Parents just need to rant

[twinklytoes9468]

So I am both a coach and a parent (I don't coach my own kids) but I am posting this from a parents point of view. My kids have been going to the same gym for 5 years and I must have paid them thousands and thousands of pounds.Yet I never feel treated as a customer.
Because it's a gymnastics club parents and gymnasts are just expected to suck up crap like being financially fleeced, favouritism, mediocre coaching. You can't question anything without feeling you will be labelled a 'pushy parent', be met with defensiveness (or sulking) and hostility.
Why do we put up with it!!

(rant over)

 

[Deleted member D3987]

yikes!

 

[Becauseisaid]

Why do we put up with it!!

I guess that's the question, isn't it?

 

[x98peterson]

Healthcare used to be the same way...... until the government starting using "pay for performance" guidelines. Maybe you should refuse to pay unless you get the "podium". lol

 

[munchkin3]

I do find your post compelling. I especially have questioned why as a parent, the gymnastics coaches, or owners generally dislike dealing with parents, deeming them CGM or thinking their kid is the most important.
I have always hated approaching the coaches to talk about my kids gymnastics because I can see the body language.....oh, no, here we go again....(with the exception of one of our coaches who freely discusses the kids and likes any and all ideas)
Our kids are the most important (to us) and their gymnastics progress does depend on us....and we do know a thing or two about our kid relating to gymnastics....
Interesting dynamic really.

 

[gymdog]

You're a coach at this gym? How strange.

 

[twinklytoes9468]

You're a coach at this gym? How strange.

No another gym - they do a different discipline

 

[gymdog]

Makes more sense

 

[blueredzone]

I talk with the front desk people. I very rarely talk to the coach. That is only when they approach me. I mainly discuss our ds that is in rec not our dd who is on team

 

[Deleted member 14190]

huh

 

[leotardmakermum]

My daughter has been at a gym where the gym was designed so that parents could not physically get anywhere near coaches. It completely hampered any communication at all. Now, I can understand that coaches do not want to be at the beck and call of parents who want to know when their Susie will get her kip. However, there were times when we turned up late due to a physio appointment for an injury and I needed to communicate the new version of the training plan to the coach. I was not allowed to go to the gym floor, and the coaches were not allowed to leave the gym floor. There was a large distance between the two. I could have written him a note for my daughter to take in to him, but if he'd had any questions, we would have had to continue passing notes - ridiculous, when a conversation would have worked so much better. We could have also had an extremely private (NOT!) conversation yelling over the balcony at one another.

That gym did an excellent job of communicating to parents that we were simply there to pay the bills, but apart from that, they wanted nothing to do with us. This was a very major reason for us leaving.

My daughter has also been in gyms where parents are freely able to discuss anything with coaches. "Susie is having a hard time at the moment because her school teacher has just left, and she misses him. If she seems a little out of sorts, that will be why." "Susie's knee was sore again after practice yesterday, and we're seeing the doctor tomorrow." I love gyms like this, because they show that the gym respects and values parents.

I don't want to be shunned by the gym. In my opinion, parents are an important stakeholder in gym relationships. The relationships should work in a triangle: gymnast/parent, gymnast/coach, coach/parent. All of those relationships are important, some more-so in some situations than others.

 

[gymmomx2]

My daughter has also been in gyms where parents are freely able to discuss anything with coaches. "Susie is having a hard time at the moment because her school teacher has just left, and she misses him. If she seems a little out of sorts, that will be why." "Susie's knee was sore again after practice yesterday, and we're seeing the doctor tomorrow." I love gyms like this, because they show that the gym respects and values parents.

I don't want to be shunned by the gym. In my opinion, parents are an important stakeholder in gym relationships. The relationships should work in a triangle: gymnast/parent, gymnast/coach, coach/parent. All of those relationships are important, some more-so in some situations than others.

Totally agree with you and what I quoted is the way it works at both the gyms where my kids train.

 

[BachFlyer]

My daughter has been at a gym where the gym was designed so that parents could not physically get anywhere near coaches. It completely hampered any communication at all. Now, I can understand that coaches do not want to be at the beck and call of parents who want to know when their Susie will get her kip. However, there were times when we turned up late due to a physio appointment for an injury and I needed to communicate the new version of the training plan to the coach. I was not allowed to go to the gym floor, and the coaches were not allowed to leave the gym floor. There was a large distance between the two. I could have written him a note for my daughter to take in to him, but if he'd had any questions, we would have had to continue passing notes - ridiculous, when a conversation would have worked so much better. We could have also had an extremely private (NOT!) conversation yelling over the balcony at one another.

That gym did an excellent job of communicating to parents that we were simply there to pay the bills, but apart from that, they wanted nothing to do with us. This was a very major reason for us leaving.

My daughter has also been in gyms where parents are freely able to discuss anything with coaches. "Susie is having a hard time at the moment because her school teacher has just left, and she misses him. If she seems a little out of sorts, that will be why." "Susie's knee was sore again after practice yesterday, and we're seeing the doctor tomorrow." I love gyms like this, because they show that the gym respects and values parents.

I don't want to be shunned by the gym. In my opinion, parents are an important stakeholder in gym relationships. The relationships should work in a triangle: gymnast/parent, gymnast/coach, coach/parent. All of those relationships are important, some more-so in some situations than others.

I wish I could like your post 5 million times. I feel as though your old gym is more standard than not. It is a culture.

