This year at HPYC, due to the growth of our program, we will be instituting two new policies in regards to attendance and late arrivals. While we understand that things come up, we feel that attendance is very important, both for safety reasons and to ensure the best possible experience for all of our sailors. We are confident that these changes will have a positive impact on our program.
Attendance: Children are expected to attend all scheduled lessons. Our lessons are planned in a sequential fashion, meaning each lesson builds upon the skill introduced in the previous class. Therefore, an absence means that important information is missed. As such, children who miss a class will not be able to participate in our weekly game, which is held during the final lesson of each week (“Fun Fridays” or “Thrilling Thursdays”).The reason for this is the games are specifically designed in order to assess the skill or skills covered throughout the week. Instead, children who skip a class will work with an instructor during game time (either one on one or in a small -group setting) on the skill that they missed. This policy will mitigate safety concerns and ensure that none of our sailors miss out on vital instruction.
Tardies:Children are expected to be at the yacht club at 8:45 (morning classes), or 12:50 (afternoon classes). This gives children time to prepare for class, and also is used as instructional time in which the instructors teach knot tying and sailing phrases. Sailors may also be asked to rig during this time to allow maximum time on the water. Children who arrive after 9:00 (morning classes), or 1:00 (afternoon classes) will not be able to sail that day. Instead, the child will remain on the dock with an instructor and will practice rigging, knot tying, or boat maintenance. The reason for this is that once rigging has begun and sailing pairs have been made, it is not appropriate to hold up the class for one sailor. Additionally, we as instructors are not able to appropriately supervise a child sailing alone into the harbor. The exception to this rule is if a parent, guardian, or caretaker calls by 8:45 and informs the instructors of extenuating circumstances, though it should be noted that depending on the lesson and degree of delay, the child may still be asked to remain on the dock.
We are confident that these policies will ensure that we have another safe, educational, and most importantly, fun summer!
