Signs a Rec League is Dying

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:RTO has not had any effect on our league's coach volunteers. For some reason after covid it became incredibly hard to get volunteers for anything. Weird since working from home should have opened up more free time. Everyone wants their kid to participate but they want to drop and run.

True for our league as well. Not sure what the explanation was. We can't even get parents to volunteer for one-offs like "check kids into evaluations".

Our league requires a certain number of volunteer hours per season. You can also pay an extra fee ($$$) to opt out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kid's rec league team meets that definition of "dying", but the coaches are great and the players are learning the game and having fun playing with kids who will be their teammates in high school. If your kid is in a similar league you may want to help recruit to build it back up rather than jumping ship to a league that feeds into the neighboring high schools.

If the OP checks with her local high school I would not be surprised if the coaches are recruiting players with no prior experience in the sport just to fill the team.

OP here. I cannot even tell you how hard I have tried the bolded. Countless hours of my time. But I can't do it alone.

OP, you can’t want it more than the other parents want it. Maybe it’s time to let it go. Parents will either rise to the occasion or they and their kids will go without.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:RTO has not had any effect on our league's coach volunteers. For some reason after covid it became incredibly hard to get volunteers for anything. Weird since working from home should have opened up more free time. Everyone wants their kid to participate but they want to drop and run.

Yup, agree with this. Parents have way more flexible schedules than they did in 2019 yet I've met far less of them recently because of the "drop and run" phenomenon. We had to fold a team last year because of lack of coaches (I couldn't volunteer because I was the parent rep organizing everyone) and our Girl Scout troop is about to go because I can't get a second person to show up to be a warm body for 2 hours/month. In all cases parents have said "can't we just hire someone?" but the reality is that no one wants to take erratic jobs managing children for $15/hour.

[Anonymous]

I truly honestly think people just don't want to put on adult pants.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:RTO has not had any effect on our league's coach volunteers. For some reason after covid it became incredibly hard to get volunteers for anything. Weird since working from home should have opened up more free time. Everyone wants their kid to participate but they want to drop and run.

True for our league as well. Not sure what the explanation was. We can't even get parents to volunteer for one-offs like "check kids into evaluations".

Our league requires a certain number of volunteer hours per season. You can also pay an extra fee ($$$) to opt out.

But what happens if everyone pays the fee?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:RTO has not had any effect on our league's coach volunteers. For some reason after covid it became incredibly hard to get volunteers for anything. Weird since working from home should have opened up more free time. Everyone wants their kid to participate but they want to drop and run.

True for our league as well. Not sure what the explanation was. We can't even get parents to volunteer for one-offs like "check kids into evaluations".

Our league requires a certain number of volunteer hours per season. You can also pay an extra fee ($$$) to opt out.

But what happens if everyone pays the fee?

Then the rec league folds. See my post above. We had everyone opt to pay their way out after many seasons of declining volunteering or no-show volunteers. We had collected enough funds to hire people but couldn't get sufficient paid employees to fill the gap. Then we had no one to coach or run things so we returned everyone's money and cancelled the season. It was sad for the kids but I don't think their parents cared.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:RTO has not had any effect on our league's coach volunteers. For some reason after covid it became incredibly hard to get volunteers for anything. Weird since working from home should have opened up more free time. Everyone wants their kid to participate but they want to drop and run.

True for our league as well. Not sure what the explanation was. We can't even get parents to volunteer for one-offs like "check kids into evaluations".

Our league requires a certain number of volunteer hours per season. You can also pay an extra fee ($$$) to opt out.

That's the way to go.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:RTO has not had any effect on our league's coach volunteers. For some reason after covid it became incredibly hard to get volunteers for anything. Weird since working from home should have opened up more free time. Everyone wants their kid to participate but they want to drop and run.

True for our league as well. Not sure what the explanation was. We can't even get parents to volunteer for one-offs like "check kids into evaluations".

Our league requires a certain number of volunteer hours per season. You can also pay an extra fee ($$$) to opt out.

But what happens if everyone pays the fee?

Then the rec league folds. See my post above. We had everyone opt to pay their way out after many seasons of declining volunteering or no-show volunteers. We had collected enough funds to hire people but couldn't get sufficient paid employees to fill the gap. Then we had no one to coach or run things so we returned everyone's money and cancelled the season. It was sad for the kids but I don't think their parents cared.

OP here. Our board discussed the fee recently (someone else beside me had proposed it initially) and this was the concern - we'd get more money for things, but it wouldn't help.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:RTO has not had any effect on our league's coach volunteers. For some reason after covid it became incredibly hard to get volunteers for anything. Weird since working from home should have opened up more free time. Everyone wants their kid to participate but they want to drop and run.

True for our league as well. Not sure what the explanation was. We can't even get parents to volunteer for one-offs like "check kids into evaluations".

Our league requires a certain number of volunteer hours per season. You can also pay an extra fee ($$$) to opt out.

But what happens if everyone pays the fee?

Then the rec league folds. See my post above. We had everyone opt to pay their way out after many seasons of declining volunteering or no-show volunteers. We had collected enough funds to hire people but couldn't get sufficient paid employees to fill the gap. Then we had no one to coach or run things so we returned everyone's money and cancelled the season. It was sad for the kids but I don't think their parents cared.

OP here. Our board discussed the fee recently (someone else beside me had proposed it initially) and this was the concern - we'd get more money for things, but it wouldn't help.

Sorry to hear that. Not a great sign. When we were at that point one season before we folded, we were transparent with parents and let them know that we would also need x volunteers per event or we would not be able to have a season. Everyone agreed and we moved forward with the season, but there wasn't a way to enforce volunteering and what happened was that the league ended up being run by the energy of a small handful of volunteer parents. We didn't have sufficient social pressure for everyone to step up and make it work.

If your league is in a place where people have close social ties and a lot of peer pressure, then being transparent might work ("we can't have a season unless we have 3 volunteers signed up in advance for each game. If volunteers don't show, the game will be a forfeit"). But if you're already at the point of discussing volunteer buyouts after having insufficient volunteers, I don't think this will be effective. Parents will happily go to select teams to avoid participation, and the select teams will happily expand and take their money to accommodate them.