If you read these directions (I’ll try to make them both informative and entertaining) you shouldn’t have any issues. If you do have any issues, contact
[email protected] (yes, even if you aren’t registering for soccer, an email to that address should get you the help you need).
If there is only one sport or activity being registered, the site is rather easy to follow, and I don’t think anyone will need help, but if you do, the directions below will still be helpful. However, when many sports are open for registration, that’s when things can be a little confusing. May and June are the months with the most sports open for registration, so I’ll use them in my example.
In my example I’ll use the new family that moved into town, the Brady’s. Mr. and Mrs. Brady, with their sons Greg, Peter, and Bobby, and their daughters, Marcia, Jan, and Cindy.
Mrs. Brady enters the site http://tshq.bluesombrero.com/wanaquenj. (You're already here!)
She goes to the “Programs” tab and reads about all our available programs. She realizes that Greg would love to play football, that Marcia, Peter, and Cindy would like to play Rec Soccer, and that Cindy and Bobby would like to go to the summer camp at Back Beach. If she had known about these programs, she could have skipped this step.
She now goes to the “Register Here” tab and sees links for each of those programs. She picks “Football” and that takes her to her choices for football, and since Greg is in the 8th grade, she clicks on the “Register Now” button next to the Seniors program. Since she hasn’t registered on the site, she’ll be taken to a page where she can create a user name and password. She’ll be asked the usual (but somewhat fewer) questions that are asked of a parent and she’ll be able to register Mr. Brady as well. Then she’ll be asked to register each of her children. If she wants, she can register only the children she intends to enroll in a sport / activity, but it’s easier to register all of them at once since that will make future registrations easier – so she does that. One of the key fields is date of birth. The site keys all registrations off of each person’s DOB.
Even with listing six kids, the process is quick, and she’ll still remember that this all started with a football registration. After she is finished entering all the children’s information, she’ll be taken to a page that lists each of her children, and the sports or activities that they can register for at that time. So even though she initially only clicked on Senior football, she can scroll down the screen and select Camp for Bobby and Cindy, and Rec Soccer for Marcia, Peter and Cindy. Now here is the caution: Both Greg and Marcia are the same age and can qualify to play on the Senior football team, so the site automatically selects both of them. Only Greg wants to play football, so Mrs. Brady has to scroll down to Marcia’s section and unselect Senior football. If she doesn’t, her credit card will be charged for both to play football – there is a handy Order Summary on the right side of the page that keeps a running total of the cost of the registrations you’re making. Mrs. Brady is sure to show all the children how much they cost her, although secretly she’s just glad they’ll be out of the house.
If at some later point the Brady’s want to add Alice as a new participant (or themselves) – the Borough plans to pilot this site for their Bus Trips to Broadway, Mrs. Brady can click that button at the bottom of the screen.
For now, it’s just sports and camp for the kids, so Mrs. Brady clicks continue.
She is now taken to what would normally be the dreaded list of questions about each child. The good news is that the list has been greatly shortened – if there is an emergency, and a parent isn’t there, the child is going to be taken to wherever the medical professionals think is best. Coaches will have easier access to parents’ email and cell phone numbers, and we won’t have to hunt in our trunks to find poor carbon copies that tell us to contact Aunt Ida at 866 .. (or is that 668, I can’t read the handwriting). Each sport or activity may or may not have different questions. Unfortunately, the site can’t distinguish which are the same and which aren’t and which to send to which sport other than by asking for each sport. This really isn’t that big a deal and since it’s all on one screen you can even cut and paste if that makes it quicker for you – for example, if Cindy had a long list of allergies.
When she clicks continue on the bottom of that page, she’ll be taken to the even more dreaded, volunteer question. Here she can volunteer to coach or help coach a team, and if she registered Mr. Brady when she registered herself, she can volunteer him. She can also click on the “I don’t want to volunteer” button and feel guilty for the rest of the season, (or maybe the rest of the hour).
The next page is probably the most dreaded of all. It’s where she enters her Master Card or Visa numbers and pays for all her darling children to play sports and attend camp. Sorry, we don’t take Amex.
We don’t give refunds, but if later in the month Jan decides she does want to play some sport, Mrs. Brady can log back in and register Jan for that sport. (Technically the site refers to parents as registering and each child going to an activity is an order.)
After placing her order, Mrs. Brady decided to explore the site some more. The link that said “Experimenting” intrigued her, so she clicked it and had a chuckle watching the videos of the dancing at the recent Travel Soccer dinner.
She then clicked on “Spirit Wear” and noticed that Soccer had a link to some very nice apparel. After spending so much money on her children, Mrs. Brady thought it only right that her husband and she should look good on the sidelines, so she bought numerous items. She can’t wait for the other sports to add their own links.
Mrs. Brady understands that different coaches will use the site differently, but she likes some of the links from the site, so she bookmarks as she expects to check it frequently. When she comes back to the site she doesn’t have to log in each time. Most of the pages and links she can view without logging in. So, Alice, who Mrs. Brady never registered, can check all those pages as well. If either click on a link that requires their registration, such as a team link, the site will prompt them for their id and password. If Mrs. Brady clicks on the wrong team link and none of her children are on that team, the site will simply tell her that she isn’t authorized to see that team’s page. However, if one of her children is on that team, she is taken to that team’s page.
If Mrs. Brady changes her address, cell or email, she should log into the site from the home page. She will be taken to her account page. In the upper right corner is a gear, she clicks it and is taken to her profile where she can update the information she previously provided.
I hope these directions are helpful and not just entertaining. I also hope that you really don’t need the help and that the site is intuitive enough without the directions. The site is new and can be very powerful but we’re all learning and there is a learning curve. Don’t be afraid to play and click on the links or otherwise explore. Rec Soccer has team pages. If the coach is too busy to mess with them, but you have time, go ahead and play with them – if the site says you need special access, let me know at the email above. If your child’s sport doesn’t show team pages (they are there, just not easy to get to), and you want to see what you can do, let me know and I’ll make them easy to get to. The only real caution is around the shopping cart. You can play and add orders (registrations) but don’t click on the button to execute the transaction, because your credit card will be hit and I can’t reverse those charges.
There is an advantage for the Rec Commission moving to this site – it’s cheaper and the money we save can go towards other programs. At the same time there are advantages for parents – while we support Homefield Advantage, they don’t carry everything, and the coupons from Dick’s are welcomed. Not to mention that the site should make it easier for coaches and administrators to communicate with parents, and we’ve heard that is one thing parents want more of.