Serious Question - College Athletes, Parents and Snacks
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Anonymous
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HS DS and his teammates get fast food before, after or between games and practices. Many people seem aghast at the notion of anything from McDonalds, but I'd rather DS eat a couple of McDonalds chicken sandwiches (his post-practice go-to snack) than a team or parent supplied sandwich with lunch meat. I get that lots of people are concerned about obesity, and DS has teammates who have to manage their calories, but DS usually eats breakfast, a large lunch, two chicken sandwiches, a shake and a soda after practice and then a full dinner and he's still slightly underweight.
I anticipate that if he plays D3 in college as planned, my contribution to his meals will be money on his debit card. Is there some reason (other than pearl clutching about nutrition) that this won't work? |
Anonymous
| At Washington and Lee, when I was a student in the early '00s, I remember all the lacrosse parents being at EVERY game and having meals for the team afterward. They were a close knit bunch and it was sort of like a tailgate after the game. I wasn't on the team, just a student spectator. I also knew that the basketball team parents came to many games but they did not have that same routine of providing meals for the players post game. So, I think it depends on the sport, the coach and the parents. |
Anonymous
So lets sketch this out. Your son goes on to play a D3 sport in college. Let's say he goes to Washington and Lee since the PP cited them and they have a game up in Washington DC on a Saturday against Catholic. They will be leaving Lexington no later than 8 AM. I will assume that some of the boys will make it to the dining hall or eat at their house before they leave, but some won't. They board the bus for DC and presumably the school's dining facilities have packed lunches and snacks for the team. Maybe some kids bring their own snacks. Maybe some are provided by a parent provided fund. Maybe the school provides them. They arrive at Catholic around 11:30 (and that is being generous). Unload, go to the locker rooms and get prepared to take the field. They are on the field at 12:00 noon for warm ups. They play at 1 and are done around 3 or 4. They have now been on the go for 8 hours, including 2 hours of intense physical activity and its nearing dinner time with 3 to 4 hours still to go until they are back at school, so what are their options to eat? 1) Have a school or parent provided pot luck or catered meal at Catholic where the boys can eat as soon as they have showered and packed their gear. 2) Eat a cold boxed meal prepared the night before 3) Have the bus stop at McDonalds or Subway or some other restaurant on the way back where each kid pays his own way. 4) Eat locally with parents/friends and hitch a ride back to school. Honestly, most D3 schools probably do a mix of these things depending on the distance for each game and the Coach's and school's preferences and budgets. Also remember that there are NCAA limits and regulations as to what colleges can provide to athletes in terms of food and snacks, so working with the parents to coordinate some of these meals makes sense logistically and financially. As for nutrition, I'm not going to say that the occasional McDonalds is bad, especially for a very active HS or college student, but anyone who is serious about their athletic performance should be focusing on eating the right foods at the right time so as to maximize their recovery and performance as well as their long term physical health. College athletics is pretty intense schedule wise and can put a lot of strain on students bodies, especially if they are not paying attention to their nutrition. |
Anonymous
| No. Never heard of this. |
Anonymous
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And who knows what NCAA rules a parent might be breaking by providing "gifts". Give my kid money for lunch? No problem. Give my kids teammate some money for lunch? Might be a problem? Provide some general snacks for all? Likely not a problem?
