All-Star Covid-19 / Varsity Response

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How is everyone’s gym handling fees if comps are virtual or cancelled? Will tuition be reduced?

At our gym tuition is all inclusive. I’m ok with paying for a training only season or if most comps are virtual. Spending $4k is a lot, with the economy the way it is. I’m not sure it’s worth it. If I could easily afford it I wouldn’t mind, but my child will be starting college in 2 years. My daughter loves being on team but I’m starting to think she should sit this season out.
 
My gym has a set monthly tuition and then a payment plan for comps. We will be refunded for comps not attended. And if we have to train virtually in the event of another shutdown we have have a reduced monthly fee.
 
How is everyone’s gym handling fees if comps are virtual or cancelled? Will tuition be reduced?

At our gym tuition is all inclusive. I’m ok with paying for a training only season or if most comps are virtual. Spending $4k is a lot, with the economy the way it is. I’m not sure it’s worth it. If I could easily afford it I wouldn’t mind, but my child will be starting college in 2 years. My daughter loves being on team but I’m starting to think she should sit this season out.

We’re paying normal fees which include comp fees. But I assume our accounts will be credited if we don’t do all the usual comps.
 
It makes sense to cancel early events and not start the season until 2021. But I wonder if event producers are starting to think outside the box in case nothing changes by January 2021. I worry what canceling an entire season might do to the sport. With just about all gyms practicing again in some capacity, I think Varsity really needs to try to give these kids some sort of legitimate competition season (that is run as safely as possible, of course). Teams haven't competed since Feb/March, and I'm wondering how long some kids will be willing to train and prepare for competitions without any actually happening. Varsity did that Worlds points competition thing to soften the blow of a shortened season and keep people engaged, so it seems they are indeed aware of how important it is to give teams something and keep them in a competitive mindset.

It's hard to imagine virtual cheer competitions being fair or practical. So they might need to figure out how to run in-person competitions with far fewer people in the building at a time. It would take a ton of planning and might be a logistical nightmare depending on the venue, but there has to be a way to get teams in and out of a building faster.

The event producer Spirit Unlimited used to have Worlds teams compete twice in one day--- the first performance would be in a closed-off room with a very small number of seats (so basically, a parent might see the teams in their own division and then leave the room). Competing in front of a very small audience might have to be the norm for the time being (unless you believe the virus hangs in the air and would therefore put everyone who walks into a room at risk even if they never see each other).

Giant free-for-all competitions with thousands of people in the building probably aren't happening anytime soon. I'm curious if Varsity is seriously looking into alternative methods of running competitions or if they're just hoping things get better by January, which is still relatively far away.
 
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If you run HEPA filters, you can cycle the air between groups. You can also use UVC to clean the air in between groups when no one is in the room. It might be expensive to do a gym or convention center sized room, though (It was a few hundred dollars to get a system that would do that between students in my relatively small office-but I figured it would be worth spending, since we will have students on campus this fall).
 
It makes sense to cancel early events and not start the season until 2021. But I wonder if event producers are starting to think outside the box in case nothing changes by January 2021. I worry what canceling an entire season might do to the sport. With just about all gyms practicing again in some capacity, I think Varsity really needs to try to give these kids some sort of legitimate competition season (that is run as safely as possible, of course). Teams haven't competed since Feb/March, and I'm wondering how long some kids will be willing to train and prepare for competitions without any actually happening. Varsity did that Worlds points competition thing to soften the blow of a shortened season and keep people engaged, so it seems they are indeed aware of how important it is to give teams something and keep them in a competitive mindset.

It's hard to imagine virtual cheer competitions being fair or practical. So they might need to figure out how to run in-person competitions with far fewer people in the building at a time. It would take a ton of planning and might be a logistical nightmare depending on the venue, but there has to be a way to get teams in and out of a building faster.

The event producer Spirit Unlimited used to have Worlds teams compete twice in one day--- the first performance would be in a closed-off room with a very small number of seats (so basically, a parent might see the teams in their own division and then leave the room). Competing in front of a very small audience might have to be the norm for the time being (unless you believe the virus hangs in the air and would therefore put everyone who walks into a room at risk even if they never see each other).

