Families that never volunteer - swim team

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why don’t you not let the delinquent families not swim? I know it totally sucks to punish a kid for their parents’ faults but maybe you need to actually enforce things? Don’t ban them for next season- make it the next meet.

+1, that seems like a great solutions, but the people on this board would rather complain anonymously instead of doing anything to change the status quo.

This idea is floated every year and is always a source of early July musings at our pool. The reality is that the way many teams are run, there isn’t anyone with actual authority to block participation. It would take a board vote to amend the bylaws and I don’t see many boards that would be willing to bother with this. Even if they did, enforcement would be tough- you’d have to have a club manager or board member intercept and refund registration at the beginning of the year, and have high school and college aged coaches with the confidence and authority to tell a kid to get out of a lane when they show up to practice. And then on the back end, there could be repercussions in terms of the original member agreement a club member signed vs. the benefits of membership they have access to. We even worked in the off-season to see if we could institute a no-volunteer fee to be levied at the end of the season but gave up because of the complications.

Anyway, by late July, as a parent rep I mostly forget the annoyances of volunteer recruiting and just feel the happy glow of a fun season. It always works out.

Interesting. Luckily at our pool, there are fmvery few families with swimmers who swim at A meets who fail to volunteer regularly. The B meets are a different beast and arguably so much more work. Very frustrating to see hundreds of kids swim and the same bedraggled volunteers running the show. I’ve started to sit a few B meets out to put pressure on those parents. I think maybe giving the families that DO volunteer some kind of extra credit could be a work around vis a vis the rules though. There are also ways to track and incentivize volunteer hours—a little fun competition? Winner gets a zero gravity lounger for the next season? Who knows. But some teams obviously need to make volunteering more fun.

The families who complete their volunteer hours at our pool get an early team registration link (our management board is always threatening to cap our team size). Since the threat hasn’t been fulfilled yet, it’s not a huge prize but it’s something.

[Anonymous]

I think it is awful how people piled on to what is a legitimate observation about swimming. Even if you disagree, there is a lot of value in dissenting opinions, otherwise we are all just robots doing things this way because it has always been this way. Grow up and be strong enough of mind, and curious enough to consider other possibilites. I for one, agree witht the OP that the reliance on parent volunteers in order for a meet to happen is absolutely a problem. And, often that volunteering is over 5 hours, standing in very hot weather. There are more and more and more demands on all of us, and believe it or not, some people do actually have more on their plate than you! Or perhaps are not physically able to stand in the heat week after week for 5 hours without seriously compromosing their health, which frankly would be none of the other parents business (especially if these parents were like your lot calling the OP lazy!!). So, just because you can make it work given what you have on your plate does not mean that the parent or family next to you can! I have met many, many parents who have to take their child out of swimming because they were becoming stretched too thin and could not work in the time demands with all the other demands. It is great for those families who can make it work, but not all can. Not one parent or family I met that had to take their kid out of swimming after one or two years because of the difficulty to balance practice time, meet length, and expectaion of parent volunteering were lazy, not one. As parents, we should all support each other more, LISTEN to ech other with compassion and consider the possibilites of inclusivity! Even minor changes to parent volunteering expectations could open the doors for many parents.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why don’t you not let the delinquent families not swim? I know it totally sucks to punish a kid for their parents’ faults but maybe you need to actually enforce things? Don’t ban them for next season- make it the next meet.

+1, that seems like a great solutions, but the people on this board would rather complain anonymously instead of doing anything to change the status quo.

This idea is floated every year and is always a source of early July musings at our pool. The reality is that the way many teams are run, there isn’t anyone with actual authority to block participation. It would take a board vote to amend the bylaws and I don’t see many boards that would be willing to bother with this. Even if they did, enforcement would be tough- you’d have to have a club manager or board member intercept and refund registration at the beginning of the year, and have high school and college aged coaches with the confidence and authority to tell a kid to get out of a lane when they show up to practice. And then on the back end, there could be repercussions in terms of the original member agreement a club member signed vs. the benefits of membership they have access to. We even worked in the off-season to see if we could institute a no-volunteer fee to be levied at the end of the season but gave up because of the complications.

Anyway, by late July, as a parent rep I mostly forget the annoyances of volunteer recruiting and just feel the happy glow of a fun season. It always works out.

