Making the  Difference Water Safety Program

This program has been in operation for some time now and in the 2019-2020 season has continued to progress. This program is now in operation from Term 3 2020. Working with schools, and in particular low decile schools, it aims to improve pupils water safety, knowledge and swimming skills. Aimed primarily at Year 4-8 students, it covers the Water Safety NZ Water Skills for Life Program.

For many years now one of the chief aims has been to improve deep water skills by having the schools come to the Rotorua Aquatic Centre for sessions, instead of classes being held at their own school pool. The club has provided swim instructors to attend the schools.

The programme is run in partnership between Swim Rotorua and CLM Swim Magic. Funded by BayTrust covering admin and instruction costs, and Rotorua Lakes Council providing free access through the Aquatic Centre, and the Rotorua Energy Charitable Trust who cover transport cost, this is an extensive programme.

Leadership and Personal Development Opportunities for Senior Athletes

Swim Rotorua have recently introduced a policy to provide leadership and personal development opportunities for our athletes who are 14 years and older. We feel it is important to develop the leaderships skills of our T senior athletes. In addition we have introduced the following initiatives:

1. Swimming NZ Swim Teachers' Award

Students 16 years and over who have a suitable level of maturity, responsibility and communication skills might want to consider enrolling for this course with Swimming NZ. Courses are regularly run in Rotorua, and provide 43 NCEA Level 3 credits on completion. This opportunity is open to those in all squads, but please discuss it with your coach or the Head Coach, Aidan.

Swim Rotorua will provide encouragement, supervision and opportunities to undertake the  volunteer hours necessary through the junior programme, holiday programmes and Making the Difference. We also have a Swimming NZ qualified Evidence Gatherer for the course. This enables our swimmers to gain a qualification and work experience, and may lead to paid coaching/swim teaching opportunities. We look forward to others coming on board.

2. Volunteer work for the Duke of Edinburgh Awards

As part of the Duke of Edinburgh Awards students need to do 3-6 months (and for Gold possibly 12 months) volunteer work of 1 -2 hours per week. Swim Rotorua may have some opportunities for students to complete volunteer work with the club eg  If you are interested in this, please contact Claire Baylis in the first instance cbaylis@xtra.co.nz