Athlete Roster Groups Overview

➧ Locating the Athlete Roster Groups Setting

Athlete Roster Groups are found under Settings > Athlete Roster Groups in the Manage Team admin console.

➧ When to Use Athlete Roster Groups

When you need to divide your roster into segments because you have different programs as part of your team. Some examples:

• High Schools with Varsity and Junior Varsity teams
• Teams with Swim and Dive programs
• Teams that want to limit signups for swim clinics/lessons
• Teams with “mini-mascot” or other pre-competitive programs
• Teams with multiple practice pools or other need to divide the team

➧ Benefits of Using Athlete Roster Groups

• Collect and charge special registration fees for each group
• Assign group tags
• Limit signups during registration
• Send group emails using the group name as a mailing list 

Using and Managing Athlete Roster Groups

➧ Using Athlete Roster Groups in Registration

Teams that have had to use multiple registration forms can now combine complicated swimmer group combinations and fees into one form.

Any groups you have created are available to enable on your registration form. The suggested age range controls which groups are offered for athletes in your registration form. You can set optional group-specific fees, and allow no groups to be selected ("none" option). When none are selected, all default registration fees will apply.

➞ See the Registration: Athlete Roster Groups section tutorial for more information about assigning groups during registration. 

➧ Athlete Roster Group Limits

You can set custom limits on your athlete roster groups, making it easier to manage and organize your team more effectively.

You must first enable and define your Athlete Roster Groups as discussed above, and then enable the Athlete Groups tab in your registration form, and select the groups you want parents to see when registering. 

When both of these configurations have been completed, you will see the checkbox to Limit registrations by roster group on the Edit Registration Limits page.

➞ See the Registration Limits - Team, Age Groups, Roster Groups article for details.

➧ Manual Assignment in Athlete Profile

To manually assign an athlete to a group, go to Manage Team > People > Click the athlete’s name > Affiliations. Click Add Affiliation or Edit an existing affiliation to select the roster group. 

» Note: You can only manually assign one Roster Group affiliation in a season.

➧ Communication Using Athlete Roster Groups

Athlete Roster Groups can be addressed via Communications like any other group in SwimTopia, by typing the name of the group in the "To:" when composing a message.

➞ See our Communications: Emails and Alerts article.

Do you need to reach a specific group in a previous season?

When you email directly from the Communications center, you are only able to reach members of your athlete roster groups registered in the active season. So, if you've already updated your season, the Athlete Roster report (under your Manage Team admin console) is the best way to reach previous groups. 

Are you holding a pre-season clinic and want to separate your communication to these athletes/parents? You might benefit from creating a separate season to manage your clinics since athletes can only be in one roster group at a time within a season.

➞ See this section of our Registration Fees - Scenarios and Setup article for details.

» Note: Any parent/guardian listed with an email is included in the communication sent to an athlete assigned to an athlete group, a role, and from athlete-specific reports. This will also ensure the message will be delivered to the parents when there's no email address affiliated with the athlete. Messages are sent to parents and athletes regardless of their opt-in/out choice, which only pertains to the "Members" groups. If you do not need a parent to be copied (i.e. you're emailing Asst. Coaches who are also athletes, but they are over 13), you can click on “Expand Groups” and remove the parents. Use caution in doing this. The Children's Online Privacy Protection Act ("COPPA") and SafeSport rules state that adults cannot communicate with minors (a parent or other adult must be copied).

Athlete Roster Groups in Reports

➧ Athlete Roster Report (Member Information section)

This report allows you to sort by the Roster Group and any column with the arrows.

Also notable, is the option to include non-competitive athletes and the label that displays to easily differentiate these athletes who have been assigned to a non-competitive roster group, or who are marked as non-competitive directly in their profile (under People).

The Compose button allows you to communicate to these roster groups. 

➧ Athlete Attendance Report (Member Information section)

➞ See our Athlete Attendance article for details.

➧ Registration Details / Data Export (Registration section)

Athlete Roster Groups assigned during registration are included in the Download Athlete Data (csv) report for each registration form under Registrations > Click on Registrants#.

Or for all forms combined in the Registration Details / Data Export under the Reports tab (example below).

The Athlete Roster Group is not sortable in this report view, but you can use the Download Registration Data (csv) report to manipulate the data as needed.