College kids do go "hungry" so while I earlier joked about Team Snacks earlier as a something that ends in Rec Sports there are some legitimate issues. I would personally be nervous about any possible NCAA rule violation though. So personally, I wouldn't mind giving my kid $100 when in town for a "single" meal. If they choose to "take a teammate" to dinner that is fine with me. |
Anonymous
| Is OPs question about providing food overall or about parental involvement in college sports. I thought it was the latter. My DCs D3 school had no trouble providing meals for the kids. But parents who were attending meets liked to be involved and would provide special snacks on occasion. My other DC is at a big 10 school (not an athlete) and the athletes have their own dining hall and seem to be treated like kings. |
Anonymous
| My brother was a D1 athlete at the Naval Academy. It’s a unique environment where the students have very little freedom and unstructured time. Parents came as often as they could and often supplied homemade baked goods to the young men on the team after the games. A huge batch of fresh brownies or chocolate chip cookies was like a taste of home before they had to report back in. |
Anonymous
| At our particular school its a game day thing. No matter where in the US the tournament is - on campus, a short drive , or a plane ride away, the PARENTS -who are located all over the country - are flying in to provide food, meals and snacks and constant support on top of $70,000 tuition (nobody gets money to play, and many athletes are full pay). AND, this is on top of aggressive team fund raising because none of these teams are fully funded. It is one thing to gripe about the additional cost - and that’s not my true beef. My real beef is the high level of helicopter (or perhaps this is more like bulldozer) parent involvement at this stage in life. When you see the “mealtime” interactions it’s just not healthy - the level of dependency is staggering. It goes way beyond supporting in the stands - it’s helicopter snowflake epitomized. |
Anonymous
You should always be nervous about NCAA rules, which is why it is important for these types of team meals and snacks to be coordinated with the school, but it is legal for parents to pay for meals for whole teams in general and for boosters to pay for meals in conjunction with competition away from the school. From the NCAA D3 Regulations manual (similar rules apply for D1 and D2): 16.11.1.5 Occasional Meals. A student-athlete or the entire team in a sport may receive an occasional meal from an institutional staff member or representative of the institution’s athletics interests under the following conditions: [R] (Revised: 1/10/92) (a) The occasional meal may be provided at any location in the locale of the institution; (Adopted: 1/10/92, Revised: 1/10/05, 1/9/06) (b) Meals must be restricted to infrequent and special occasions; and (Adopted: 1/10/92) (c) Institutional staff members and representatives of the institution’s athletics interests may provide transportation to student-athletes to attend such meals. (Adopted: 1/10/92, Revised: 1/10/95, 1/9/06) 16.11.1.5.1 Meal Provided by Representative of Athletics Interests—Outside Locale of Institution. A representative of the institution’s athletics interests may pay for or provide a meal to a student athlete or team outside of the locale of the institution as long as the meal is in conjunction with, or en route to or from, an away-from-home contest. [R] (Adopted: 7/21/09) 16.11.1.6 Occasional Meals Provided by the Relative of a Student-Athlete. A student-athlete or a team may receive an occasional meal provided by the relative of a student-athlete at any location. (Adopted: 7/21/09) Now obviously, if I were the parent of a college athlete, I would still think it would be wise to check/coordinate with the school officials before providing a meal to the team. |
Anonymous
Helicopter parents are a real problem, which is why the coaches I know pay almost as much attention to evaluating the parents as to the student athletes that they are recruiting. |
Anonymous
| DH and I were D3 athletes 20 years ago and this was not the norm for us. Maybe its because college students were expected to be able to manage without mommy back then, or maybe its because we attended a rather remote college that not even that many locals went to (closest major city--one that had an international airport--was 4 hours away.) |
Anonymous
Soooo, you're gonna love this! Maybe you should turn on your computer camera and film yourself then post it. We'll wait ... Ready? Okay, here goes! Our children are at Ivies. All 3 are on teams. We have attended every game except for 2. That's right, we've only missed TWO games!!! Are you screaming in agony yet? Usually we see the kids after the game but it is not guaranteed. We never see them before the game. They join the post-game tailgate for 30-45 minutes before they are back on the bus and headed back to school. The kids eat the meal that is there at the tailgate. Maybe I've got altitude sickness or something (oh my!!!) but I don't see our presence or other parents attendance as helicoptering or bulldozing parent involvement. We're there to watch our kids. Our interactions with our kids are minimal (because, really, it is only 30-45 minutes). The schools are close enough that we can get there easily, and we can get to/from most games in a one-day trip if we want. Are there some parents who go to every game? Sure. Are there some whom we've never met? Sure. But I can guarantee you that there is no judgement either way. The nice thing about Ivies is that the game schedules are a little more sane. We have many friends with kids on D1 teams and those schedules and locales can be pretty difficult. And, yes, -many- of those parents are making every game no matter where it is. That's really saying something when you're talking about D1 schools playing coast-to-coast. Anyway, we're happy with the set-up. And our kids seem happy to see us. Sometimes we'll bring some brownies or something for them to share on the bus but usually not. Let me know if we should call 911 cuz this was all just too much for you! I don't know what sport your kid plays but I genuinely hope we don't run into you since we're clearly coming at this from totally different perspectives and you don't seem to have a lot of give in you. Good luck to your kid. |
Anonymous
This. I actually think it is nice when parents attend games. For some of these sports, there would be no spectators unless there were parents. |
Anonymous
At my Big 10 school, the athletes had their own dorm as well as their own dining hall. The rumor was that they got steak as an option for dinner every night. I can't imagine my school leaving meals for athletes on the road up to parents. They definitely had it catered specifically for the athletes. Parents got to go in after the kids had eaten. |
Anonymous
| I was in the marching band. My parents came to 2-3 home games to watch me preform - they could drive but required an overnight stay. They would also come to away games that were closer to home. They always brought large amounts of baked goods. |