Transmorfing HSC

We kick off summer with a look at finances and instructor pay. A commenter noted on our previous post that the latest issue of On Wisconsin quotes Sailing "Program Manager" Dave Elsmo boasting that HSC sells more than 300 memberships a year. Three hundred? The club used to have 800-1000 members in a typical year. Elsmo added that, "the number of students involved at any given time is much higher than that." Sure it is--the club is giving away well over a hundred FREE membership every year, but membership is still way down from a few years ago.

Worse, the club is still paying people to teach sailing, as if teaching sailing were a job.

HSC instructors shouldn't be paid because there's no need for it, and hiring should be based primarily on prior evaluations, which would help to weed out the cronyism and nepotism that infects HSC. To facilitate this, all students should be required to fill out evaluations after every lesson. All first-year instructors would be probationary and evaluated as the season goes along because they won't have any prior evaluations. Unfortunately, this will never happen because the "club" as envisioned by Jim Rogers and now Dave Elsmo is a jobs program for buddies of current employees, with no accountability.

The same article goes on to quote new instructor Ed LeBlanc as saying, "The worst thing you can do is take a swim." Was Ed raised in a bubble, or is he trying to insult swimmers? On hot days, we used to capsize our Techs just to go swimming! Harvey didn't like that, of course, nor lowering the main to do it, but in a light wind you can go swimming off a Tech and just hold on to the painter. The larger boats including the sloops and keelboats are excellent swimming platforms. The water is much cleaner out in the middle of the lake than by shore.

An article in last summer's issue of On Wisconsin noted that the sailing team manages to squeak by on just $65,000/year. Sixty five thousand dollars?! So that a few undergraduates can travel around the country racing dinghies for fun? This includes an annual spring break "training trip" to Florida. We've noticed before how big their budget is. It should be slashed immediately.

One wonders where the increasing instruction costs combined with decreasing membership and all those large, frivolous budget items will lead. If nothing else, they create an incentive to rip off customers*.

We didn't actually go and dig out the latest budget due to lingering hangovers, but I think the club could save another $50,000 by firing Dave Elsmo.

Next time, we'll look at Hoofers' ASA instructors and why the ASA program sucks.

*Customer: a paying "club" member.

Mermaids

JUNE 12 UPDATE: We toned down the text which seemed to offend someone, or so they claimed, someone who evidently took this post too seriously, and we removed the image (but it's saved incase the FB post disappears). As for paid private lessons, they are indeed allowed, as one commenter has noted and contrary to what others are claiming. The rate is actually $35/hr, not $25 as someone suggested in a comment (see the Ground School manual link in one of the comments--Thanks). Of course not all of that goes to the instructor. The club skims most of it for "overhead" and the instructor gets his/her regular wage. As usual, a certain commenter(s) is the one with an apparent axe to grind, and our info was correct. And of course we are aware that at least two students are required for a regular lesson to take place, but that has no bearing on private/one-on-one lessons.

Hilarious public Facebook post here:

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10108181353483917

Check out the Facebook link which includes inappropriate comments that were removed and comments with typos that suggest giddy excitement. Welcome to Hooters, er, Hoofers.

Although the club isn't advertized this way, people looking for a good time can join and skip the sailing. Better yet, save $250 and just come to the Friday socials. Or heck, just go out to the nearest bar. On the other hand, someone who really wants to learn to sail probably isn't going to do any better with private lessons because it's best to try out different instructors, although a beginner might not know that.

For the record, private lessons are allowed, but only for paid instructors. If you are an unpaid (volunteer) instructor, for some reason paid private lessons are not in your future.

As for general club members, giving a paid private lesson (or any lesson) could get you suspended from the club and/or charged with unlawfully captaining a boat. Why would anyone expect to get paid for teaching a lesson anyway? Because the objective of some people is not to contribute in a club environment but rather to enrich themselves (at your expense). This may be a 'club' by name, but underneath, it is a jobs program for unqualified friends of the commodore.

A graph of skyrocketing instructor pay over time is here.

NO CHARGES!

Breaking news on the Yu Chen tragedy is here:

http://host.madison.com/wsj/news/local/courts/no-charges-in-the-death-of-a-windsurfer-struck-by/article_0038f30a-d342-5485-942c-e74ea463aced.html"

Basically, the DA concluded that the boat's design was at fault. Short people driving a big powerboat are going to have difficulty seeing what's in front of them, so if they run something over, it's not their fault because short people can't be blamed for being short.

We're paraphrasing, but this is just typical for state employees. Unless you have a signed statement from them essentially admitting that they did something wrong, it is almost impossible to convict. It's always somebody else's fault.

The DA concluded: "the position of the seats on the boat could have obstructed their vision." According to the driver, he "had to shift and keep his head up to see his surroundings because of the design and arrangement of the boat." Sounds like he couldn't see over the bow and had to crane his neck and really pay attention to where the boat was going. That is asking a lot.

I've been on the UW rescue boat and visibility is fine. Of course, as you go faster, the bow tends to rise out of the water, affecting visibility in front. On a big power boat, the bow will generally point the highest just prior to planing, at around 15-18 mph.

More analysis after obtaining the sheriff's report.

Updated June 4