Making waves with the University of Exeter Swim Programme

Swimming is a fantastic way to ensure children of all ages get a healthy start to life. It’s never too young to teach a child to swim, and our classes are based around structured sessions that are also lots of fun, with our fully-qualified instructors on hand to ensure that they not only engage with the children themselves, but also with parents, a factor that is hugely important in encouraging children to continue to swim as they get older.

The programme was started in Sept 2006 by a group of students as a community project. It started with just 10 classes, approximately 50 swimmers. Over the years the programme has grown putting greater emphasis on swimming lessons as an excellent community engagement project for the University. The growing success allowed the University to offer more teaching positions to students to better their CV’s, currently we employ approximately 15 staff including Level 1 and 2 coaches and 'Helpers' in the water with the younger groups. 

The programme now runs on Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday evenings 4pm-6pm and Saturdays 9am-1pm with a view to adding Tuesday lessons starting in June. This will accommodate 540 children continuously throughout the year. In addition to the ongoing lessons a summer programme will be in action for 6 weeks over the main children’s school holidays. 

All children follow the ASA NPTS pathway gaining awards through their scheme and we keep a record in individual log books awarding certificates of achievement as they move through the levels.

Swimming classes range from Ducklings level (age 3) right through to advanced. The best way to find out what level your children swim at is to ask our Swimming Pool Coordinator for a free swimming assessments - after the assessment you are under no obligation to book further lessons with us.

 Adults who have never been comfortable in the water benefit greatly from our peaceful private swimming pool - unlike public pools you will be able to relax completely and learn to swim under expert tuition.

Neil Sheppard (Assistant Director of Sport) said:

“The swimming programme has been a huge success over the last five years through excellent community engagement, a dedicated and highly skilled group of swimming teachers and having a low teacher to pupil ratio to aid quick results.

There are plans to expand the programme further to make swimming lessons at the University of Exeter a truly unique experience”  

 Why Chose Us?

• Small Class Sizes (6 or less Students per Instructor)
• Professional ASA and STA Qualified Swimming Instructors.
• Swimming Lessons Taught in Quiet, Peaceful Private Pools.
• Swimming Lessons and Instruction for Toddlers, Children and Adults.
• Excellent Success rate.
• Private 1 : 1 Classes Available
• Full Liability Cover.
• Qualified First Aider ALWAYS on-site
• Clean, Safe Teaching Environment
• Facility refurbishment in Summer 2011

For more information contact our Swimming pool coordinator on 01392 722905 or swimminglessons@exeter.ac.uk