swim! and swim@ have agreed an ‘Olympic’ new partnership with STA, which includes setting-up as a STA Approved Training Centre (ATC) and its internal tutor workforce starting to roll out STA’s full range of professional qualifications in swimming teaching, lifesaving, first aid, pool plant and education this month across its sports brand portfolio in swim! and swim@ centres Nationwide.

Becky Adlington OBE, Steve Parry MBE and Adrian Turner are behind the creation of swim. These Olympians, in partnership with JD Gyms engage with over 30,000 children every week and have delivered over 4000 leisure industry qualifications. The company for the last decade has also been at the forefront of building innovative, affordable and accessible leisure facilities across the UK, with currently 12 of their own bespoke learn to swim centres.

With ‘swim!’ on a mission to further expand their learn-to-swim portfolio in response to exceptionally high demands for lessons, they have joined with STA to accelerate and consolidate all of their aquatic training programmes. With a current national shortage of swimming teachers, the aim is to open up new, accessible and affordable training opportunities for current staff and the wider community.

Safety Training Awards, STA’s awarding organisation, which is regulated by Ofqual, is providing the structure for the team at ‘swim’ to be able to achieve this. The flexibility of STA’s ATC training model means they can deliver a high standard of professionally accredited ‘CIMSPA-endorsed’ qualifications across swimming teaching, lifesaving, first aid, pool plant and education courses, and have full control of planning and managing the whole training process based on each company/site’s requirements.

With two aspects to their Nationwide delivery, swim! offer quality lessons in state of the art, bespoke learn to swim facilities of their own alongside swim@ helping children in the community learn to swim through investment in school facilities. The whole business is committed to delivering the highest standards in swimming teaching, and by becoming an STA ATC, their in-house STA tutors will have full control over the quality of the training being delivered to their workforce, and thus raise standards further.

Becky Adlington OBE, Brand Director and Shareholder for swim! and swim@ is excited about the opportunity ahead; “We are delighted to be partnering with STA, a national governing body for swimming, and we look forward to unlocking all the benefits of becoming an Approved Training Centre. This strategic partnership will give us the flexibility and freedom to manage our swimming teaching training programmes and allow us to internally control our standards for teaching – all while providing an avenue for us to upskill staff and recruit and train new swimming teachers in support of our growth plans.”

Dave Candler, STA’s CEO said; “The team is delighted to be working with swim! and swim@, and we look forward to sharing our experiences with the team so that the teams and workforce can derive all the business benefits from STA’s Approved Training Centre model.”

“Recruiting and training swimming teachers in particular has always been a big challenge for the leisure industry, and especially in current times with a national shortage of teachers. Therefore, for large employers of swimming teachers like swim! and swim@, who have high demands for lessons, they cannot always rely on there being an external training course available at a time, or in a location their business demands. It, therefore, makes complete sense for them to take back control of their training needs by becoming an ATC and employ in-house tutors who can manage and internally drive and deliver the training needs of their aquatic workforce,” confirmed Dave.