Giant free-for-all competitions with thousands of people in the building probably aren't happening anytime soon. I'm curious if Varsity is seriously looking into alternative methods of running competitions or if they're just hoping things get better by January, which is still relatively far away.

I understand that traditional comps maybe impossible but the more I think about it I don’t feel that virtual will work. I agree it’s not practical or fair. I haven’t heard a option that even sounds like a viable option. Then factor things like cheating (illegal crossovers, whatever else). That was hard to catch before, will be impossible virtually. Not to mention it just sounds anti-climatic. I think I’d prefer they just train and not compete.
 
I understand that traditional comps maybe impossible but the more I think about it I don’t feel that virtual will work. I agree it’s not practical or fair. I haven’t heard a option that even sounds like a viable option. Then factor things like cheating (illegal crossovers, whatever else). That was hard to catch before, will be impossible virtually. Not to mention it just sounds anti-climatic. I think I’d prefer they just train and not compete.

I think virtual could work, but maybe the best solution is Varsity/the EP needs to send one staff member to each gym taking part. To check for cheating and to livestream and/or record video.
 
There needs to be some method to mostly ensure a single run through for each "performance". Allowing teams as many full-outs as they want until they get it right changes the internal dynamics of the sport more than losing the crowd, IMO. While I understand many of the challenges with doing a live feed, I still think some type of code word or on-sight official proctor or something could be done even if recordings of the performance had to be slowly uploaded.

Allowing multiple chances rewards risk-taking with skills even more. Teams would be running far more full-outs and there is more chance of fatigue-related injuries. I would not be a fan of allowing as many tries as you want.
 
There needs to be some method to mostly ensure a single run through for each "performance". Allowing teams as many full-outs as they want until they get it right changes the internal dynamics of the sport more than losing the crowd, IMO. While I understand many of the challenges with doing a live feed, I still think some type of code word or on-sight official proctor or something could be done even if recordings of the performance had to be slowly uploaded.

Allowing multiple chances rewards risk-taking with skills even more. Teams would be running far more full-outs and there is more chance of fatigue-related injuries. I would not be a fan of allowing as many tries as you want.

Yes!

Coaches prepping for NCA filming weekend like:

"Hey guys it's full out weekend for NCA, remember:

We start bright and early Saturday at 6am. No one leaves til we have at least 5 hit fullouts to choose from. If we do not have one by 9pm tonight, be prepared to return to the gym at 7am Sunday!"
 
That and it almost rewards teams for competing routines that may be too difficult.

Because again, if you put your PARENT team in a room for a weekend with a stunt sequence they've never tried and even THEY can hit once if you give them unlimited takes.
 
There needs to be some method to mostly ensure a single run through for each "performance". Allowing teams as many full-outs as they want until they get it right changes the internal dynamics of the sport more than losing the crowd, IMO. While I understand many of the challenges with doing a live feed, I still think some type of code word or on-sight official proctor or something could be done even if recordings of the performance had to be slowly uploaded.

Allowing multiple chances rewards risk-taking with skills even more. Teams would be running far more full-outs and there is more chance of fatigue-related injuries. I would not be a fan of allowing as many tries as you want.
Multiple tries would absolutely change the dynamics and shouldn’t be considered. Virtual live stream presents a lot of technical issues. Live proctor could help prevent some cheating and ensure one 1 run but that also requires trust in the system. How would anyone know if a gym was given multiple runs?

There are some that would never consider “bending” the rules. I’ve never seen or heard of it happening at our gym. our last gym I’ve seen stack a level 2 mini prep team with an athlete that had aged out and was on an elite level 5 team. This was not isolated incident. Not only was the gym willing to do these things, the parents supported AND defended gym when caught.
 
Aren't gyms still closed in some states?

With all these cancelled comps, I wonder how feasible it would be for gyms to just plan for a half-season type experience for 20-21 and push choreo to Dec/January?
 
5/6 months on from when things started to get really bad with Covid, how are your state's/country's situations now? Are things starting to improve?

I'm no longer involved with cheer but I know in England (not sure about the rest of the UK), cheer gyms started re-opening around the end of July and have had/are having tryouts. Not sure about stunting or competing.

Schools in all UK countries are starting straight back in with face to face/in class teaching (with safety measures). Scotland are back already but England, Northern Ireland and Wales start back in September.
 
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