We go to Potomac Swim and Tennis. Our strategy is to recruit the top swimmers at our club team to drive long distances to our pool. This way our team is good, and we almost always have enough officials, because kids who are that good often have parents who volunteer. Kills 2 birds with 1 stone.

Anonymous wrote:I'd actually love to get certified in S&T but I'm not a former swimmer myself and so genuinely feel that I lack the necessary experience and skills. (I can swim, but I never had to get legal in breast or fly myself even though I learned them.) Most or perhaps even all of our team's officials are former (real) swimmers. How do other folks feel about this? What should I do? In the meantime I volunteer in lots of other ways.

I'm not a swimmer but our family's first year on the team someone suggested that I do it and it's been great. You need to know the rules and how to apply them, and it helps you really understand your child's sport and what's happening.

To answer OP's question, we talk about volunteers at our pre-season parents meeting. We usually have a separate officials interest meeting on deck during one of our early season practices where our officials coordinator and a few current officials hang out to answer questions from parents who are interested. For critical jobs like ref and starter, the reps and officials coordinator start to talk to good candidate parents a year or two in advance so that they can shadow for a year and see if they like it, and get on the job training in addition to the NVSL classes.

We have lots of experienced parents but always want new ones in all roles so we may pre-populate some shifts with at least one experienced parent so that there is someone to train newbies. For example this is for things like data table or clerk of course.

We do sign ups through Swimtopia and our website has a description of each role, including whether experience is needed and the type of personality who might fit a particular role. At B meets, we also split shifts. It may mean we need more volunteers but it also means no one besides the ref is stuck for a long night which makes things more appealing.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Nothing. It’s the same few people. Team rep needs to be replaced.

I find this bizarre- so the same people do it over and over and over for years and years and you don’t bother trying to get new officials? I would hate to be an official at your pool, geez

I actually think this is part of the problem. Our team definitely has a clique of timers (I'm in the group now, but it was super intimidating when we first joined the team). The same is true for the moms running the tents. I get why this can be easier, but it makes it really hard for new people to get comfortable. Team reps need to take the lead here.

Our pool lets/encourages anyone to time. The families that are more involved get encouraged to either do table or get certified to start judging

You take the lead. If you see a problem and have a solution, offer to help own and drive it. The team rep is also a volunteer like you and has limited capacity to take the lead on much else.

This was in response to 7/10 14:22, sorry

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Nothing. It’s the same few people. Team rep needs to be replaced.

I find this bizarre- so the same people do it over and over and over for years and years and you don’t bother trying to get new officials? I would hate to be an official at your pool, geez

I actually think this is part of the problem. Our team definitely has a clique of timers (I'm in the group now, but it was super intimidating when we first joined the team). The same is true for the moms running the tents. I get why this can be easier, but it makes it really hard for new people to get comfortable. Team reps need to take the lead here.

Our pool lets/encourages anyone to time. The families that are more involved get encouraged to either do table or get certified to start judging

You take the lead. If you see a problem and have a solution, offer to help own and drive it. The team rep is also a volunteer like you and has limited capacity to take the lead on much else.

Anonymous wrote:This is not a problem unique to swimming. It's the always the same small set of parents that are the Boy Scout leaders, Girl Scout leaders, soccer coaches, basketball coaches, baseball coaches, swim officials, etc, etc.

Swim is unique in that it requires far more volunteers to run a single meet than any of the groups you mentioned. If parents are going to sign up their kids, they should either step up and volunteer or pay a fine.

Anonymous wrote:This is not a problem unique to swimming. It's the always the same small set of parents that are the Boy Scout leaders, Girl Scout leaders, soccer coaches, basketball coaches, baseball coaches, swim officials, etc, etc.

What’s stopping you from becoming one of them? Oh right, you don’t actually want to put in the time and work, you just want to complain that they don’t bow and scrape when you show up to do your few required volunteer hours.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Nothing. It’s the same few people. Team rep needs to be replaced.

