Anonymous
Post 07/19/2025 20:54     Subject: PVS Champa not letting parents in

There are plenty of coaches on this forum. Can any of you suggest these changes to PBS so at least parents can get into watch their kids? We are the ones paying the bills for everything at the end of the day.
Anonymous
Post 07/19/2025 20:52     Subject: PVS Champa not letting parents in
Coaches were not timing on Friday at finals. I was there there were plenty of parents plus some. The guards still didn’t let parents in. We were all talking about it on deck.
Anonymous
Post 07/19/2025 20:10     Subject: PVS Champa not letting parents in
Anonymous wrote:I was there Friday night. A large security guard told the parents who were watching their kids swim the 800 through the glass windows (coaches were timing) that he needed to "clear the hallway or he was going to get someone with a badge to do it and you won't like what happens.". Some parents missed their kids' swims entirely, though I thought you had to tine your kid for anything 400 and over. Once they decided to let parents into the pool area, the woman guard demanded to do bag inspections before each person entered (not sure why they couldn't do this when everyone was lined up in the hallway).
Anonymous
Post 07/19/2025 19:30     Subject: PVS Champa not letting parents in
I was there Friday night. A large security guard told the parents who were watching their kids swim the 800 through the glass windows (coaches were timing) that he needed to "clear the hallway or he was going to get someone with a badge to do it and you won't like what happens.". Some parents missed their kids' swims entirely, though I thought you had to tine your kid for anything 400 and over. Once they decided to let parents into the pool area, the woman guard demanded to do bag inspections before each person entered (not sure why they couldn't do this when everyone was lined up in the hallway).
Anonymous
Post 07/19/2025 18:48     Subject: PVS Champa not letting parents in
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:To those of you that were texting with your kids- how? The whole Eppley area is a complete SOS dead zone for Verizon. No calls or texts get through anywhere near the building. And try to sign up for a job on the sign-up genius? Nope.

And + another one to timing half the meet. I’d rather wait outside in the sun or snow for 90 minutes while my kids swims two events than time the whole meet, staying 2+ hours after kid is done for the day and overtired. If my kid is staying towards the end, sign me up for the whole session.

Send them as texts not iMessages, log onto the wifi.



? I’m old.
Anonymous
Post 07/19/2025 17:40     Subject: PVS Champa not letting parents in
Anonymous wrote:To those of you that were texting with your kids- how? The whole Eppley area is a complete SOS dead zone for Verizon. No calls or texts get through anywhere near the building. And try to sign up for a job on the sign-up genius? Nope.

And + another one to timing half the meet. I’d rather wait outside in the sun or snow for 90 minutes while my kids swims two events than time the whole meet, staying 2+ hours after kid is done for the day and overtired. If my kid is staying towards the end, sign me up for the whole session.

Send them as texts not iMessages, log onto the wifi.
Anonymous
Post 07/19/2025 17:04     Subject: PVS Champa not letting parents in
To those of you that were texting with your kids- how? The whole Eppley area is a complete SOS dead zone for Verizon. No calls or texts get through anywhere near the building. And try to sign up for a job on the sign-up genius? Nope.

And + another one to timing half the meet. I’d rather wait outside in the sun or snow for 90 minutes while my kids swims two events than time the whole meet, staying 2+ hours after kid is done for the day and overtired. If my kid is staying towards the end, sign me up for the whole session.
Anonymous
Post 07/19/2025 16:12     Subject: PVS Champa not letting parents in
Anonymous wrote:The big mistake at Open champs was using a google form instead of SignUp genius for volunteer signups so no one had any clue how short they were on timers. I have heard that PVS itself is not happy with how that meet was organized and there were challenges in the lead up.

But I agree that there needs to be a better way to incentivize parents. I know some teams have fees if parents don’t volunteer but I’ve been told by multiple parents they don’t care about another $100 so they will just pay it.


+1

They did the same thing for Sr champs last weekend and I thought it was so weird because you had no idea if they had 1 timer or 20. People are more inclined when they can see how many people have or have not signed up.

I also think there is a plus and minus to teams having volunteer requirements. People who have met then by LC season peace out on volunteering and those who have not or ar close but still won't get there figure their money is already gone/they aren't getting their refund so why bother.
Anonymous
Post 07/19/2025 15:59     Subject: Re:PVS Champa not letting parents in
facts are needed to make assumptions. Half of the timers used to start the meet were coaches and or kids under age of 10 to get meet started. Until volunteers replaced coaches and kids, doors remained closed. This is not a PVS problem. This is a team problem. Each team needs to provide timers. Get with your team rep and work out the details.
Anonymous
Post 07/19/2025 15:53     Subject: Re:PVS Champa not letting parents in
Test
Anonymous
Post 07/19/2025 15:13     Subject: Re:PVS Champa not letting parents in
Happened last week at senior Champs as someone else said. I think the security was kinda rude BUT I don't really blame them. They are tasked with the job and have to do what their superiors mandate.

Anonymous
Post 07/19/2025 15:13     Subject: Re:PVS Champa not letting parents in
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:They should seriously consider having 1/2 meet shifts with a 10 min break to switch out timers. If my kid is the third event I’m not willing to time the entire meet but I would time 1/2 the session and parents with kids in late events could still arrive later in the meet and time.


+1M!!!

I’ve thought this so many times. I’d happily time half the meet and get an up close view of my kid swimming. But normally she is only swimming half of it and I don’t want to hang around the entire time once she is already done. So so stupid to not allow for this.


When our team fills timer slots at other meets, we do this - someone texts the team chat, “I’ll time events 1-10 on Friday, can someone take 11-20?”, and we swap out. Or someone will volunteer and ask if someone can relieve them for events x and y if they want to film their kids.

I think the meet directors don’t do this because they don’t want to deal with trying to track down 32 timers as opposed to 16 timers each session. It would be problematic if the second half timer didn’t show up, or showed up late. It works better if you can split the shifts with someone you know and trust.
Anonymous
Post 07/19/2025 15:03     Subject: PVS Champa not letting parents in
Anonymous wrote:UMD is trash. They need to move the meet to George Mason.



It's not the venue, it's the execution/management of the event - simply moving to another location doesn't solve this.

Anonymous
Post 07/19/2025 14:59     Subject: PVS Champa not letting parents in
UMD is trash. They need to move the meet to George Mason.
Anonymous
Post 07/19/2025 14:41     Subject: PVS Champa not letting parents in
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:NCAP brought in college students from Marymount to time finals at NCI, which was awesome. They absolutely need to come up with a solution to this. Because it was BS that people that timed for prelims couldn’t get in and were treated just like the parents who never volunteer. What is my incentive to volunteer, I’ll just wait it out like everyone else then. Part of it is also the session set up. It started with the 800 free and it wasn’t parent timed. You’re going to be hard pressed to find someone that wants to time someone else’s kid swimming the 800. On the flip side, for the last events tonight, the 200 breast, those parents were not necessarily there when doors opened or the meet started.


The fastest heat of the distance event is never parent timed at finals.

The host team needs to require their parents to time one or two sessions whether they have a swimmer or not. When host teams have taken this approach, they haven’t run into these issues.


No parent is driving to IMD to time if their kid isn’t racing…unreasonable and unrealistic to expect this

I agree, there are more than enough parents there to not have to require parents of kids not swimming to volunteer.


Agreed, but any DC swimming in the meet from the host club should have parents assigned to at least one session for timing. When our club hosted meets, we all had to take 1 or 2 timing sessions or kid didn’t swim. We also donated food and drinks for the meet.


We’ve done the same. It’s on the host team to have parents work at minimum one session.