guys,
looking for some input...i've had several girls miss tournaments and/or tournament games and/or too many practices. it's my fault i've not had an attendance policy in place but that changes now. we're 14U.
curious what you're thoughts are (too strict, too ***, too vague) on the policy i'm about to implement. it's located here:
Lady Bomber Fastpitch
thanks,
jay
I looked at your proposed policy. You can never cover everything, but one thing that jumped out at me is the "extenuating circumstances". Of course a death in the family is one, but how about a cousin getting married? Or relatives coming into town on short notice? I could go on and on.
Another thing I noticed is that anyone could miss practice and be fine so long as they notify you before the practice? That's fine, so long as everyone knows this way in advance, such as before they accept a spot on the team. Otherwise, you'll have people missing practice left and right and you will have no way to do anything about it. That will make the more dedicated families upset. Also, I'm not sure what "prior to tournament" means. Is that 2 days before a tournament, a week, a month?
Now that the season is upon us, my advice is to go with whatever you might have laid out last fall. If you didn't specify anything then, explain to the families that you should have, and now in lieu of that, you are going to fashion something as reasonable as you can, which could be the plan you attached onto your post. And then at your tryout in the fall for 2012/2013, have something specific in writing that everyone must agree to before they join the team.
Oh, one other thing now that I'm thinking of it. The "Not start the next game" choice can be meaningless in travel ball. Most girls know they won't start every game, and if they don't actually play any less with that penalty, it has little effect.
Again, be as specific as you can in your tryout literature, leaving yourself some wiggle room. For example, I think I allowed any player to miss one tournament of their choosing (except for Nationals or Colorado) for any reason, so long as they notified me at least a month in advance and no more than one other player was already missing that tournament. If they missed more than one, they wouldn't be coming back the following year. I noted that the exceptions were few and far between and needed to be obvious, such as death in the immediate family. I think I indicated that the exceptions were to be judged solely by me and that my notion of extenuating circumstances was probably much more limited than that of most people. If you allow everyone to miss one tournament, that takes away any complaining that families can't have a non-softball vacation in the summer, especially before volleyball or other tryouts begin for school.
Again, be specific, leave yourself an out for a true emergency and then follow-up on your plan. You might need to tweak each year when you discover that a penalty is too light or too harsh.