From: death@brokaw.lcs.mit.edu (Mark A. Sheldon)
Subject: Re: 'Open' vs 'Closed' competitions?
Organization: MIT Laboratory for Computer Science
Distribution: usa
Date: Mon, 13 Apr 1992 20:23:35 GMT

In article <1992Apr13.093005.11308@cbfsb.cb.att.com> edbruij@cbnewsg.cb.att.com (edgar.de.bruijn) writes:
>In article <2472@voodoo.UUCP> das@voodoo.boeing.com (Deb Schwartz) writes:
>>Please forgive my ignorance, but what is the difference between 'open' and
>>'closed' ballroom competitions?
>>
>
>The difference between 'open' and 'closed' ballroom and latin competitions
>is that in open competitions foreign couples are allowed to join the
>contest.
>
>To determine the nr one of a country (or maybe a state in the USA)
>the competition is mostly closed --> closed for foreign couples.

Edgar is absolutely correct about this sense of open and closed.
However, in the competition world, these words are used to get at two
distinctions:

1) Eligibility (which is what we've been talking about here).
Essentially, a competition sponsor gets to say who's eligible to
compete.  If titles are given, and the titles are sanctioned by some
organization like the US Amateur Dancers' Association or the National
Dance Council of America or ..., then those organizations have
eligibility requirements.  For example, the Massachusetts Closed Amateur
Championships were run by the Mass chapter of USABDA.  The chapter is
going to sponsor the winners to represent the state in the USABDA
national championships.  Thus, they wanted to restrict the competition
to couples from the state.  In fact, the rules were that at least one
member of the partnership had to live in Massachusetts --- a rule
designed to allow the winning the couple to compete (since the man lives
here but the lady lives in Delaware, making their 3rd in the US position
quite remarkable).  Since USABDA sends US representatives to the amateur
world championships, their national championship competition is closed
to non-US couples.  I'm not sure how they handle mixed couples.  The
NDCA, the professional organization, requires that both members of a
partnership live in the US for some period of time (2 years I think)
before they are allowed to represent the US abroad.  One of the top US
amateur couples has lived in Germany for several years.

2) Choreography.  In most competitions, there are different levels for
various events: usually Bronze, Silver, Gold, Pre-championship,
Championship.  The first three levels restrict what figures (steps) a
couple is allowed to do.  Doing silver steps in a bronze event can get
you disqualified.  Now, in this context, closed means closed to some
syllabus of figures.  So in pro-am events you will sometimes see bronze
waltz, bronze open waltz, etc.  Open here means that some figures from
the next level are allowed.  In fact, there is no technical difference
between bronze open and silver --- but it allows a teacher to have more
students competing.  Just to make it even more confusing, sometimes open
by itself means `beyone the syllabus' which means unrestricted.  Gold
Star is another term for this.  This is the usual situation here on the
East Coast --- the West Coast (and other countries) do things
differently, but perhaps that can all wait for another post:-)

The system for pro-am competitors can get extremely baroque --- again
usually to allow one pro to get paid to dance with a large number of
students.  So you might see Ladies Silver Open A --- the letter
designating an age category.

-Mark