 

[SPX]

My daughter has been at a gym where the gym was designed so that parents could not physically get anywhere near coaches. It completely hampered any communication at all. Now, I can understand that coaches do not want to be at the beck and call of parents who want to know when their Susie will get her kip. However, there were times when we turned up late due to a physio appointment for an injury and I needed to communicate the new version of the training plan to the coach. I was not allowed to go to the gym floor, and the coaches were not allowed to leave the gym floor. There was a large distance between the two. I could have written him a note for my daughter to take in to him, but if he'd had any questions, we would have had to continue passing notes - ridiculous, when a conversation would have worked so much better. We could have also had an extremely private (NOT!) conversation yelling over the balcony at one another.

That gym did an excellent job of communicating to parents that we were simply there to pay the bills, but apart from that, they wanted nothing to do with us. This was a very major reason for us leaving.

My daughter has also been in gyms where parents are freely able to discuss anything with coaches. "Susie is having a hard time at the moment because her school teacher has just left, and she misses him. If she seems a little out of sorts, that will be why." "Susie's knee was sore again after practice yesterday, and we're seeing the doctor tomorrow." I love gyms like this, because they show that the gym respects and values parents.

I don't want to be shunned by the gym. In my opinion, parents are an important stakeholder in gym relationships. The relationships should work in a triangle: gymnast/parent, gymnast/coach, coach/parent. All of those relationships are important, some more-so in some situations than others.

Your old gym sounds just like ds's old gym, except they added glass between the balcony and the gym floor to complete the separation, then started telling team parents (including pre-team) that they shouldn't be there. Surprisingly the ds's coach for developmental was great and came out to the lobby after the class specifically to talk to the parents, even though it was awkward as all get-out and he got flack for it from management several times. Once ds moved to pre-team we never had any contact with his new coach. The anti-parent attitude was one of the reasons we left that gym and it was indicative of other problems at the gym. Happily, ds's new gym is nothing like that and his pre-team coach usually wanders through the huge waiting/viewing area, which is right next to the gym floor, both before and after practice and often is looking for a few parents to talk to about specific things or just to let you know "he had a rough evening and might be a bit down about x" or " hey he got y" or " he really worked hard today". It is very nice because a) I know next-to-nothing about gymnastics, so it helps to be prompted when to congratulate and b) ds is not the most communicative soul especially if he is upset about something, so it helps to know where the sore spots might be so I don't inadvertently poke them.

So I guess my answer to the OPs question "why do we put up with it?" is maybe we shouldn't. After all, if that adversarial approach annoys enough parents who vote with their feet & wallet, the gym will not remain open long, while the ones with a more collaborative approach will thrive. I'm not saying, stick your nose in and be a CGM or relocate over minor things but as a wonderful coach at a another gym we looked at told me "we are raising kids not just gymnasts" and the behavior they see and experience has a huge influence on them. Of course if you are in an area with only one gym and a little one who really wants to do gym, then you have a harder choice.

 

[leotardmakermum]

SPX, I think you've hit the nail on the head with "We are raising kids not just gymnasts". Gyms which treat the gymnasts as people with feelings and an outside life, which acknowledge and place value on school education by not cutting into it much or at all, and which treat parents as people who are trying to raise well-rounded human beings not automatons who can only fling themselves around in a gym - those are the gyms that I want to be involved with.

If you're going to treat me as a chequebook, or my child ONLY as a gymnast, well I'm sorry, but I'm not hanging around long.

That said, even within those gyms, there are often absolute gems of coaches who love and value their gymnasts and are interested in and concerned for their general wellbeing.

 

[TxGymMom1]

My daughter's gym also practices the "Great Divide" -- they even have an awesome 2nd floor seating area - that they will not allow anyone to use because it may "encourage" team parents to stay and watch more. Our gym created this "team chat" thing where the coaches can communicate special events and such to us, but there is no way possible to speak to them one on one about your child. I am not about putting my info "out on the street" so I do not communicate with them via the chat room on anything personal. If she is going to miss a practice, I simply phone the gym and say she "wont be there" -- knowing full well the coaches want to know "why." If they want to know, they can call and ask -- one to one -- like it should be Parents are needed at our gym to PAY BILLS ONLY.

 

[wgymmom]

Yep, we're a "just pay and shut up" gym too. YES, I do ask questions about my DD, and I always feel like I've committed some huge blunder and made everybody mad afterwards. I was even questioned by the former HC how well I knew my DD. Guess what - I DID know her better than he did.

 

[Anna's_Mom]

Physically our gym is set up about the same way, and it is really difficult to talk to a coach at practice time because they move from one class/practice to another, so if they stop to talk to a parent another entire class or practice is waiting on the coach. The only time it was possible to talk to the HC easily is if there is a major problem with gymnast, then CH and owner call a meeting with parent and gymnast (happened to us once -- it was icky and I still resent the entire episode). However, our HC started sending email announcements of things and I decided that email was the answer. So when I have a question or need to communicate something, I email him. We've had several exchanges that would have been much, much better in person but this was the best that was available. Not sure how he feels about it, but also not sure I care if he is unhappy about it. He answers and that's all I need. DD is never going to be his top gymnast nor his favorite, and perhaps this puts me in the roll of CGM, but I'm protecting her and a balance in her life, and that of our family. So far, it seems to be a reasonable approach.

 

[munchkin3]

On the other hand, my kids were at a gym where the parents had extreme communication with the coaches.....waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay to much drama, arguments, parents deciding levels, etc. At our new gym, I have not even spoken to my sons coaches......I only speak with the head coach....I am so happy.
No drama, no nonsense...

 

[3gymgirls]

We are blessed to be at a gym with excellent communication. Coaches happily give their mobile phone number to team parents so you can text if your child is missing practice. Last night at practice, my daughter was feeling sick and I was running errands. Coach called me herself to pick up my daughter.

We are also free to stay and watch practice as often or as rarely as we like. I know from reading other comments on here we are spoiled.