How SCA Poland Successfully Hosted the Polish Latte Art Championship Amid the Pandemic - SCA Community Spotlight
The coronavirus pandemic has put a stop to most international events, including the World Coffee Championships, but some SCA Chapters and Competition Bodies are innovating to help their local competitors come together— safely— for a chance at becoming national champions.
DAMIAN CZYŹEWSKI, National Coordinator for the SCA Poland Chapter, shares his group’s experience hosting the 2020 Polish Latte Art Championships this past June. This article is part of our #SCACommunity Spotlight series featuring the work of coffee communities around the world. Follow SCA Poland on Facebook and Instagram.
This past June, the volunteers of the SCA Poland Chapter came together to host a very different version of the Latte Art Championships under a strict sanitary regime amid the coronavirus pandemic.
First, allow me to congratulate our champion and our runners-up:
Dominik Dobosz, the 2020 Polish Latte Art Champion
Agnieszka Rojewska
Magdalena Głowacka
Aleksandra Rutka
Maciek Szymański
Mateusz Józef Dąbek
Before I share some of our experiences hosting this event, I want to note that the coronavirus situation in Poland is generally stable, and we have very few cases in this region. The Latte Art Championship is also a non-sensory competition, which makes sanitation easier to manage. All competitors were informed about the requirements before the event and had time to consider whether they wished to participate. Current regulations in Poland allow gatherings of up to 150 people.
During the three days of competition, we have used:
Over 100 silver-coated high-performance face masks
Over 300 single-use nitrile gloves
Over 10L of disinfectant liquids for both hands and gear
Everyone who attended the event was obligated to use masks and gloves, including all competitors, technical judges, head judges, and volunteers. Everyone was screened for their temperature and asked about their health. Each entry in the building also had an area with disinfectant liquid and gloves and masks.
So, how did we make this event happen while maintaining a safe distance? Here's how we did it:
1. All meetings were hosted using online video conferencing
We hosted our orientation meeting with all participants via the popular video conferencing platform, Zoom. Doing this allowed us to avoid crowding everyone in the morning in a closed space. This is something I highly recommend— even after the pandemic situation.
We hosted the orientation meeting a day before the competition at 8:00 pm. This allowed everyone who needed to be in the meeting to attend, be heard, and ask questions, with the added bonus of using attachments, links, and text.
Video conferencing is a feature that also removes entry barriers for competitors and SCA Chapters who want to host events. We managed to organize all planning sessions virtually, keeping physical distance until the training session and stage presentations.
As we all know, competitors have their regular day jobs. The normal rigors of competitions can cause significant stress for them. If, for example, we host an orientation meeting at 8:00 am, and the last competitor competes at 5:00 pm, they are frequently waiting for up to 10 hours in the venue for their turn. Competitions are time-consuming affairs, so decreasing the amount of time a barista has to spend waiting around will directly improve the number of professionals who wish to compete.
All orientation meetings were recorded and uploaded to the web so that anyone who needed access to them later could find them, including volunteers and SCA/WCE staff. The experience for both judges and participants was so good that I would not be shy to say that this could be the new standard on the international level. Online meetings and recordings create new options for SCA/WCE staff to join these meetings and supervise them as needed.
2. To limit the number of people in the building, competitors were allowed to enter during their training and competition time with only one coach or supporter.
After and before prep and competition time, competitors and their single companion were required to leave the building. Bear in mind that we hosted this competition in a large sponsor venue, not at Expo.
The winner announcement was hosted outdoors, where the risks for contamination are lower, keeping with our strict sanitary regime. The event was hosted without an audience in the venue. However, the whole event was broadcast live on our Facebook channel. Visit the links below to watch the recordings:
Our finals livestream: https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=273198910557797
Preliminaries part 1: https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=3985297694875826
Preliminaries part 2: https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=569055397140489
3. Competitors and judges were obligated to use masks, and everyone except for visual judges was required to use gloves on the premises.
To ensure that competitors were fully aware of the requirements prior to the event, we emailed this information to them well in advance. We also explained these requirements in detail during the orientation meeting.
We also made a few additional protocol changes, including a ban on physical contact during greetings for both the competition and the start of the presentation. We asked competitors to avoid handshakes and limit their hellos to visual nods and vocal greetings.
4. Debriefing was done through Zoom.
The success of a virtual debriefing session after the competition surprised me, even more so than the orientation meeting. Competitors got a lot more time to view their scoresheets, which were sent via email. A virtual debrief allows both competitors and judges to attend the session without increasing their stay for a day longer. It lowers entry-level costs for both competitors and chapters.
As with the orientation meeting, the debriefings can be recorded, allowing SCA/WCE officials to join remotely or review the footage later.
I have taken part in debriefings as a host, judge, competitor, and trainer on the national and international levels. Hosting this session virtually, where we can all view the same copy of the scoresheets during our Zoom session, allowed for a precise debrief. Because we gave the competitors more time for revisions, they all had the opportunity to ask more specific questions and allowed us to use video footage from the live stream to revise or explain the judges' scores and comments. This was by far the most composed and informative debriefing I have experienced. I would highly recommend this to be the new standard for the national and international level wherever possible. We all know how stressful and intense competitions can be and this debriefing procedure allowed us all to do this while staying calm and professional.
We don't know what the future holds for us, but we at SCA Poland look forward to continuing to innovate and evolve the way we host competitions in this new world. In future, we will be adding face covers to support people with glasses, as glasses tend to cause steam when used with face masks alone. Additionally, we have set up a sponsorship agreement with a testing facility for the Polish Roasting Championship we're hosting at the end of August. As this is a sensory competition, our partners will be running coronavirus tests for all competitors, judges, and staff before their entry to the venue and we will be employing a highly modified cupping protocol.
We at the SCA Poland Chapter welcome questions and ideas! Please follow us and send us a message via Facebook or on our website.
DAMIAN CZYŹEWSKI is National Coordinator for the SCA Poland Chapter. This article is part of our #SCACommunity Spotlight series featuring the work of coffee communities around the world. Follow SCA Poland on Facebook and Instagram.