Interesting. Luckily at our pool, there are fmvery few families with swimmers who swim at A meets who fail to volunteer regularly. The B meets are a different beast and arguably so much more work. Very frustrating to see hundreds of kids swim and the same bedraggled volunteers running the show. I’ve started to sit a few B meets out to put pressure on those parents. I think maybe giving the families that DO volunteer some kind of extra credit could be a work around vis a vis the rules though. There are also ways to track and incentivize volunteer hours—a little fun competition? Winner gets a zero gravity lounger for the next season? Who knows. But some teams obviously need to make volunteering more fun.

The families who complete their volunteer hours at our pool get an early team registration link (our management board is always threatening to cap our team size). Since the threat hasn’t been fulfilled yet, it’s not a huge prize but it’s something.

Volunteering at B meets is a lot more work than volunteering at A meets. Many of our B meet only swim parents who are in the know sign up to volunteer only at A meets.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think it is awful how people piled on to what is a legitimate observation about swimming. Even if you disagree, there is a lot of value in dissenting opinions, otherwise we are all just robots doing things this way because it has always been this way. Grow up and be strong enough of mind, and curious enough to consider other possibilites. I for one, agree witht the OP that the reliance on parent volunteers in order for a meet to happen is absolutely a problem. And, often that volunteering is over 5 hours, standing in very hot weather. There are more and more and more demands on all of us, and believe it or not, some people do actually have more on their plate than you! Or perhaps are not physically able to stand in the heat week after week for 5 hours without seriously compromosing their health, which frankly would be none of the other parents business (especially if these parents were like your lot calling the OP lazy!!). So, just because you can make it work given what you have on your plate does not mean that the parent or family next to you can! I have met many, many parents who have to take their child out of swimming because they were becoming stretched too thin and could not work in the time demands with all the other demands. It is great for those families who can make it work, but not all can. Not one parent or family I met that had to take their kid out of swimming after one or two years because of the difficulty to balance practice time, meet length, and expectaion of parent volunteering were lazy, not one. As parents, we should all support each other more, LISTEN to ech other with compassion and consider the possibilites of inclusivity! Even minor changes to parent volunteering expectations could open the doors for many parents.

If people can't do the their share of volunteer time, their kids simply can't participate, full stop end of story.

[Anonymous]

💯

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
I volunteered when my kids where on swim team, but I really dislike this whole concept. It shuts out a entire group of families who cannot volunteer or afford the fee.

In my opinion, kid swimming should be pared WAY down (no need for all this food, awards, blah blah blah). Kids who are talented and want to compete should be able to do so without depending on parent availability or income. We should not have to incentivize swim team for kids who perhaps wouldn't want to participate without the grub and medals.

This!

I belong to a pool with a swim team. We don’t do swim team but I see a lot of how it operates. There are a ton of activities people are pressured into volunteering for that are. Not. Necessary. Concessions. Sundae fundraisers. Banquets. Friggin gift bags. Cut that stuff out and you have a lot less need for volunteers. And then I see moms doing things teens on the team should be doing. Like setting up chairs on deck. Why aren’t the kids doing that??

It looks miserable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why don’t you not let the delinquent families not swim? I know it totally sucks to punish a kid for their parents’ faults but maybe you need to actually enforce things? Don’t ban them for next season- make it the next meet.

+1, that seems like a great solutions, but the people on this board would rather complain anonymously instead of doing anything to change the status quo.

This idea is floated every year and is always a source of early July musings at our pool. The reality is that the way many teams are run, there isn’t anyone with actual authority to block participation. It would take a board vote to amend the bylaws and I don’t see many boards that would be willing to bother with this. Even if they did, enforcement would be tough- you’d have to have a club manager or board member intercept and refund registration at the beginning of the year, and have high school and college aged coaches with the confidence and authority to tell a kid to get out of a lane when they show up to practice. And then on the back end, there could be repercussions in terms of the original member agreement a club member signed vs. the benefits of membership they have access to. We even worked in the off-season to see if we could institute a no-volunteer fee to be levied at the end of the season but gave up because of the complications.

Anyway, by late July, as a parent rep I mostly forget the annoyances of volunteer recruiting and just feel the happy glow of a fun season. It always works out.

