Gordon, I think your posts sum up the issue quite well. At a certain level, we're discussing the financial viability of the club we all love to participate in.
When we ran at Tremblant this year, the PCA had an event immediately following ours, and they graciously extended an invitation to allow COM members to run with them. Track overcrowding with their event aside, that was something they offered to help make their event a success. We could certainly work with the tracks we run at, find who is running after us, and offer something similar. I'm under the impression that due to insurance reasons, we have to have our attendees be members of the club, so perhaps we roll membership into an 'away' attendee's fee, such that they become COM members in addition to event participants.
For my small part, I've publicized our upcoming event at Summit (which I cannot attend, regrettably) on several forums where I spend many hours of the day, distracting myself from the end of the quarter sales rush. Particularly in the south and mid-Atlantic regions, there are a lot of nuts like ourselves who enjoy track time immensely, so if we were able to get another 5 or 10 'locals', it could reduce the financial loss we see at these events. I know it's not much, but every additional car helps share the cost.
I think we're all concerned about not only the viability of the club, but also fairness to our members, those who volunteer and those who participate. Ignoring the issue, or being unwilling to make adjustments on anyone's behalf, is only going to result in things getting worse, and not better. We're all in this club together, and we all share some part of the burden to do what we can to make it a success.
$380 for NHIS??????
I'm totally new here, haven't even done an event yet, but will be at NHIS on Oct. 21st with my white knuckles and hopefully a much less scared instructor in my seat.Grippy wrote: So, if driving on great tracks with loads of track time doesn't lure in the membership, then what else can we do? Personally I would give up 2 NHIS events to go to 1 Mosport, hands down, if I had to make a choice.
Gordon
Just a suggestion about the away events, maybe the club could try to work out a group rate for local ammenities (hotel, dinner, etc..) to try and minimize those costs associated with away events. I don't know what is available in the areas, but if a local bed/breakfeast could be filled, or if a few condos were available, a specific resturant function room could be rented out, folks could lower some of the extra costs across a group rate?
Probably not something that would put a "huge dent" in this issue, but every little bit helps. As a new person and not knowing much about where to stay, where to eat, etc. planning these away track events similar to a "group vacation package" is sort of appealing for me because it lumps you in with other experienced folks and just adds to the event.
Paul G.
Paul G.
#12
#12
Regarding the instructor payment issue, the COM Board of Directors and I support keeping the instructors free of payment while instructing at any COM events. This includes the second time trial day, as long as the instructor helps the club by teaching a student the first day.
As many of you know, COM instructors may have up to two students at any given event. This is in addition to any licensed drivers who may request a ride-along instruction any time during a two day event. Instructors often do not have much time to tend to the needs of their vehicles, some of which tend to require much TLC. Just look at the Subarus. This is not to say that Subaru drivers do not make good instructors or Subaru do not make good track vehicles, but my point is that instructors give up much of their time to help students and licensed drivers throughout the entire two day event. Instructors tend to not have much time to relax, but to jump from driver's seat to passenger's seat to give pointers for all drivers. Their services are very well appreciated by COM.
Our instructor core is managed carefully by Carl Fossum, the Chief Instructor, and Mark Swinehart, the Registrar. For any given event, instructor count is controlled by constant communication betwen Carl and Mark. They do all the work to try and balance the need of instructors based on the demand set by registered students and licensed drivers requesting instructors. Carl and Mark understand clearly that COM is a non-profit business to cater to the membership to drive at the race tracks, while supplying as many instructors as needed for a given event. They have the laborous job of trying to attract more instructors when a student count is high or telling an instructor that the student demand is low, so the instructor may only register as a licensed driver. For 2006, Carl and Mark have done a wonderful job at managing this balance. Let me show you the attendance ratio between instructors and students for all events so far in 2006.
(sorry, it is tough to get this table to look correct...)
This shows that COM does not tend to give instructor free tracktime at the cost of the club. COM will need to manage its revenues and costs much more closely to get to a better looking bottomline. The COM Board of Directors and I will do better moving forward, but I believe charging instructors is not the way.
Instructors are our primary source of revenue generation, especially for the long-term. COM's primary interface to the student, who decides to try track driving the first few times, is typically the instructor and the fellow drivers around him or her. To me, I want to keep all of our instructors because they teach the students valuable lessons about track driving, show the students a good time while trying to control the instructors' own fate in the hands of the students, with the hope that the student will return to a track again with COM. The long-term viability of COM resides in our instructors, because licensed drivers will move on as life usually goes in unknow directions. A steady stream of new students and student-to-licensed-driver converts will keep COM thriving in the long-term. These are all reasons why the COM Board of Directors chose to keep events free for instructors. We choose to have a pool of quality instructors without taking on the risk of losing them to event fees. However, instructor quality is key for COM. Carl and I are bringing back instructor evaluation forms by NHIS3. All students and licensed drivers are encouraged to write about their instructors. It will help us all learn constructively how to do things better the next time.
