Wondering if anyone has an answer for this....

I'm the new membership chair. Like every club I've ever know, if the skater is under 18, parent must join club, even for associates. So I get this email from an associate member's mom saying she doesn't skate, she doesn't feel she needs to join. I pass this on to the president, figuring, it's not my place to fight over this. President sends nice email about how this give the skater a voice in the club, since being under 18 they can't vote or serve on the board but a parent can. Very nice except associate members don't vote. So now she's like "well why should I tell her the parent has to join?" I'm figuring there must be some legal reason. Just for practical reasons you can't run a club made up only of children....I'd just tell her "that's the rules, like it or lump it" but that's why I'm not the prez...

j

I'm sure this differs within each individual club; however at my skating club, there are several membership choices, one of which is the Non-Skating Adult membership. This membership includes: Registration with USFSA; Skating Magazine; IceBurgh Newsletter (club newletter); voting privileges; and eligiblility to serve on the Board of Directors after one year of membership. So with my club, this membership does provide voting privileges.

Then there's our Full Member Home Club membership, which seems like what you're talking about. This is mainly for skaters of any age; however there are some interesting things to note. Like the Non-Skating Adult membership, this includes: Registration with USFSA; Skating Magazine; IceBurgh Newsletter; one Parental Membership if under 18; voting privileges; and eligiblility to serve on the Board of Directors after one year of membership. Interesting, isn't it...

Other things to note: First, the Full Member Home Club membership costs $210.00 as opposed to the Non-Skating Adult membership, which is only $60.00. Secondly, both memberships offer voting privileges - why pay $210.00 for what you can get for $60.00, especially if you already have a skater over the age of 18?

I'm sure legal issues do play an important role in these memberships. I know when I was younger, both my parents joined as Non-Skating Adults (this was at a different club though), so that they could vote. When I turned 18, I had voting priviledges, so they dropped one membership and kept the other for my sister, who is two years younger than me. Like I said, I'm sure this differs with different clubs, but I just thought I'd share what my club offers...

What does your club mean by Associate Member? For us, that's somebody who has a primary membership with another club, and we're their second club. Their annual fee is lower, they can't vote or be on the board, and a parent doesn't have to join. We also have a Junior Club membership, at a much lower cost, for skaters who haven't tested yet. It includes the parent, but they have no voting rights. We require parents to join with a full-member skater under the age of 18 - the cost for both of them is higher than it would be for a single membership, but not by much.

The number of delegates that your club gets at Governing Council depends on the number of members that you have. Consequently, it is important for you to register as many parents as you can, if you want to have a voice in the way that things are run.

Associate member is someone who has their USFS membership with another club and they are just basically joining our club so they can skate on our ice.

I know there are lots of membership categories...but as far as I know, no club lets a skater under 18 be a member by themselves without a parent having some kind of membership as well. That's our rule. President was just looking for a way to justify it to a parent who doesn't want to join. Of course when you get down to it - that's our rules and if you want to join, you abide by the rules or you don't. I just wondered if there were some legal or USFS regulations about it.

She finally told the parent she has to join because she is the one that signs the club contract for ice and a minor can't sign a contract.

j

I'm pretty sure our old club did not require parental membership, but they had a large adult skater membership. At this point, I think that's all they have! It's a pity, because they now don't have enough members to buy indoor ice.

General members never signed a club contract for ice, only officers of the club did that in my old club.

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Our club doesn't require parent membership either, and we have quite a few skaters as members who do not have parent-members, although we do encourage parents to join. The parent still signs the club ice contract on the child's behalf.

You mean the Club's contract with the rink, jskater meant the skater's contract with the Club.

The "Underage Contract" is a good point. I used to coach swimming at a facility where the nutty owner made 14-year olds sign "contracts" to assist at practices. It didn't help, they still went no-show, but a parent who was also a lawyer said the same thing: underage people cannot be held to signed contracts. Since the kids' parents hadn't signed the committment, it was invalid.

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I'm still not sure that the ability to sign a contract is a valid reason to require an adult to join the club- after all in any other circumstance I've come across in real life, a parent/guardian signature is required for the child. The test forms I recently submitted all just had a line that said Signature of applicant OR signature of parent/guardian if applicant is under 18. Why would club ice not do the same?

I don't recall ever having heard this rule before- so if it is not one the USFSA created, I would imagine it was created by the club to a)encourage involvement and b)collect more money

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-Jessi
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I don't recall a contract for ice with the club. It was handled very simply with a check.

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In our club, members 13 & older can vote. Therefore, parents are encouraged to join through a family membership, but it's not required.

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- Ashley

Members contract for ice. The club contracts with the rink, then members contract for club ice. You agree to say, 6-7:30 am Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays Sept-December and then you are obligated to pay for that ice whether you actually use it or not.

I have no problem with parents being required to join the club - the club provides ice time, fundraisers to subsidize the ice and buy things like a harness, testing sessions, two competitions a year and an ice show - you can't do that with a club made up only of children.

j

Our club has never required parents to join. Im not the skater, and I have no need to belong and pay a membership fee.You can do all of the above with only skaters and board members offically belonging.
I have been the special events chair and the co chair for testing and comps. I have also the past two years been the ice show coord.I am not a club member not will I be one UNLESS I join the board. Its in our bylaws.

That's what I thought we were talking about.

When there were more than one club-only session available each week, I've had to sign contracts to reserve a spot on a particular sessions or sessions. For example, I never bought the afternoon ice, but I would pay for the Sunday night F&D. Most of the bigger clubs have both a membership and an ice reservation form, some ask for separate checks, too.

