded and use them toward your examiner rating renewal. This means examiners no longer need to secure paper signatures from other examiners in order to renew their examiner ratings; you only need to have your instructor rating requirements verified as normal. USPA has populated examiners’ records from courses and standardization meetings from data since 2017. If you do not see your course or standardization meeting in your verified requirements, email safety@uspa.org with the dates and a short description, and staff will update your record to reflect your activity.

Preview of Coming Attractions

The verification of rating renewals will soon be expanded to include tracking requirements toward licenses and new ratings, to include online exams via the USPA Library. Soon after, members will be able to apply for and purchase new licenses and new PRO, judge and instructional ratings, all of which can be instantly issued.

Don Kellner earned USPA 45,000-Jump Wings #1 after making his 45,000^th skydive on Saturday, April 20, over Above the Poconos Skydivers, which he and his wife Darlene own, in Hazleton, Pennsylvania. He made the jump in commemoration of the 100^th anniversary of the first intentional freefall, which Leslie Irvin completed April 28, 1919, in Dayton, Ohio.

For the jump, Kellner used a United Parachute Technologies leather Vector which the company made as a display rig. Company president Bill Booth loaned Kellner the rig for the milestone jump, which UPT says will be the rig’s only skydive.

The day of the jump was windy, and Kellner waited all day for the winds to die down. He still spots every jump manually.

USPA ended April with its highest-ever membership—40,620 members! The milestone comes after last October’s high of 40,441 members. USPA reached the 40,000-member mark for the first time ever last summer. These numbers indicate that the sport of skydiving is continuing to grow, as more people not only jump for the first time, but return to pursue the sport as a hobby. USPA anticipates that these numbers will continue to climb throughout the upcoming summer season.

The USPA Membership Services Committee is currently seeking nominations for three of its service awards: the Lifetime Achievement Award (a maximum of one recipient annually), the Gold Medal for Meritorious Service (up to three recipients annually) and the Regional Achievement Award (up to five recipients annually).

Members can find award criteria and complete nomination instructions in the Skydiver’s Information Manual Section 8-1. According to the SIM, when submitting nominations, nominators must:

1. Identify the nominee, including address and telephone number.
2. Prepare the citation in 30 words or less capturing the essence of the achievement for which the nominee’s name has been submitted.
3. In 100 words or fewer, give complete, concise details justifying the award to the nominee, with pertinent background information to assist the committee.”

Please submit nominations by June 30 so that USPA Headquarters staff has a chance to organize them prior to the summer USPA Board of Directors meeting that starts on July 12 in Arlington, Virginia.  Members may send nominations either via email to Director of Membership Services Stephanie Seidel at sseidel@uspa.org or by mail to USPA Director of Membership Services, 5401 Southpoint Centre Blvd., Fredericksburg, VA 22407.

As part of a new privacy initiative beginning January 1, new USPA members must specifically designate that USPA can share their accomplishments (licenses, ratings and awards) and contributions (donations to one of the four USPA funds) in print in Parachutist. New members must now also opt in for USPA to share their accomplishments and display their membership cards digitally through Sig.ma. Previously, members did not need to opt in before USPA listed their credentials but had the ability to opt out.

Members should check their privacy settings at uspa.org/me to make sure their accounts reflect their wishes. The default setting for members who joined prior to January 1 is “share,” and the default for members who joined after January 1 is “do not share.” Members who wish to be listed in the “To New Heights” or “Donors” sections of Parachutist magazine or who wish to display a membership card digitally on a smart phone or other device through Sig.ma, must select “share” as their designation under the Privacy tab.