Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think they are stupid but younger kids like them. Even the HS swim team does them. Our summer team has the teen coaches do them, mostly during unpaid time, which is wrong.

My daughter is a teen assistant coach and while she loves everything about summer swim, she and her fellow coaches spent hours and hours making paper plate awards for every kid on her team. A truly massive amount of work.

My daughter also was a longtime coach. So time consuming to make for the full team. The kids who show up everyday and have personality get great and funny plates. The children who come once or twice a season get “ray of sunshine” to fill up a plate even if they aren’t deserving. Some kids only get a paper plate for recognition if they aren’t a good swimmer. I wish there was a simple way to means test paper plates without singling kids out or hurting feelings.

Anonymous wrote:I remember growing up and never getting a paper plate award. My brother always got one, my best friend always got one, a couple of other long-termers on the team got a few over the years, but I never got a single one.

I'm still jealous and bitter about it. Why wasn't I enough to get an award? I never said a single funny thing? I never tried my best? I never even entered the coaches' minds when making the awards?

Yes to all these. Therapy is your only hope

Anonymous wrote:Who are these teams that give Team Reps this level of power. They are supposed to work out any meet related issues with the guest or host team, not oversee coaches. That's rediculous that they have that authority.

Team reps apparently have the power to impose discipline on parent volunteers and ban swimmers from meets. They're like an HOA board.

I remember growing up and never getting a paper plate award. My brother always got one, my best friend always got one, a couple of other long-termers on the team got a few over the years, but I never got a single one.

I'm still jealous and bitter about it. Why wasn't I enough to get an award? I never said a single funny thing? I never tried my best? I never even entered the coaches' minds when making the awards?

Anonymous wrote:What is a paper plate award?

A disposable award written with marker and illustrated. Unofficial things like “cutest couple” for two bros who are always hanging out. Or something referencing a funny thing that happened that a coach observed. Rarely serious.

Our team has almost 200 swimmers. Every year the coaches make about 10-15 paper plates and all of them are funny things kids have said/done. Yes they present them at the banquet. The kids are bummed when they don’t get one, but the stories are usually quite entertaining and I can’t imagine asking the coaches to churn out 200 of these.

Our banquet is super long already. I can’t imagine making it longer

Who are these teams that give Team Reps this level of power. They are supposed to work out any meet related issues with the guest or host team, not oversee coaches. That's rediculous that they have that authority.

....Wut?

I can see it might be disappointing but with the thread title of horror I was filling expecting something like some girl got a “Bloody Mary” paper award for getting her period unexpectedly or something like that.

What is a paper plate award?

This thread is so disappointing. I was hoping for a hilarious mishap in the actual awards like biggest butt or something like that.

You guys are such whiners. We loved the paper plate awards. Ours aren’t super specific. There things like “explorer award” “smiley” “always on time” “pirate award”.

The very specific awards were given by head coach and were related to performance

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Huge team. No paper plate awards thank goodness. As a team rep, I wish parents would spend less time complaining about trivial things and more time joining the board and help running the team. Plan the banquet if you don’t like how it is run. But for the love of God stop complaining about the dumbest things.

I wish! The board and team rep only choose their friends to volunteer and help them, and are mean to the rest.

And removing a team tradition that kids cherish is not a trivial thing.

Anonymous wrote:Huge team. No paper plate awards thank goodness. As a team rep, I wish parents would spend less time complaining about trivial things and more time joining the board and help running the team. Plan the banquet if you don’t like how it is run. But for the love of God stop complaining about the dumbest things.

I wish! The board and team rep only choose their friends to volunteer and help them, and are mean to the rest.

Huge team. No paper plate awards thank goodness. As a team rep, I wish parents would spend less time complaining about trivial things and more time joining the board and help running the team. Plan the banquet if you don’t like how it is run. But for the love of God stop complaining about the dumbest things.