Parent Guidelines

Welcome to the exciting world of swimming! Swimming is a fantastic family-oriented sport that should be a pleasurable experience for your child. Here are our parent guidelines to help you make this a reality.

  • Let your child know that he/she is the child you love first and a swimmer second.
  • Encourage your swimmer lovingly.
  • Please see coaches before or after (not during!) practice with any concerns or questions.
  • Please do not try to communicate with your child during practice unless it is an emergency.
  • Please observe practices from the outside of the pool behind the glass on the bleachers.  Parents on deck are a distraction to the swimmers and coaches who are hard at work.
  • If you have a question or concern, address it privately with your child’s coach.  If you feel your concern has not been properly answered or addressed, please see Coach Mike.
  • Stay informed by checking e-mail, team bulletin boards, and the NCAC website at www.pvbluewave.com.
  • Do not overburden your child with pressure to win or achieve best times. Swimmers perform best when they are relaxed.
  • Let your child’s swimming be his or her own.  Encourage the swimmer’s ownership of his/her participation and refrain from reliving your own athletic career through your child.
  • Keep your swimming conversations with your child positive and have only positive things to say about the team and coach.
  • Back the coach on his/her decisions even if you don’t agree.
  • Do not try to coach your child. This is very confusing to them and weakens the coach-athlete relationship.  Even well-intentioned advice can be destructive.
  • Let the child start the conversation when it comes to talking about swimming and then LISTEN.
  • Be willing to volunteer when the team hosts meets or needs parent support.  Your participation shows your child that his/her swimming is important to you.
  • With a positive attitude and willingness to lend a hand you can have a tremendous impact on your child’s athletic environment and his/her love of swimming

Please refer to the Parents Corner located under the RESOURCES tab for great articles and invaluable information.