Interesting. Luckily at our pool, there are fmvery few families with swimmers who swim at A meets who fail to volunteer regularly. The B meets are a different beast and arguably so much more work. Very frustrating to see hundreds of kids swim and the same bedraggled volunteers running the show. I’ve started to sit a few B meets out to put pressure on those parents. I think maybe giving the families that DO volunteer some kind of extra credit could be a work around vis a vis the rules though. There are also ways to track and incentivize volunteer hours—a little fun competition? Winner gets a zero gravity lounger for the next season? Who knows. But some teams obviously need to make volunteering more fun.

The families who complete their volunteer hours at our pool get an early team registration link (our management board is always threatening to cap our team size). Since the threat hasn’t been fulfilled yet, it’s not a huge prize but it’s something.

Volunteering at B meets is a lot more work than volunteering at A meets. Many of our B meet only swim parents who are in the know sign up to volunteer only at A meets.

It does make you summer swim savvy but I also find that it makes you a little bit of an a-hole to purposely volunteer at the meets your kid isn’t fast enough to make because volunteering at those meets is easier than volunteering at the meets your kid is swimming in. I totally get the people that do it because they are wrangling little ones at the B meets, but otherwise those people are also part of the problem because they are snagging volunteer slots from people who are actually at that meet.

[Anonymous]

Np here. One thing I didn’t realize is that our team expects A meet families to volunteer more than 3 times. They specified that families must volunteer at least 3 times in the registration. During the season, A meet families were told to not volunteer for B meets as they have no problem finding volunteers. It all makes sense but we didn’t know all this since we were new.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
I volunteered when my kids where on swim team, but I really dislike this whole concept. It shuts out a entire group of families who cannot volunteer or afford the fee.

In my opinion, kid swimming should be pared WAY down (no need for all this food, awards, blah blah blah). Kids who are talented and want to compete should be able to do so without depending on parent availability or income. We should not have to incentivize swim team for kids who perhaps wouldn't want to participate without the grub and medals.

This!

I belong to a pool with a swim team. We don’t do swim team but I see a lot of how it operates. There are a ton of activities people are pressured into volunteering for that are. Not. Necessary. Concessions. Sundae fundraisers. Banquets. Friggin gift bags. Cut that stuff out and you have a lot less need for volunteers. And then I see moms doing things teens on the team should be doing. Like setting up chairs on deck. Why aren’t the kids doing that??

It looks miserable.

If you’ve listened to the senior speeches at a banquet, you know that the pancake breakfasts, spirit activities, buddy gifts, etc. are a big part of what makes summer swim special for these kids. It’s intense, yes, but so fun and (imo) worth it. I do a ton of volunteering, which I can do because I teach and am technically off during the summer (though I do tutor). I have more flexibility than the full time working parents during the summer so of course I put more hours in because I can when they don’t have the same flexibility. But make no mistake—most of our parents are working full time during the summer and still make it work.

Is it intense?

To me it’s just as intense as doing a travel team and spending entire weekends at a hotel out of town to watch your kid play a game with kids of the same caliber as they could play in your area, but the “travel” label makes it special, the going to new places, the cameraderie built on eating team dinners in the lobby and the kids splashing in the hotel pool.

It’s as intense as those ice skaters and gymnasts whose parents wake up at 3-4am to drive them to practices before school and 6 hours on the weekends.

It’s as intense as each kid getting a “walk up” song for baseball games.

There’s a whole host of kid-focused activities that are over the top for some reason or another.

But life as an adult is hard enough—let’s give them something special to be a part of when they’re a kid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Np here. One thing I didn’t realize is that our team expects A meet families to volunteer more than 3 times. They specified that families must volunteer at least 3 times in the registration. During the season, A meet families were told to not volunteer for B meets as they have no problem finding volunteers. It all makes sense but we didn’t know all this since we were new.

We don’t have “A meet families”.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Np here. One thing I didn’t realize is that our team expects A meet families to volunteer more than 3 times. They specified that families must volunteer at least 3 times in the registration. During the season, A meet families were told to not volunteer for B meets as they have no problem finding volunteers. It all makes sense but we didn’t know all this since we were new.

We don’t have “A meet families”.

Yes you do. They are families whose swimmers typically swim A meets. Our team doesn’t have a specific policy for those of us whose kids swim A meets, but they gently encourage us to let families whose kids typically only swim B meets have B meet volunteer spots.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why don’t you not let the delinquent families not swim? I know it totally sucks to punish a kid for their parents’ faults but maybe you need to actually enforce things? Don’t ban them for next season- make it the next meet.

