FAMILY PARTICIPATION PROGRAM & SERVICE HOURS REQUIREMENT

Havasu Stingrays Swim Team

The best way to support your swimmer and the team is to volunteer. HSST is a parent run 501(c)3 organization that depends on all of its members to assist with fundraising, swim meets, social events, and more. We can only function if everyone does their fair share. Volunteers are called upon throughout the year to assist with a variety of activities to help ensure our success and to help each family fulfill their service hours requirement.

Each family is required to contribute 10 hours within the year. Single parent households are required to serve 5 hours. The Family Participation Program year runs from September 1 to August 31 each year. If a family does not meet their service hours within the year, the billing rate is $11 an hour for any time “owed” to the team as of August 31 and will be billed. However, if you fulfill the hours requirement then no additional dollars are “owed” to the team.

Each family can earn hours by helping with team operations, program and fundraising support, and swim meet operations. These jobs include, but are not limited to:

• ●  Volunteer of the Board of Directors: These positions involve a two-year commitment and heavy time demands that far exceed the annual service hours requirement. Further, some board positions require a degree of professional background or USA Swim experience in order for the candidate to be qualified. However, these are positions that are vital to the daily operations of HSST and Board seats must be filled with new faces and ideas from time to time. Elections are held at our December parent meeting. Please contact the President at [email protected] if you would like more information on current openings or review specific job descriptions on our website (under the Volunteer tab).

• ●  Become a USA Swimming Certified Official: Generally, swim officials enforce the rules, settle disputes between coaches and other officials and call swimmers to their respective blocks. It is vital to the longevity of our program to ensure we have enough officials. Certification by USA Swimming requires a personal time commitment to achieve the credentials initially and a continuing time commitment to maintain certification. It also involves the probability of being called on by other clubs who need officials in order to run their own meets. HSST has been the beneficiary of such generosity in the past. A parent who is certified by USA Swimming and who takes an active role as an official when they are called upon to help. For more information on how to become a USA Swimming Official click here.

• ●  HSST fundraising and social events: Each year, HSST hosts several events to help pay for the teamʼs overhead costs (supplies, pool time and coach salaries). The Coach Mike Memorial Lake Swim is held in May/June each year. Qualifying swimmers will take over the Bridgewater channel in memory of Coach Mike and volunteers are needed to ensure a smooth and safe event. During the month of April/May, swimmers are asked to gather donations for the Swim-a-Thon and on the evening of the event all members are asked to count their swimmerʼs

lap, assist with setup and cleanup, and contribute food to the party. Additionally, the HSST hosts several social events in order to build relationships and team spirit. Please contact the Fundraising/Event Officer at [email protected] if you would like to get involved with future events.

• ●  Volunteer at HSSTʼs home meet: We host one swim meet a year (usually in February) and it requires all- hands-on-deck. In order to run the meet smoothly, we will have about 25 positions that need to be filled. One month before the home meet we will send an email to team members asking everyone to sign up to donate a food item for our concession stand and take on at least one job. The jobs we need filled include setup and cleanup, timers, marshals, concession sales, admissions and program sales, officials, starter, announcer, meet photographer and more. Each of these jobs is accompanied by a time hour credit. When you log into the website and click on the job you are interested in, the time hour credit will be listed beside it. If job assignments are not filled within two weeks, the Board of Directors will assign jobs to people.

• ●  Volunteer at away swim meets: We are oen required to provide officials, timers and/or marshals at away meets in which we participate. We oen do not know which jobs assignments and time slots until 1- 2 days before the meet. An email will be sent to all HSST members asking people to sign up for a job. You are always welcome to share a job with another HSST parent so youʼre not working the entire shi.

  Both sign-ups for jobs and tracking of hours will be monitored. We understand things may come up, however, if at any time you cannot fulfill the commitment you signed up for itʼs your responsibility to find another HSST parent to be your replacement. This helps to ensure our teamʼs success!

Established 2018, Revised & Approved 2022