Glenwood Gazette – May 28, 2011

Did it feel like winter would never end? Finally, Summer is HERE! Grab your sunscreen and towels and head for the pool!

Pool Opens This Weekend, May 28!
The weather got hot just in time for you to take your first plunge into the pool this weekend! Glenwood will be open 10-9 on Saturday and Sunday, and 10-8 on Memorial Day Monday. Until public schools are out for summer on June 16, we’ll be open M-F from 3-8 pm and weekends 10-9. Keep an eye out for notices of early closures and late openings for swim meets in June and July. Welcome back to summer and to your favorite place to spend it!

2011 Membership
Make sure you have paid your dues for this year and entered your data in our new web-based database, including photographs of all the family members on your account. The staff will be checking in the members on our new computerized system and verifying identification by the pictures in the database. We know you’re anxious to get in the water, but please be patient as we implement our new access system. You can help us by making sure your photos are already in the database before you come down to the pool. The staff will also help with taking photos and uploading them at the pool, but since they’re not hired to be professional digital photographers, be kind to them if you need this service.

If you have not received your invoice, contact Membership Volunteer
Kathleen Enright at membership@glenwoodpool.org.  If you need help with the online database, contact Tim Hermans at webmaster@glenwoodpool.org. And if you need the mailing address for your forms, it’s P. O. Box 2407, Silver Spring, MD 20915.

Swim Team Screening and Dive Team Sign-Ups, May 31, 5-7 pm
That purring you hear is a Glenwood Tiger getting ready to roar into another summer season at the Big G. Many of you have already availed yourselves of our new online registration for swim team, which you can access here. We are still handling payments manually, though, and will be on hand at the pool to take your registration checks and help you sign up your kids for the team. Please take a look at the swim team page of the pool website for all kinds of information about swim team and pre-team — we have a new virtual look, but the traditions of fun summer swimming haven’t changed at all. Newcomers to swim team must be screened by the coaches to determine whether you should start at the pre-team level, so bring your suits and towels as well as your swimmer and checkbook. We’ll be using our new web platform on a host of fronts, but for now, you should still join or stay on the swim team list serve at glenwoodswim@yahoo.com to keep up with the news.

Glenwood Tiger diving starts the season next Tuesday as well, with in-person registration being held at the pool between 5 and 7 pm, RAIN or SHINE. Check in with new parent reps Elizabeth O’Kelly and Nancy Enderby and find out their plans for another great summer of Tiger Dive Team. If you’re new, no worries — you can start at any level of experience, and the practice and meet schedules allow your kids to participate in both swim and dive team if you wish.

2011 Pool Management and Staff
We are delighted to begin this summer with an experienced and familiar staff to keep our pool clean, safe and enjoyable for everyone. The Glenwood staff includes some 30+ young men and women, most of whom come from member families. Our management team of Joe Meringolo, Seth Weil and Sean Hennigan is well-known to many of you, but let us introduce them all and encourage all of you to introduce yourselves to them and the rest of the staff when you come to Glenwood.

This year’s manager is Joe Meringolo, who grew up in Silver Spring and graduated from Good Counsel High School. Joe just graduated a few weeks ago from St. Mary’s College of Maryland with a major in English and lots of time on the field, where he played both Division 3 and club lacrosse. Despite a predilection for land sports, Joe says “I have always enjoyed the calmness of the pool environment (even on hectic days) and the occasional swim. ” After working several years at various community and hotel pools, Joe heard that Glenwood was “an awesome place to work” and has been with us for the last two summers as an assistant manager. He appreciates a place where he could get to know the membership and, “more importantly, I’ve been accepted and involved in a great community of people. Entering my third year at Glenwood and first year as the head manager, I hope to have another fun and smooth-sailing summer with my staff as well as with the Big G community… and I’m going to serve the Tiger community to make sure this summer is another memorable one that everyone will enjoy. ”

Seth Weil is one of our two assistant managers this season. He just finished his sophomore year at Juniata college in Huntingdon, PA and will be graduating in 2013. Seth will be studying abroad in Newcastle, Australia, in the fall, pursuing his major in bio-psychology toward a career in physical therapy. A graduate of Albert Einstein High School and Silver Spring native, this is Seth’s fifth summer working at Glenwood, first as a guard and then a pool operator. Swimming has always been a passion for Seth. He was on the Glenwood swim team for nine years and enjoys teaching swim lessons and watching his students improve and gain a love for the sport. “I love the community here at Glenwood, everyone is very welcoming. Glenwood is a great place to work and spend my summer.”