I find this bizarre- so the same people do it over and over and over for years and years and you don’t bother trying to get new officials? I would hate to be an official at your pool, geez

I actually think this is part of the problem. Our team definitely has a clique of timers (I'm in the group now, but it was super intimidating when we first joined the team). The same is true for the moms running the tents. I get why this can be easier, but it makes it really hard for new people to get comfortable. Team reps need to take the lead here.

Our pool lets/encourages anyone to time. The families that are more involved get encouraged to either do table or get certified to start judging

Maybe Communism doesn't always eork.

Money can be exchanged for services.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Nothing. It’s the same few people. Team rep needs to be replaced.

I find this bizarre- so the same people do it over and over and over for years and years and you don’t bother trying to get new officials? I would hate to be an official at your pool, geez

I actually think this is part of the problem. Our team definitely has a clique of timers (I'm in the group now, but it was super intimidating when we first joined the team). The same is true for the moms running the tents. I get why this can be easier, but it makes it really hard for new people to get comfortable. Team reps need to take the lead here.

Yep. Our team rep is extremely unfriendly to new parents. Some of the other parents are welcoming and it makes a big difference but the actual rep is terribly uninclusive. I have a littler kid and multiple parents of her peers have said they are scared of her and thus don't volunteer.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Nothing. It’s the same few people. Team rep needs to be replaced.

I find this bizarre- so the same people do it over and over and over for years and years and you don’t bother trying to get new officials? I would hate to be an official at your pool, geez

I actually think this is part of the problem. Our team definitely has a clique of timers (I'm in the group now, but it was super intimidating when we first joined the team). The same is true for the moms running the tents. I get why this can be easier, but it makes it really hard for new people to get comfortable. Team reps need to take the lead here.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If your team has year round swimmers, surely some of those parents are trained as S&T judges, etc? That's where we get ours and we usually have enough so they only work half the meet.

There are so many year-round swim parents who do not volunteer it makes me sad- some of the parents are from NCap, which of course has a pretty hefty fine if you don’t time during the year so maybe they are burnt out, who knows.

We have two refs and four S&T, which means they are all working almost every meet- is that normal?

Our summer swim team of about 185 swimmers has 3 refs and 8 S&T. The stroke and turns generally work half of each meet while the refs generally work the entire meet.

This is not a problem unique to swimming. It's the always the same small set of parents that are the Boy Scout leaders, Girl Scout leaders, soccer coaches, basketball coaches, baseball coaches, swim officials, etc, etc.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:But the fees waived idea for S&T officials fleet isn’t really fair. Reps do all the heavy lifting by planning swim team starting in the winter and organizing team, managing payroll, interviewing, hire coaching team,…. In fact, they should get fees waived too!

We are impressed that some well-organized MCSL team charges families who don’t want to volunteer. Great incentive and brilliant!

Our rep gets free pool membership and their kids are the lifeguards, swim coaches/lessons, and much more. They exclude other families and kids from doing it and then complain. Its exhausting to listen to them. The better swim team kids left this year to coach at other pools so we don't have enough coaches or ones who are year-round team who are experienced. Its a money grab and its run out several families and more are leaving.

Does your rep have octuplets? I have trouble believing that all the lifeguards, and swim coaches are children of the same person.

They have multiple kids, plus their friend's kids and other relatives. Some of the kids do multiple roles.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:But the fees waived idea for S&T officials fleet isn’t really fair. Reps do all the heavy lifting by planning swim team starting in the winter and organizing team, managing payroll, interviewing, hire coaching team,…. In fact, they should get fees waived too!

We are impressed that some well-organized MCSL team charges families who don’t want to volunteer. Great incentive and brilliant!

Our rep gets free pool membership and their kids are the lifeguards, swim coaches/lessons, and much more. They exclude other families and kids from doing it and then complain. Its exhausting to listen to them. The better swim team kids left this year to coach at other pools so we don't have enough coaches or ones who are year-round team who are experienced. Its a money grab and its run out several families and more are leaving.

Does your rep have octuplets? I have trouble believing that all the lifeguards, and swim coaches are children of the same person.

step kids maybe? or maybe swim rep adopted kids

Polygamy? Or maybe one of those vampire parents who bites teenagers and pretends they adopted them.

Or PP just can't possibly imagine someone else's kid other than theirs deserves a job.