Parents Potential Gym Change

[katrid11]

Question about changing gyms and if we are thinking about this correctly.....

My daughters gym lost their compulsory coach last year and hence lost a good portion of the compulsory team in the last few months as they have not rehired. She has also lost most of her friends now - which is why we stayed this last year despite having no permanent coach (we felt friendship in a COVID year was crucial with all the social distancing etc) Not to mention we were excited to hear the optional coaches were going to push them hard to get them to L6 as quickly as possible yet the uptraining seems to have been more sporadic than we expected.

Hence we are considering changing gyms to a larger one. Comp team is much larger as is optionals/elite. Both gyms have sent alot of girls to nationals and some elites but the larger gym is far more consistent in that. The larger gym has more girls recently recruited for college and D1/DIII schools than her current gym. Since she wants to compete in college - that is a factor for us. We are not aware that any girls are going onto college this year to compete whereas in past years (even 2020) all of our senior L10s were recruited. Not sure if this is a trend or just a situational deal or what.

Would you change gyms if your current gym was hemorrhaging girls?
Would you change gyms if you knew the new gym would push harder but your gymnast might be 1 of 10 instead of 1 of 2?
Would you change gyms if there was no long term plan to get a new compulsory coach in even though 1 of the optional coaches had done compulsory for a while in the past?
Would you change to let your daughter chase her dream of college?

FWIW the larger gym is slightly cheaper and about the same drive. So no real major changes AND 2 of her old friends will be going there...

 

[GymDadWA]

From your explanation it seems your mind is already made up to move to the bigger gym, the reasons given are all valid, best of luck to you and your daughter.

Don't worry about the size of the team, the exceptional girls always find their way into the spot light.

 

[katrid11]

From your explanation it seems your mind is already made up to move to the bigger gym, the reasons given are all valid, best of luck to you and your daughter.

Don't worry about the size of the team, the exceptional girls always find their way into the spot light.

Thanks! I think I am still wavering a bit. It is easier not to change if you know what I mean. I know my daughter loves her coaches and has been treated really well. We are going to do a trial at the larger gym tonight and see if it is really an option for us. We know in the past the timing of practices was near impossible to get to (we are 20 min away and they started preteam practices before school ended). We know 100% we are not willing to go the homeschool route yet - a well rounded child is more important to us which may mean staying at our current gym......

 

[gymgal]

How old is the child? You may want to get her input, since this is really about choice, not necessity (like an abusive situation). I would not worry about the number of elites/collegiate gymnasts. As long as they have shown they are capable and the same coaches are still there to get the girls to that level. What are they doing with the compulsory groups, if there is no permanent replacement? Are they getting receiving the training they should? What level is your dd? All these would play a part in my decision. If she only has one more year and then going into a strong optional program, I might stick it.

As for the homeschooling comment - these students tend to be very well rounded with and without sports included. It might look different but it doesn't make it less-than. Not trying to change your mind about switching to homeschooling. Just providing perspective as those types of comments rub homeschoolers the wrong way, and rightfully so.

 

[Lucia]

How old is the child? You may want to get her input, since this is really about choice, not necessity (like an abusive situation). I would not worry about the number of elites/collegiate gymnasts. As long as they have shown they are capable and the same coaches are still there to get the girls to that level. What are they doing with the compulsory groups, if there is no permanent replacement? Are they getting receiving the training they should? What level is your dd? All these would play a part in my decision. If she only has one more year and then going into a strong optional program, I might stick it.

As for the homeschooling comment - these students tend to be very well rounded with and without sports included. It might look different but it doesn't make it less-than. Not trying to change your mind about switching to homeschooling. Just providing perspective as those types of comments rub homeschoolers the wrong way, and rightfully so.

Thanks for the homeschooling support We’ve homeschooled all along so prior to our gym journey, and I really appreciate how, at least at this point in my daughter’s training, she still has room for 4H, church, field trips with friends, family, unstructured time etc. Homeschooling has given us margins. That being said, I’m lucky I don’t work full time, and we are not homeschooling for gymnastics only so gymnastics doesn’t define our homeschool.

 

[katrid11]

How old is the child? You may want to get her input, since this is really about choice, not necessity (like an abusive situation). I would not worry about the number of elites/collegiate gymnasts. As long as they have shown they are capable and the same coaches are still there to get the girls to that level. What are they doing with the compulsory groups, if there is no permanent replacement? Are they getting receiving the training they should? What level is your dd? All these would play a part in my decision. If she only has one more year and then going into a strong optional program, I might stick it.

As for the homeschooling comment - these students tend to be very well rounded with and without sports included. It might look different but it doesn't make it less-than. Not trying to change your mind about switching to homeschooling. Just providing perspective as those types of comments rub homeschoolers the wrong way, and rightfully so.

She is 8. If she stays put - her coach wants her to do Level 4 to actually have a full competition year since L2 and L3 years were both COVID impacted. She wants to test her out of L5 and either place her L6 or L7 for fall 2022 depending. I can say the coaches have clearly been pushing the upper level skills with my child.

As for homeschooling I know many people that homeschool -- we considered doing it for the 2020/21 school year. My issue is more about what I hear about this gym's homeschool program than actual homeschooling. They do the basics + gymnastics where we are looking for things like World languages, more art, music, theatre etc in the schooling program (ie - for us a more well-rounded child).

 

[katrid11]

Thanks for the homeschooling support We’ve homeschooled all along so prior to our gym journey, and I really appreciate how, at least at this point in my daughter’s training, she still has room for 4H, church, field trips with friends, family, unstructured time etc. Homeschooling has given us margins. That being said, I’m lucky I don’t work full time, and we are not homeschooling for gymnastics only so gymnastics doesn’t define our homeschool.

I want to reiterate what I just posted. We are homeschool fans - but when we do it or a specific group. I wasn't clear about my comment - this gym's homeschool program would be my concern.

 

[Lucia]

I want to reiterate what I just posted. We are homeschool fans - but when we do it or a specific group. I wasn't clear about my comment - this gym's homeschool program would be my concern.

Yes I would feel the same! I didn’t take it wrong and didn’t mean to sound defensive, I more so just got excited about our own homeschooling experience. Your thought process is wise.

 

[gymgal]

She is 8. If she stays put - her coach wants her to do Level 4 to actually have a full competition year since L2 and L3 years were both COVID impacted. She wants to test her out of L5 and either place her L6 or L7 for fall 2022 depending. I can say the coaches have clearly been pushing the upper level skills with my child.

I think that plan is a wise one, generally speaking (without knowing your dd) and if you are comfortable with the coaches at your current gym, then I would be leaning toward staying there. She will be a L7 roughly at age 10, which gives her plenty of time to train to L10 for college recruiting if she wants that.

 

[wolf_turn_on_uneven_bars]

Until your girl has changed gyms it is a scary proposition. If and after you do you realize it didn’t need to be. Lots of girls change gyms. From what I see my guess is that by level 10 more than half the girls were at another gym earlier in their career.

 

[katrid11]

UPDATE

We did make a switch and in just 3 short weeks we already sees a big difference in DD's form and her vault. The 2 things we knew were not doing well at the old gym.

While DD is making new friends and misses her old ones (what 8 yr old doesn't) but she loves having a choreographer and a main coach. She said she has never had someone correct her hands and legs so much in a floor or beam routine..... She was excited on Tuesday that she did the entire floor routine with the choreographer only correcting her form once. Serious improvement in the form.

Whether we stay here for another 8 years who knows but we know for the next year we think we made the right decision.