Sean Hennigan is our other assistant manager. A graduate of St. Johns College High School, he is a rising senior at the Catholic University of America. Sean is majoring in elementary education and hopes to pursue a career in education law. He was on the swim team from 1996-2005 and has been lifeguard for seven years, a pool operator for three, and like Seth, this is his first year as assistant manager. Many, many kids have learned to swim from Sean, who has also taught swim lessons at Glenwood for six years. Sean notes that “the pool has become like a second home to me over the past 18 years. I love how close-knit the pool community is, and I truly enjoy the time I spend at the pool, both in an out of the water.”

Snack Bar Training and Operations

Another bit of good news is that member volunteers Gina Hardiman and Ramona Schreiber are once again stepping up to manage the snack bar this summer. This experienced duo has done a fabulous job engaging our kids to help provide this service within our community, and they are eager to get started early in 2011. The official opening day is the first day of practice, Wednesday, June 1st but if we can get training accomplished this weekend we can open this weekend!

Training schedule:
Sat, May 28th – 4 – 5 pm
Sun, May 29th – 3:30 – 4 pm
Tues, May 31st – right before and right after the Swim Team meeting
Wed-Fri, June 1-3 – 4 – 5 pm

Meet the managers outside the snack bar for training. Each worker AND PARENT must sign an worker agreement form and include contact information (email & phone number). This agreement must be completed before you are cleared to begin working; any child from a member family aged 11 or over is welcome to join the snack bar staff.

We need HELP from parents! If you are willing to help with Costco runs, please contact Gina Hardiman (regliz@aol.com) or Ramona Schreiber (rbutchko@verizon.net). Additionally if you have any questions or your child would like to train at another time, please feel free to contact Gina or Ramona via email.

Volunteer at Glenwood This Summer
Glenwood is a great place to be because of the families who contribute to our pool community. Did you read about the fabulous turnout for clean-up day on the website (see news? That was all volunteers, folks — familiar and new pitching in together. Social events, swim and dive teams, early bird swim, lessons for kids, the snack bar – there’s something for everyone at Glenwood when YOU help make it happen.

One of our newer board members, Steve Schrier, is our volunteer coordinator this year and has all kinds of projects for you. To name a few, there’s the Crab Feast, the New Members Dinner and the Ladies’ and Guys’ Nights Out. The annual “Swim for Tim” swimathon benefit for juvenile diabetes research always needs a crowd of helpers – watch for more on that event. Get in touch with Steve at steve@glenwoodpool.org if you want to help out, and if you have an idea to make things better, let us know at board@glenwoodpool.org. We want to hear from you!

What We Did on Our Winter Vacation
It sure seemed busy to us, as there were lots of projects that have come to fruition since last Labor Day. Among them were revamping our website look (still in progress), creating an online membership database and access system, and procuring and installing a new security system, shade structure for the baby pool, and lighting around the back deck. Labor donated by member Boy Scouts Stefan Weston, Nate Rogers and their troop before and after last season resulted in improved drainage throughout the pool grounds, a new railing at the rear gate entrance, and long-overdue painting and power-washing of our buildings. Our pre-opening clean-up had record turnout and filled two extra-large dumpsters with damaged trees, limbs and other natural debris — the mess seemed the worst in recent memory.

So as you return for another great summer, please take a moment to look around and see what we’ve done and continue to do together to keep this the wonderful place it is.

Coming Up Next:
Early Bird Swim, Group Lessons, the Summer Social Calendar and more.

Questions? Suggestions? Contact your Gazette editor Karen Clark at karen@glenwoodpool.org