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What is the Change?

The change moves from calendar year (January – December) model to a seasonal (August 1 – July 31) for age grouping.
For Rose Tree Soccer Club this will apply to all programs including Travel, Recreational, camps etc.

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Who decided the change?

US Youth Soccer, US Club Soccer, and the Association Youth Soccer Organization (AYSO) collectively announced a major update to age group formations that will take effect for the 2026–27 season.

Why the change?

To better align players with their school grade peers.
Helping to reduce “trapped” players, i.e., players (usually with birthdates in the last quarter of the year) who continue in high school after the rest of their cohort have moved on to college.
Better alignment with school-grade peers for social and developmental benefits.

Will this impact the 25/26 season?

No, teams will remain under the birth year system through the end of the 2025/26 seasonal year.
July 31, 2026 is when current player passes expire.

New Age Groups

Example of the New Age Group Change

Player A was born in December of 2015.
For the current season player A is a U11 player and Player Age group is Calendar year (January – December) 2015.
For the new change Player A will be U11 again and Player A new age group is August 1, 2015 – July 31, 2016.

Can a player play up an age group at RTSC in the U9-U12 age groups?

Rose Tree Soccer Club will have two exceptions to playing up at the Travel level.
Exception 1 is an exception that we as a club have had in the past even before the age group change.
Exception 2 is being introduced to keep players with their grade if possible and desired.
Rose Tree Soccer Club encourages players to play in the new age group, but understand that there might be exceptions that will be better suited for a player to play up.

Birth Year Policy Exceptions - Exception 1

Process for determining the conditions for a player(s) to play up a birth year:

Travel committee will review player evaluation from the previous fall season and earlier if applicable. Expectation upon review would be a top quartile score for the fall season from all coaching staff of their previous fall team.
Player(s) must attend both evaluations for his/her birth year. If approved, player(s) must attend both evaluations of the older birth year. Expectation is players will attend all assigned evaluations, no exceptions.
Evaluators will be notified of the players prior to the evaluation and asked to score the player within a subcategory of the usual (A/B/C/D) scoring system. For example, a player rated A1 would indicate the top 1⁄3 of the A category. A3 would indicate a player in the bottom 1⁄3 of the A category.
Travel committee will review the results of the first birth year evaluation and the first older birth year evaluation. Expectation is a top quintile score in both evaluations to be considered for placement in the older age group.
Travel committee will review data from all evaluations and make a decision on placement in the birth year, or recommendation for older birth year.

Birth Year Policy Exceptions - Exception 2

Applies to the players born in August/September.
Reason for exception to allow those to play with their classmates.
Those born in August/September can play up if the reason is to play with teammates from their grade.
Example:
A player born in August of 2015 whose new age group is U11 (8/1/15 – 7/31/16) can play up with U12 (8/1/14-7/31/15) group if the player would be playing with classmates.

Can players U13 and above play up?

Yes.
For teams U13 and above the Coaches decide the teams. Therefore, the coaches are allowed to determine if they want to accept a younger player on their team who is in a younger age group.