YMCA of the Highland Lakes

★★Tiffany Miller

We have been members of the organization for 4 years, with some periods of participation and others of absence. Our three daughters are enrolled in year-round sports programs at the Y. We have not missed one season of sports. Unfortunately, the last two seasons have been plagued by disorganization, resulting in inadequate communication with volunteer coaches and subsequently, dissatisfaction among parents. This lack of organization has led to several capable coaches facing challenging situations with unhappy parents. The front desk acts as a liaison for Sundae, the sports program director, but she rarely responds to messages or addresses concerns. In the last soccer season, the organization failed to accommodate younger children adequately, with a single team comprising pre-kindergarten to 2nd-grade students. My pre-kindergarten daughter, who was placed in this team, found it difficult to keep up with older children, leading to a loss of interest in the sport. Similarly, my 1st-grade daughter experienced communication breakdowns during her first year of volleyball, missing at least three practices due to lack of information. This season, inconsistent emails regarding practice schedules and coaches have caused further confusion. Despite reaching out to Sundae directly by email, I remain uncertain about my daughter's practice schedule. Is her practice tonight? Who knows. My eldest daughter, who has participated in year-round sports for several years, faces a scheduling conflict this season due to an unexpected change in game schedules (games on Monday instead of Saturday), which was not communicated prior to registration. This change, coupled with the organization's history of game cancellations due to poor planning, has been disappointing, especially given her final season in the program with her friends.

★★★★★Christine A Blair

This place is great,very clean,good options for workouts,good price,and always clean

★Chaz B

Updated review Pickleball courts are in terrible shape. The floor has many dead spots. Floor should be replaced, lines for courts should at very least be redone. There are several contentious and rude folks who play. They have installed a monitor and camera given issues on courts, which does not seem to have helped. Several of the long time players have quit due to managements inattention to address the contentious people. The management will not listen to the players who have communicated how to make things better. It is definitely not a fun nor positive environment to play such a wonderful sport. The YMCA should do better!!!! This remains the most dated YMCA I have ever visited in the area, state and across the country. Classes are very crowded and weight room is extremely crowded during peak hours. Weight room has a lot of equipment yet given size of room with the amount of equipment it is very cramped and dangerous. A person could easily drop a weight on someone or trip moving between equipment. This is really notable by the plated leg press. Weights storage is dangerously close to the mirrors along wall. Stuff was hanging out of ceiling and you could see ledges have never been cleaned. This Y needs a top to bottom cleaning. Fire exit door in weight room had weights and other stuff in front. Shelves and mats are too close to allow for safe exit. Gym floor and track are very old and could be redone. A member told me they have fund raisers yet they never noticed any improvements in infrastructure. I noticed women have to walk through lobby from pool to get to their locker room. The floor is linoleum which could cause an extreme slipping hazard. This is the only Y in area and Texas that does not have at Sunday hours. A couple times when I was there in evenings, kids were just running a muck with no structure. I even saw them throwing balls from second story at each other. They were running around throwing balls almost hitting a lady on track. The Y only had a young kid as a monitor yet most of the time the kids ignored them. In my view the Y, needs to require much more structure rather than just allowing the teens to congregate and run crazy. The Y is an essential necessity in the community. Hopefully this review will enlist management to rectify these issues in the effort to provide a safe and productive environment for the community.

★★★Kristi Conine

We enjoy the pool and the gym is great. Brooke is awesome! So far this soccer season has been much more organized (thank you Mia) even though she had to deal with a low registration turnout. What you really need is something for youth! Classes ie. Cooking, camping, karate, physics etc. Start off with an afternoon a week of supervised free play. Subverting different every week.

★★★Jackie Taylor

The 3 stars are for the aquatic area and weight room, both are great! But I agree with the other reviews that the organized sports are a disaster. My daughter signed up for basketball last spring and they couldn’t find enough coaches so they turned it into a “clinic” versus a sports season. We have started going elsewhere for our kids sports.