All,
I'm thinking about attending convention in three weeks. My reasons are several but most important is that I want to become more involved in USMS and I figure the best way to find out how/what/when/where is to attend convention.
Does this make sense? Would it be worthwhile?
Paul
I respectfully disagree, anything on the National level is going to take a LONG time and proceed at a slow pace. Some good ideas may come up during the course of the year and at Convention, just don't hold your breath when it comes to implementing anything.
Now on the local level, you can make a lot of changes in a fraction of the time. LMSC boards are smaller than USMS committees and meet more frequently. Local is where the action is and where changes can be put to the test. Plus, there is a great need to focus on the grass roots of swimming in order to sustain the National organization. If teams are whitering on the vine, pools are closing, and swimmers not registering *in your local community* don't expect a USMS committee to do much about it. Take action locally and devote 95% of your available energy to your LMSC, it will yield much more than serving on a USMS committee.
This is my approach and don't expect anybody to agree with it. However, both my strategy and tactics come from personal experience and observation. YMMV so proceed accordingly ;-)
Well stated Doug. Bottom line is the people who make up the organizational framework of USMS come from "local" clubs and if we don't recruit and develop people at that level first we won't have anyone to draw on to be part of committee's.
Generally speaking, if you remove competition from the discussion what does USMS do which impacts masters swimming on the local level? I don't mean this as a criticism but a legitimate question? There is the new club mentoring program which I think will be very helpful if coaches take advantage of it (Doug tapped into it for AZ right out of the gate).
The insurance situation would seem to be one of the more challenging things to be addressed, as I noted earlier one of the main reasons that people are members of USMS is that a local club requires it to cover their insurance needs. However a number of teams have self insured and found it to be more cost effective so a problem then is created for USMS as teams like Sun Devil and Dallas with very large numbers of swimmers are no longer requiring membership....only the handful of swimmers who compete register.
From my discussions with a number of coaches across the country most feel that when you take away the insurance benefit the big question becomes what does USMS provide them at the local level to make their business more profitable? Remember, as much as USMS prides itself on the voluntarism of its members the bottom line is the bottom line and that means clubs grow or die...or drift along in no mans land and turn coaches over frequently...or don't have coaches. USMS can grow if it remembers this and if it indeed can move from a "bottom up" management system to a "top down". UMHO of course!
I respectfully disagree, anything on the National level is going to take a LONG time and proceed at a slow pace. Some good ideas may come up during the course of the year and at Convention, just don't hold your breath when it comes to implementing anything.
Now on the local level, you can make a lot of changes in a fraction of the time. LMSC boards are smaller than USMS committees and meet more frequently. Local is where the action is and where changes can be put to the test. Plus, there is a great need to focus on the grass roots of swimming in order to sustain the National organization. If teams are whitering on the vine, pools are closing, and swimmers not registering *in your local community* don't expect a USMS committee to do much about it. Take action locally and devote 95% of your available energy to your LMSC, it will yield much more than serving on a USMS committee.
This is my approach and don't expect anybody to agree with it. However, both my strategy and tactics come from personal experience and observation. YMMV so proceed accordingly ;-)
Well stated Doug. Bottom line is the people who make up the organizational framework of USMS come from "local" clubs and if we don't recruit and develop people at that level first we won't have anyone to draw on to be part of committee's.
Generally speaking, if you remove competition from the discussion what does USMS do which impacts masters swimming on the local level? I don't mean this as a criticism but a legitimate question? There is the new club mentoring program which I think will be very helpful if coaches take advantage of it (Doug tapped into it for AZ right out of the gate).
The insurance situation would seem to be one of the more challenging things to be addressed, as I noted earlier one of the main reasons that people are members of USMS is that a local club requires it to cover their insurance needs. However a number of teams have self insured and found it to be more cost effective so a problem then is created for USMS as teams like Sun Devil and Dallas with very large numbers of swimmers are no longer requiring membership....only the handful of swimmers who compete register.
From my discussions with a number of coaches across the country most feel that when you take away the insurance benefit the big question becomes what does USMS provide them at the local level to make their business more profitable? Remember, as much as USMS prides itself on the voluntarism of its members the bottom line is the bottom line and that means clubs grow or die...or drift along in no mans land and turn coaches over frequently...or don't have coaches. USMS can grow if it remembers this and if it indeed can move from a "bottom up" management system to a "top down". UMHO of course!