+1, that seems like a great solutions, but the people on this board would rather complain anonymously instead of doing anything to change the status quo.

This idea is floated every year and is always a source of early July musings at our pool. The reality is that the way many teams are run, there isn’t anyone with actual authority to block participation. It would take a board vote to amend the bylaws and I don’t see many boards that would be willing to bother with this. Even if they did, enforcement would be tough- you’d have to have a club manager or board member intercept and refund registration at the beginning of the year, and have high school and college aged coaches with the confidence and authority to tell a kid to get out of a lane when they show up to practice. And then on the back end, there could be repercussions in terms of the original member agreement a club member signed vs. the benefits of membership they have access to. We even worked in the off-season to see if we could institute a no-volunteer fee to be levied at the end of the season but gave up because of the complications.

Anyway, by late July, as a parent rep I mostly forget the annoyances of volunteer recruiting and just feel the happy glow of a fun season. It always works out.

Interesting. Luckily at our pool, there are fmvery few families with swimmers who swim at A meets who fail to volunteer regularly. The B meets are a different beast and arguably so much more work. Very frustrating to see hundreds of kids swim and the same bedraggled volunteers running the show. I’ve started to sit a few B meets out to put pressure on those parents. I think maybe giving the families that DO volunteer some kind of extra credit could be a work around vis a vis the rules though. There are also ways to track and incentivize volunteer hours—a little fun competition? Winner gets a zero gravity lounger for the next season? Who knows. But some teams obviously need to make volunteering more fun.

The families who complete their volunteer hours at our pool get an early team registration link (our management board is always threatening to cap our team size). Since the threat hasn’t been fulfilled yet, it’s not a huge prize but it’s something.

Volunteering at B meets is a lot more work than volunteering at A meets. Many of our B meet only swim parents who are in the know sign up to volunteer only at A meets.

It does make you summer swim savvy but I also find that it makes you a little bit of an a-hole to purposely volunteer at the meets your kid isn’t fast enough to make because volunteering at those meets is easier than volunteering at the meets your kid is swimming in. I totally get the people that do it because they are wrangling little ones at the B meets, but otherwise those people are also part of the problem because they are snagging volunteer slots from people who are actually at that meet.

Nonsense. Our team requires you work at 5 meets. If my kid only swims in two B meets all season, I still have to work at extra meets to hit 5. I don't need to wrangle kids, so I will take the easier A meet jobs whenever I can get them. A meet parents do sometimes get pissy about B meet parents working "their" meet because they KNOW the A meet jobs are much easier than the B meet jobs. Too bad so sad!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Np here. One thing I didn’t realize is that our team expects A meet families to volunteer more than 3 times. They specified that families must volunteer at least 3 times in the registration. During the season, A meet families were told to not volunteer for B meets as they have no problem finding volunteers. It all makes sense but we didn’t know all this since we were new.

We don’t have “A meet families”.

This is strange to me b/c its the B meet volunteer slots that our team is always begging for people to do at the last minute. The A meet slots are always filled right away. We have a 200+ team and the B meets are long slogs in the evening heat.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why don’t you not let the delinquent families not swim? I know it totally sucks to punish a kid for their parents’ faults but maybe you need to actually enforce things? Don’t ban them for next season- make it the next meet.

+1, that seems like a great solutions, but the people on this board would rather complain anonymously instead of doing anything to change the status quo.

This idea is floated every year and is always a source of early July musings at our pool. The reality is that the way many teams are run, there isn’t anyone with actual authority to block participation. It would take a board vote to amend the bylaws and I don’t see many boards that would be willing to bother with this. Even if they did, enforcement would be tough- you’d have to have a club manager or board member intercept and refund registration at the beginning of the year, and have high school and college aged coaches with the confidence and authority to tell a kid to get out of a lane when they show up to practice. And then on the back end, there could be repercussions in terms of the original member agreement a club member signed vs. the benefits of membership they have access to. We even worked in the off-season to see if we could institute a no-volunteer fee to be levied at the end of the season but gave up because of the complications.

Anyway, by late July, as a parent rep I mostly forget the annoyances of volunteer recruiting and just feel the happy glow of a fun season. It always works out.

