Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Their girls teams scoring-

08/07 lost 6-0
09 lost 0-2
10 lost 8-1
11 lost 7-0
12 lost 6-1
13 won 2-1

09 won 2-0. There are four HYS ECRL Girls teams. 07/08, 09, 11,13. Two of the four won.

What do you mean? There are 2010s and 2012s as well.

Anonymous wrote:Their girls teams scoring-

08/07 lost 6-0
09 lost 0-2
10 lost 8-1
11 lost 7-0
12 lost 6-1
13 won 2-1

09 won 2-0. There are four HYS ECRL Girls teams. 07/08, 09, 11,13. Two of the four won.

Anonymous wrote:Seems to be a major misconception in this thread about field costs, and how rec and travel work. Rec programs are the biggest money maker for any soccer program. This includes house leagues as well as rec clinics and camps. Why? because they are open to the largest volume of participants. Even though the fees are significantly lower, a house league runs with almost zero overhead cost. The coaches are volunteer and field space (yes even turf) is essentially free for youth clubs.

Youth clubs are (almost always) non-profits that receive field space allocations from the county *based on the size of their recreational programs*. The fields are priced at less than $10/hr in most cases. The reality is that all these rec players are subsidizes your travel team (which have VERY high overhead costs and are not profitable if we are talking about the top level). A healthy rec program is also essential for clubs to continue to get field space allocations from the county.

I used to be a treasurer for HYS travel before they consolidated payments to the club. Prior to Covid, each individual travel team had a team manager and treasurer who took care of ALL of the business of each team - collecting money from each player, processing scholarships, keeping the budget, paying VYSA and league fees, paying county field fees, ordering uniforms, paying coaches directly, setting up and paying for tournaments, managing player registration and player cards, scheduling field space, etc. Each team had its own bank account and checkbook. The travel fees were different for every team and were determined by the team's needs and what was collected paid for EVERYTHING - it was cost-neutral venture. No extra money collected, no extra money spent. All travel players paid HYS the same club fee that recreation players paid to the club - it was around $135 and was factored into the overall travel costs. That money is what subsidized the entire club because the majority of rec players were on scholarship which meant that they had their full club fees waived if they could prove that they were a FARMS family.

Travel players could receive a scholarship as well, but it was nominal. They got a small allotment from the club - usually about $150-200 per player per season. However, each team had a cap on the amount of scholarship money that could be received - usually 5 scholarship players per team. So if your team had 8-9 scholarship players on a travel team (as a number of boys teams did) they got less scholarship money.

Now that payments are consolidated through the club, overall costs to play HYS travel have increased sharply (it's approximately $700-1000 per year more than it used to be) and there is much less transparency about where the money is going. So while you may think that rec subsidizes travel, at least at HYS, that is definitely not the case. And there is some very shady money stuff going on there.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think this thread will likely be enough to deter any family from choosing Herndon but if you are on the fence, run the other way. We were new this year and regret our move. The club lied to lure our player on many many levels. The coach is disinterested and provides zero communication. The club is not responding to our concerns at all. This is on top of the crappy first tournament and the dangerous and cramped fields. I cannot say one good thing about this club.

Who did you reach out to? Did they just ignore you?

Julian Lee Chang. Emails were ignored. Is there someone above him?

My son's U14 team has plenty of practice space and they aren't the top team, not sure why there are so many whiners on here.

They have a half a field one night, a third of a field another night, and one night with a quarter field. Quarter field night isn't great but I don't see why people can't deal with it for one night a week without whining.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Half the Herndon travel players are on financial aid? That doesn't sound financially sustainable.

Riddle me this one, genuinely curious to hear you out:

How does the rest of the world do it?

What do you mean by rest of the world? We are talking about the finances of a youth soccer club located in the dc metro area.

our 2013 practices at Arrowbrook, I never really paid attention to the practice situation because our team has plenty of space at every practice. They play full field against one other 2013 team, no other teams are on the field with them.

Last night we were there late looking for a lost item and I was shocked to see all the older boys they crowd on to the field in the next time slot. Why would you put two younger teams on a field and then four older teams on field?

Its lucky for us I guess but it doesn't fill me with confidence that our team won't be the one screwed over next season.

I assumed every team had one night where they could play full field, we are not even the first team. They really need to be able to scrimmage to get better.

Anonymous wrote:Half the Herndon travel players are on financial aid? That doesn't sound financially sustainable.

Riddle me this one, genuinely curious to hear you out:

How does the rest of the world do it?

Anonymous wrote:I think this thread will likely be enough to deter any family from choosing Herndon but if you are on the fence, run the other way. We were new this year and regret our move. The club lied to lure our player on many many levels. The coach is disinterested and provides zero communication. The club is not responding to our concerns at all. This is on top of the crappy first tournament and the dangerous and cramped fields. I cannot say one good thing about this club.

Who did you reach out to? Did they just ignore you?

I think this thread will likely be enough to deter any family from choosing Herndon but if you are on the fence, run the other way. We were new this year and regret our move. The club lied to lure our player on many many levels. The coach is disinterested and provides zero communication. The club is not responding to our concerns at all. This is on top of the crappy first tournament and the dangerous and cramped fields. I cannot say one good thing about this club.

Anonymous wrote:Seems to be a major misconception in this thread about field costs, and how rec and travel work. Rec programs are the biggest money maker for any soccer program. This includes house leagues as well as rec clinics and camps. Why? because they are open to the largest volume of participants. Even though the fees are significantly lower, a house league runs with almost zero overhead cost. The coaches are volunteer and field space (yes even turf) is essentially free for youth clubs.

Youth clubs are (almost always) non-profits that receive field space allocations from the county *based on the size of their recreational programs*. The fields are priced at less than $10/hr in most cases. The reality is that all these rec players are subsidizes your travel team (which have VERY high overhead costs and are not profitable if we are talking about the top level). A healthy rec program is also essential for clubs to continue to get field space allocations from the county.

Sorry no idea about the field space but your statement that travel teams are not profitable is hilarious. Of course they are.

My son said it was a lot less crazy at Arrowbrook last night so maybe Herndon or the county did something.

Half the Herndon travel players are on financial aid? That doesn't sound financially sustainable.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just wondering, is that true if most of the players are on scholarships?

I would say about 50%... mind you, some scholarships are $500 for the year. Scholarship doesn't always mean that they're playing for free.

Easily half the rec players are on scholarship, not sure how that tilts the rec finances.

Anonymous wrote:Just wondering, is that true if most of the players are on scholarships?

I would say about 50%... mind you, some scholarships are $500 for the year. Scholarship doesn't always mean that they're playing for free.