Recruiting

Connie- believe it or not, I've been plowing through every word. Little wonder that heat arises with some of this stuff as inevitably the philosophical/political aspects ignite passions somewhat reflective of the vehement debates usually along party lines that define acrimony. What I think everyone is trying (or should be) for the pragmatic fixes to some of the dysfunctions identified. What has come out in some of the later posts is how different the experiences are for different clubs & their swimmers depending on affiliation, historical factors, regional economy, political will- you name it, all rendering a debate very difficult because we're all reflecting our different experiences. To illustrate, here are my two main club experiences since entering masters (1984): North Vancouver was my first club & their pool time & coaching were all provided by the municipality as a recreation program: you could pay drop in, monthly, seasonally etc. Their insurance covered in-pool practise issues. If you wanted to join the master's swim club, all you paid was the registration fee to Masters B.C. After a year or so I began to realize that this was an unusual setup compared to other swimmers I met at meets & seeing as I bumped into the then administrator for recreation programming at a party, I asked about it & received this (abridged) reply, "We regard exercise among the highest strategies to avoid catastrophic loads on our health care system, both from people who are seniors now & from the baby boomers just entering ages of higher risk. We can pay now, or pay a lot more later." Nanaimo was my next & current club. We are orgaization that rents pool time period. The city has a six level scheme that it slots users into that determines both fee level & pool priority. When I first arrived, we were a 'level 2' (same as age group, synchro etc), then a new administration arrived that reclassified us as a level 6 (the lowest, same as a for-profit scuba lesson rental for example), as well, they tried to get us to swim at 11pm at night. We spent a great deal of political capital getting most of the damage reversed (age discrimination suit threatened etc., 'cause the age groupers had stayed high priority). Nasty situation, grudges nursed, etc. A new pool has eased things, but never have I experienced the sense of being valued as a user that North Vancouver projected. Lest I write a novel here, my point in detailing this has only be illustrative of two different experiences; imagine across USMS membership.

Connie- believe it or not, I've been plowing through every word. Little wonder that heat arises with some of this stuff as inevitably the philosophical/political aspects ignite passions somewhat reflective of the vehement debates usually along party lines that define acrimony. What I think everyone is trying (or should be) for the pragmatic fixes to some of the dysfunctions identified. What has come out in some of the later posts is how different the experiences are for different clubs & their swimmers depending on affiliation, historical factors, regional economy, political will- you name it, all rendering a debate very difficult because we're all reflecting our different experiences. To illustrate, here are my two main club experiences since entering masters (1984): North Vancouver was my first club & their pool time & coaching were all provided by the municipality as a recreation program: you could pay drop in, monthly, seasonally etc. Their insurance covered in-pool practise issues. If you wanted to join the master's swim club, all you paid was the registration fee to Masters B.C. After a year or so I began to realize that this was an unusual setup compared to other swimmers I met at meets & seeing as I bumped into the then administrator for recreation programming at a party, I asked about it & received this (abridged) reply, "We regard exercise among the highest strategies to avoid catastrophic loads on our health care system, both from people who are seniors now & from the baby boomers just entering ages of higher risk. We can pay now, or pay a lot more later." Nanaimo was my next & current club. We are orgaization that rents pool time period. The city has a six level scheme that it slots users into that determines both fee level & pool priority. When I first arrived, we were a 'level 2' (same as age group, synchro etc), then a new administration arrived that reclassified us as a level 6 (the lowest, same as a for-profit scuba lesson rental for example), as well, they tried to get us to swim at 11pm at night. We spent a great deal of political capital getting most of the damage reversed (age discrimination suit threatened etc., 'cause the age groupers had stayed high priority). Nasty situation, grudges nursed, etc. A new pool has eased things, but never have I experienced the sense of being valued as a user that North Vancouver projected. Lest I write a novel here, my point in detailing this has only be illustrative of two different experiences; imagine across USMS membership.