Multicultural Lynwood children learn to Swim and Survive

Those arriving in WA from overseas often have limited swimming and water safety skills, as these are not a focus of education in their home countries. This can have tragic consequences, and drowning statistics show that between 1st July 2006 and 30th June 2016 33.3% of drownings in Western Australia involved people from Culturally and Linguistically Diverse (CaLD) backgrounds.

Royal Life Saving Society WA’s Access and Equity program, sponsored by Principal Community partner BHP and the Department of Home Affairs, is working hard across the community to address this issue.

As part of this program we are currently running two weeks of in-term Swim & Survive lessons with the Intensive English Learning Centre at Lynwood Senior High School. Lynwood describes its student intake as being a multicultural blend, with many students from various Asian countries, the Middle East and most recently African migrants.

114 students are taking part in the current Royal Life Saving Swim and Survive program at the school, learning swimming and water safety education skills with experienced instructors. The program is being supervised by Liz Fowler from Swim Mechanix, a Royal Life Saving endorsed swim school which has extensive experience in running program for at-risk students.

Royal Life Saving WA hopes to assist more schools with a high number of multicultural students to run similar programs, as we work to ensure all WA children have an opportunity to learn vital swimming and water safety skills. If you would like to know more about the Swim and Survive Access and Equity program and how we can work with your school find out more at the link below.