Now here's one paragraph that spawns two separate rants...
"One of the mothers I work with was ranting because she feels obligated to get involved in community volunteer activities in order to ensure that her children get to play on the local soccer teams. Seems if you are an active parent you can whine your kid's way onto a team no matter how untalented the child is. They will bump kids with ability in order to appease the community doers..."
The term "community volunteer activities" implies that volunteers from the local community are required to ensure that these activities are viable... She feels obligated to get involved so that her kid(s) can play soccer?.? Sheesh, If nobody got involved and volunteered, there would be NO organized soccer in that community unless people were hired to run the programs... She should feel obligated, but not for the reason she thinks.
I was a volunteer assistant coach for my youngest son's softball team for 5 years (age 6 to 10)... The emphasis was on providing recreation for all the kids, teaching them skills and teamwork, but mostly just for them to have fun... That said, there was also an emphasis on competition... There was a league schedule and end of season playoffs... This required a balancing act on the part of the coaches to ensure that everybody got to play, but at the same time, to try to win the game... Even 6 year olds prefer winning to losing.
Take a situation of a team with 14 players of various skill levels, 12 of which show up for a game:
As far as the batting order for a game was concerned, we listed all 12 players on the score sheet, and they batted in sequence whether they were in the field at the time or not... At the start of the year, the coaches made up the team's batting order, mixing players of different skill levels... Not all the good batters were at the "top" of the batting order... After a couple games, the batting order was slightly revised, and "locked". The first kid to bat in the next game was the kid that would have batted next at the end of the previous game... We just cycled through the order all season... At season's end, everyone (if they showed up for every game), would have the same possible number of at bats give or take one.
We had 9 players on the field at a time... Rather than have a kid sit out half the game (except for batting), six players would play the complete game on the field, and the other 6 would alternate innings on the field or riding the bench (3 at a time each)... This kept the players more "in the game" mentally, by reducing their boredom at not playing... In this situation, the coaches took more liberty as to who played more than others... Generally the better players played on the field more than the less skilled, and played more in the infield... That said, during the season, every player got to play a complete game in the infield, and every player did the alternate inning playing on the field thing.
Couple stories on parental involvement (and whining):
One boy had skills that were well above the team's average... One big problem was that he would not pay attention during the game... He was doing the alternate on / off field cycle at shortstop, when a batted ball whizzed by him only a couple feet from his head... He didn't even see it or know what had happened... The head coach moved him to the outfield more for his safety than anything else... After the game his parents approached the head coach asking as to why their son wasn't playing the complete game, after all, he was better than most of the others... The above explanations were given, then the fatal question was asked: What can we do to ensure that our son gets to play more?.. The killer answer: "Have him come to practice!"
Another boy was small, at the beginning had no baseball skills at all, and didn't even have much of an understanding of the game... He showed up to most of the practices and games, and over a few years, learned, and developed his skills. (His parents had to have been practicing with him at home too!) ... Patrick usually played the half game in the field routine, but one game there were only 10 or 11 players that showed up. The decision was easy... Patrick was to play the complete game at second base... He had earned it!.. When the head coach told him, I overheard his mother (quietly) emit: "YESsss!!!" ... One of those good moments for everyone involved!
No big surprise here... The kids that were more teachable were the ones that came to most of the practices, AND their Parents came to all their games and often to practice... BTW, any parent coming to practice was roped into helping out if they so wished.
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