Hi Barracuda parents!

We met as our parent volunteer board last night and it was a very productive meeting. I did want to point out a few things that we decided in this meeting. While we are so excited to have such a popular swim program and a team that has grown from the 50ish kids we had when I first got involved to over 150 kids with over 25 on a waitlist, we do want to provide a fun and safe program for all of those involved. At the same time, we are a neighborhood swim club with an emphasis on being inclusive and making sure the kids are learning in a great social environment. This year, in an effort to allow as many 5/6 year olds to be a part of the team as possible, we will institute the following rules:

1. Must be able to swim 1 length from first practice

• We will strictly enforce the rule that was posted on Swimtopia and in the registration sign up. This is not swim lessons, rather a swim team. Your child certainly does not need to be proficient in swimming or know any of the swim strokes to join our team but it is very important that your child know how to swim 1 length of the pool unassisted. With the number of 5/ 6 year olds we have, it is simply not safe for the coaches to have kids at practice who can’t make it across the pool. We do plan to have a try-out the first week of practice to make sure that this rule is respected. Now is the time to register your child for lessons if this is a concern. I do believe I can get someone a full refund if they decide this might be a problem for their child as long as it is decided well before the season starts. At some point, I will be unable to get the ASA portion back but will be able to refund the $115 that goes to the Barracudas if your child is unable to swim on the team.

1. Split practice schedule

• We will split practice into (2) 30 minute sessions for the 5/6 year olds. Each parent will select the time slot they prefer on a sign up genius that we will send out prior to the season and that will be your child’s designated practice time throughout the season. If there is a one off need to change times, you will need to let the practice coordinators know so that we can assure there are not too many 5/6 year olds in the pool at one time.

1. 2 Meets per swimmer

• Unfortunately we can’t have 50+ 5/6 year olds at every meet. As you can imagine (and for those who did swim team last year) it is chaos with so many 5/6 year olds on the pool deck at the meets. 5/6 year olds also take longer than any other age group to swim their races and that can cause the meets to last too long if we have too many heats in this age group. What we are proposing is that we will send a sign up genius prior to the season. We ask that swimmers sign up for 2 meets. The goal is to have no more than 30 5/6 year old swimmers at each meet. If there are meets that have less swimmers than 30, we will open the meet up to other swimmers. We will send the sign up genius out after the 1^st practice.

1. Guppy Meet!

• We will have our first Guppy Meet on Saturday June 25^th. This will be a much more casual meet with only 5/6 year olds. We will work to make it a fun experience and get some special ribbons for our 5/6 year olds. This will not count towards the 2 meets you can sign up for.

With all this being said, we will be allowing all swimmers who were on the waitlist a chance to sign up. Then we will cap the team and only allow signup’s for the 11+ age groups. If a parent has an 11+ child with younger siblings, we will make an exception and allow the entire family to register. I do understand that not being able to swim in every meet will not be ideal for some families. I am checking with Murphy Candler to see what their numbers and capacity looks like. As of last week, they had way less 5/6 year olds. If you think your child will benefit from a smaller team and possibly more instruction, they have a great program and I would be happy to help you move teams. Please reach to [email protected] out if you have any questions.

Michael