By Terin Frodyma on SwimSwam
The University of Iowa Recreational Services will shut down the Iowa Flyers Swim Club (IFLY) next year, redirecting more than $100,000 and over 1,000 hours of staff time to programs for university students.
In a report from The Gazette, families associated with the club were shocked by the decision to cut the program, which has ranked in the top 100 nationally many times and serves around 275 members aged 6 to 18.
The program’s annual budget is between $400,000 and $600,000, funded mainly through membership and participation fees. That budget does not include pool maintenance and operations, which come from student fees at the University of Iowa.
IFLY parent advisory committee member Christi Johnson, who has two children who compete for IFLY, said the committee met with the university’s Recreational Services leadership and that they had been supportive. However, the decision to slash the club was frustrating.
“I really don’t even have words to describe being in the meeting with Recreational Services leadership as they announced they were going to be terminating the program; we were crushed, surprised, shocked, frustrated, there was anger in the room, and it was really a lot to process,” Johnson said in the report from The Gazette. “Recreational Services has been wonderfully supportive. Great coaching, great administrative staff, everything about the program felt really, really good.”
Despite the university slashing the team, families have decided to continue the program and competition under the Armbruster Swimming Foundation, a nonprofit founded by John Landon, a former Masters swimmer with IFLY and a father of four IFLY swimmers.
Landon established the foundation as a nonprofit in 2023, a few years after the University of Iowa ended its men’s swimming and diving program in 2021, after initially cutting both men’s and women’s programs after the 2020-21 academic year due to COVID-19-related financial losses.
The women’s program was then reinstated after a Title IX lawsuit and a court injunction.
With this move, the club will be renamed First Flyers Swim Club, a name USA Swimming has already approved for future competition.
Landon added that the program cannot afford the university’s facilities and will need to find other locations to continue operating at its current level. For the fiscal year 2027, the rental rate for the entire aquatic center on campus is $340 an hour. The Armbruster Swimming Foundation is meeting with the City of Iowa City and the City of Coralville park and recreation departments to explore expanding the “learn to swim” program and securing potential pool space for the First Flyers swim Club.
Read the full story on SwimSwam: Univerity of Iowa Cutting Iowa Flyers Swim Club Next Year, Families to Keep It Running as Nonprofit
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