Hey all you parents of our 15-18 year old swimmers! Well, you don't need me to tell you that this has been a strange year! Consequently, your Hammerhead Team Reps have been making some changes in the hopes of creating a great season for our swimmers.

We will have a new head coach this year, Summer Liu, who we are really excited about. She promises to bring a calm, positive energy to the team- you can find her bio on the team website. Additionally, we are excited to have Cailey Graham back as the Head Assistant Coach.

In an effort to be transparent, we want to let you know that money is a concern for us this year as a team (as it is for many teams). As you may know, we make the bulk of our money from concessions. At this time, we are still awaiting guidance from the NVSL as to what will be allowed at concessions.

Our biggest worry is hiring coaches and not being able to pay them. Therefore, we have decided to go with a completely different model for assistant and mini-hammerheads coaches this year.

Any 15-18 year old who is interested in coaching will have the opportunity to coach this year, but we will not be offering a salary. Obviously there are some pros and cons to this model but we think this is the best way to include the most teen swimmers who would like to coach, without straining an uncertain bank account.

Pros:
- Anyone can opt to coach. We will not turn any interested persons away
- Great experience learning to coach from an experienced head coach.
- A chance to show off your willingness to learn and dedication to coaching, which could help you get a future coaching job.
- Team Reps will gladly sign off on service hours and/or write recommendations
- We will not ask any assistant coaches to sign an attendance contract this year. We ask that they make their best effort to attend practices and meets but will not officially track attendance
- Based on how the season goes money-wise, we will offer bonuses at the end of the season to assistant coaches who consistently showed up and helped with coaching.

Cons:
- We truly wish we could offer salaries at this time, but with the uncertainty of this season we need to be conservative with our finances.

If you have a 15-18 year old swimmer who is interested in coaching or if you have any questions, please let us know by emailing [email protected] or by texting or calling Jill at 703-405-8755.