Interesting. Luckily at our pool, there are fmvery few families with swimmers who swim at A meets who fail to volunteer regularly. The B meets are a different beast and arguably so much more work. Very frustrating to see hundreds of kids swim and the same bedraggled volunteers running the show. I’ve started to sit a few B meets out to put pressure on those parents. I think maybe giving the families that DO volunteer some kind of extra credit could be a work around vis a vis the rules though. There are also ways to track and incentivize volunteer hours—a little fun competition? Winner gets a zero gravity lounger for the next season? Who knows. But some teams obviously need to make volunteering more fun.

The families who complete their volunteer hours at our pool get an early team registration link (our management board is always threatening to cap our team size). Since the threat hasn’t been fulfilled yet, it’s not a huge prize but it’s something.

Volunteering at B meets is a lot more work than volunteering at A meets. Many of our B meet only swim parents who are in the know sign up to volunteer only at A meets.

It does make you summer swim savvy but I also find that it makes you a little bit of an a-hole to purposely volunteer at the meets your kid isn’t fast enough to make because volunteering at those meets is easier than volunteering at the meets your kid is swimming in. I totally get the people that do it because they are wrangling little ones at the B meets, but otherwise those people are also part of the problem because they are snagging volunteer slots from people who are actually at that meet.

Nonsense. Our team requires you work at 5 meets. If my kid only swims in two B meets all season, I still have to work at extra meets to hit 5. I don't need to wrangle kids, so I will take the easier A meet jobs whenever I can get them. A meet parents do sometimes get pissy about B meet parents working "their" meet because they KNOW the A meet jobs are much easier than the B meet jobs. Too bad so sad!

Our team has the opposite issue. B meets are worth more “points” due to their length. Many families who kids typically also swim A meets volunteer for B meets over A Meets, leaving families without A meet swimmers to work A meets.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why don’t you not let the delinquent families not swim? I know it totally sucks to punish a kid for their parents’ faults but maybe you need to actually enforce things? Don’t ban them for next season- make it the next meet.

+1, that seems like a great solutions, but the people on this board would rather complain anonymously instead of doing anything to change the status quo.

This idea is floated every year and is always a source of early July musings at our pool. The reality is that the way many teams are run, there isn’t anyone with actual authority to block participation. It would take a board vote to amend the bylaws and I don’t see many boards that would be willing to bother with this. Even if they did, enforcement would be tough- you’d have to have a club manager or board member intercept and refund registration at the beginning of the year, and have high school and college aged coaches with the confidence and authority to tell a kid to get out of a lane when they show up to practice. And then on the back end, there could be repercussions in terms of the original member agreement a club member signed vs. the benefits of membership they have access to. We even worked in the off-season to see if we could institute a no-volunteer fee to be levied at the end of the season but gave up because of the complications.

Anyway, by late July, as a parent rep I mostly forget the annoyances of volunteer recruiting and just feel the happy glow of a fun season. It always works out.

Interesting. Luckily at our pool, there are fmvery few families with swimmers who swim at A meets who fail to volunteer regularly. The B meets are a different beast and arguably so much more work. Very frustrating to see hundreds of kids swim and the same bedraggled volunteers running the show. I’ve started to sit a few B meets out to put pressure on those parents. I think maybe giving the families that DO volunteer some kind of extra credit could be a work around vis a vis the rules though. There are also ways to track and incentivize volunteer hours—a little fun competition? Winner gets a zero gravity lounger for the next season? Who knows. But some teams obviously need to make volunteering more fun.

The families who complete their volunteer hours at our pool get an early team registration link (our management board is always threatening to cap our team size). Since the threat hasn’t been fulfilled yet, it’s not a huge prize but it’s something.

Volunteering at B meets is a lot more work than volunteering at A meets. Many of our B meet only swim parents who are in the know sign up to volunteer only at A meets.

It does make you summer swim savvy but I also find that it makes you a little bit of an a-hole to purposely volunteer at the meets your kid isn’t fast enough to make because volunteering at those meets is easier than volunteering at the meets your kid is swimming in. I totally get the people that do it because they are wrangling little ones at the B meets, but otherwise those people are also part of the problem because they are snagging volunteer slots from people who are actually at that meet.

All A meet kids swim in the B meets, though. So the "A Meet families" can just as easily work the B meets. I don't see your point.