What role, if any, should USMS play in saving college swimming? How about USA Swimming? Are either currently doing anything about the shrinking base? What can they do?
Aside from the participants themselves (including coaches), both institutions seem to be the greatest benefactors of keeping college swimming around:
USA Swimming benefits because its membership believes it has the ability to earn a scholarship or admission to a college or university that they might not otherwise. They may continue in the sport when there is the belief that they may be rewarded down the road. Some may continue training for significant International competition while not losing time on their education by competing and training while in college.
US Masters Swimming benefits because they have a significantly larger recruitment base because of existing college swimming programs.
These are affluent towns too we're talking about. It's all the impoverished inner city schools that have the teams (numbers, but not usually skill) and the pools.
As a teacher in an "impoverished inner city school" I find that laughable. Where do impoverished city schools get the money to maintain pools? Doesn't impoverished mean "without money"? My city has shut down every single public pool and our one high school pool was shut down years ago due to at least a decade's worth of deferred maintenance finally coming home to roost. Maybe CT is different from MA.
These are affluent towns too we're talking about. It's all the impoverished inner city schools that have the teams (numbers, but not usually skill) and the pools.
As a teacher in an "impoverished inner city school" I find that laughable. Where do impoverished city schools get the money to maintain pools? Doesn't impoverished mean "without money"? My city has shut down every single public pool and our one high school pool was shut down years ago due to at least a decade's worth of deferred maintenance finally coming home to roost. Maybe CT is different from MA.