I want to thank everyone who has asked about how COM manages the instructors and offered opinions to this matter. It shows that we have a membership who cares about the direction of the club and are interested to keep the club viable. I encourage posting of these questions at the forums or emailed directly to me.
Alex Teng
COM President
As many of you know, COM instructors may have up to two students at any given event. This is in addition to any licensed drivers who may request a ride-along instruction any time during a two day event. Instructors often do not have much time to tend to the needs of their vehicles, some of which tend to require much TLC. Just look at the Subarus. This is not to say that Subaru drivers do not make good instructors or Subaru do not make good track vehicles, but my point is that instructors give up much of their time to help students and licensed drivers throughout the entire two day event. Instructors tend to not have much time to relax, but to jump from driver's seat to passenger's seat to give pointers for all drivers. Their services are very well appreciated by COM.
Our instructor core is managed carefully by Carl Fossum, the Chief Instructor, and Mark Swinehart, the Registrar. For any given event, instructor count is controlled by constant communication betwen Carl and Mark. They do all the work to try and balance the need of instructors based on the demand set by registered students and licensed drivers requesting instructors. Carl and Mark understand clearly that COM is a non-profit business to cater to the membership to drive at the race tracks, while supplying as many instructors as needed for a given event. They have the laborous job of trying to attract more instructors when a student count is high or telling an instructor that the student demand is low, so the instructor may only register as a licensed driver. For 2006, Carl and Mark have done a wonderful job at managing this balance. Let me show you the attendance ratio between instructors and students for all events so far in 2006.
Code: Select all
Instructors Students Instructor ratio Licensed Total
1 NHIS-1 29 19.7% 46 31.3% 1.6 72 49.0% 147
2 Mosport-1 14 21.5% 9 13.8% 0.6 42 64.6% 65
3 NHIS-2 26 19.0% 35 25.5% 1.3 76 55.5% 137
4 Mont Tremblant 19 21.1% 22 24.4% 1.2 49 54.4% 90
5 Mosport-2 11 22.4% 12 24.5% 1.1 26 53.1% 49
6 Summit Point 8 30.8% 7 26.9% 0.9 11 42.3% 26
7 NHIS-3 30 23.3% 30 23.3% 1.0 69 53.5% 129
Totals / Ave. 137 21.3% 161 25.0% 1.2 345 53.7% 643
Student per
Instructors Students Instructor ratio Licensed Total
NHIS Events 85 20.6% 111 26.9% 1.3 217 52.5% 413
All Others 52 22.6% 50 21.7% 1.0 128 55.7% 230
Totals / Ave. 137 21.3% 161 25.0% 1.2 345 53.7% 643
This shows that COM does not tend to give instructor free tracktime at the cost of the club. COM will need to manage its revenues and costs much more closely to get to a better looking bottomline. The COM Board of Directors and I will do better moving forward, but I believe charging instructors is not the way.
Instructors are our primary source of revenue generation, especially for the long-term. COM's primary interface to the student, who decides to try track driving the first few times, is typically the instructor and the fellow drivers around him or her. To me, I want to keep all of our instructors because they teach the students valuable lessons about track driving, show the students a good time while trying to control the instructors' own fate in the hands of the students, with the hope that the student will return to a track again with COM. The long-term viability of COM resides in our instructors, because licensed drivers will move on as life usually goes in unknow directions. A steady stream of new students and student-to-licensed-driver converts will keep COM thriving in the long-term. These are all reasons why the COM Board of Directors chose to keep events free for instructors. We choose to have a pool of quality instructors without taking on the risk of losing them to event fees. However, instructor quality is key for COM. Carl and I are bringing back instructor evaluation forms by NHIS3. All students and licensed drivers are encouraged to write about their instructors. It will help us all learn constructively how to do things better the next time.
I want to thank everyone who has asked about how COM manages the instructors and offered opinions to this matter. It shows that we have a membership who cares about the direction of the club and are interested to keep the club viable. I encourage posting of these questions at the forums or emailed directly to me.
Alex Teng
COM President
#423 ST3 1996 Sumazdaru Miata STi
Who is online
Users browsing this forum: Bing [Bot], Google [Bot] and 1 guest