I have belonged to small clubs that had only one session. Then, we only had one form and one check.

Since I skated when I was an adult, I was the "adult member" for my nieces as well. (My sister didn't skate and I handled all the skating-related expenses like ice time, skates, and lessons. Payback's a b****: she's had my twins visiting her for over a week now. LOL)

At most of the clubs, they limited the number of times you could "guest" on a session. That forced you to buy the ice time in bulk, alleviating the club's cash flow problems. They still have to pay the rink, usually in installments.

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My daughter Icy belongs to our local club, as a full member, and one parent gets to vote on club matters since she is under 18 yrs old. I also have my own non-skating membership with the club, to help out with their enrollment numbers.

Icy skates synchro, and so she has a synchro membership with another club (like an associate membership) but does not have voting rights. I did not have to become a member as well.

In this area of Massachusetts/southern New Hampshire, I've never heard of a parent having to become a member as well as the child, especially for an associate membership.

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blades, gary, Lucy, Emily, take care of Aiden and Sami. Sami is my sweetest heart, and always will be, forever. RIP Cubby Boy, my hero dog.

I don't have my rulebook handy but I believe that USFS requires every skater under 18 to have a parent registered with him/her. So that would be my answer to a parent who questioned it.

My club requires every skater under 18 to have a parent registered because of insurance issues. The child, if involved in an accident, has to have an adult who is responsible for him/her. Home-club member or not, if you're under 18, your have to have a parent join with you.

Yes, but our parents are included in the child's membership. We don't have to get the child and the adult to have two different memberships, certainly not for an associate membership! I'd be questioning this policy at any rink my daughter skated at, because that's not how 'things are done' here.

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blades, gary, Lucy, Emily, take care of Aiden and Sami. Sami is my sweetest heart, and always will be, forever. RIP Cubby Boy, my hero dog.

Yes, there's a discount price for the two - you don't pay full membership for two - it's a family membership. As far as associate - these are folks that are mostly joining to use our ice which is subsidized by fund raisers full members do that associates usually don't participate in so I have no problem asking for $$ from them.

And I have to say I don't understand questioning the policy of another club just because it's not "how it's done" at your club. As you can see, there's a quite a variety of "how things are done" at clubs across the country, though clubs in the same region tend to be similar. Around here, requiring parents to join is "how it's done here"

j

Since not one club in our state requires a parent to join, I dont think its a USFSA rule.I vote and sign for both my underage skaters.I dont think I would join a club that said I had to Join.

Then certainly don't move to Arizona! All of the clubs here require parents join with minor children. The price difference between my adult full membership and the family one is about 30 dollars, I think. I don't really remember. I'm not sure, but I think it's that way in most Southwestern states.

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"Without a struggle, there can be no progress" ~ Frederick Douglass

UMM ever hear of independent members?

So, your family membership is like our regular membership - does it cost more than a regular one? Can there be more than one skater in the family coevered under the family memebership?

I'm questioning the policy because it doesn't seem membership-friendly. Forcing a non-skating parent to join because the child is an associate member seems a bit over the top to me. Doesn't the USFS have a limit on how many clubs you can be a member of? When clubs send the info into USFS, how do you list the parents? Is this just a way of boosting club numbers?

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blades, gary, Lucy, Emily, take care of Aiden and Sami. Sami is my sweetest heart, and always will be, forever. RIP Cubby Boy, my hero dog.

A family membership is $80 for one parent and one child - that includes the $35 + $12 USFS membership and that is CHEAP CHEAP CHEAP compared to every other club in our region. It's $15 for each additional family member which we give $12 of that to the USFSA. When membership renewal comes up next year I plan to bring that up to the board and suggest a rate increase.

It's $50 for an individual membership with $35 of that going to the USFS. $60for parent and child for associate and none of that goes to the USFS - clubs around here charge $80 to $100 for associate membership. Since we dont' send in their USFS dues, they are not part of our official membership.

Around here people often belong to 3 or 4 clubs so they can get more ice. There's not much public freestyle ice around here so if you want to skate freestyle sessions, with music and use the harness, you join a club. Individual USFS membership will not get you any ice.

If you had read my OP, you'd see that I'm not quite sure why we require associate parents to join (probably just because "that's how it's done here"), but I support it because I don't believe we could do everything we do with mostly children as members. Also associate members don't really support the club (Presumably because they are doing stuff for their own club) and since a lot of club ice is subsidized by the club, I have no problem asking a higher membership rate. I'm also guessing the fact that you need to contract for ice is the legal reason we do it.

Only one person has ever questioned it and it's the policy around here so it hasn't seem to impact our membership enrollment or seemed unfriendly. Clubs make rules. You don't like the rules, don't join. Or join and put up with the rules until you can get on the board and convince people to your way of thinking. That's a democracy.

j

The other reason people join our club as associates is because we put on a kick-### show in the spring and they want to be in the show. If you have something that people want, they are more willing to go along with your rules, friendly or not.

j

I'm not aware of a club in our area that requires a parent to join, so I guess it varies a lot across the US. Parents act on behalf of their child members when it comes to club business, so I doubt there's some sort of legal issue around parent membership. I certainly wouldn't try to use that as a justification when it's not a legitimate one.

But the cost of membership varies from club to club anyway and some clubs cost more than others, even in the same geographical area. I think the total costs at jskater's club, including the parent membership, are very close to the costs at my daughter's club - and lower than some of our neighboring clubs. I'd be a bit at a parent quibbling over how they structure their fees.