Editorial: Case for keeping the school pool

Opinion

Most people who grew up in New Zealand will have fond memories of the school swimming pool. It is as Kiwi as pavlova and pohutukawa trees in summer, a small piece of the jigsaw that creates a picture of what it is to be a New Zealander.

But it is more than that. It is the place where many of us learned to swim, a skill that is not only enjoyable but arguably essential for a people who live in an island paradise and from generation to generation have enjoyed a love affair with the water - swimming in it, sailing over it or catching their fish from it.

Given the history and the culture, there should be a ripple of concern at the Herald series published yesterday and today which shows that the great New Zealand tradition of the school swimming pool is under threat. Since 2002 the number of state school swimming pools has declined from 1906 to 1688. Although some have gone because the schools themselves have shut, it seems that most have been closed because schools have done the arithmetic and assessed their priorities.

In our series, the president of the Schools Trustees Association, Chris Haines, pointed out that there were some things in the school curriculum that could not be discarded. Unfortunately, the teaching of swimming did not fall into this category. "The cost burden is so great that schools are looking at swimming pools and saying, 'That's just too much and do we really need it?' " Increasingly it seems the answer is no, an answer made easier because swimming no longer enjoys the status in the curriculum that it once did. Although there are some minimal standards, there is no requirement that they be met. The performance of schools in teaching their children about the water is, at best, uneven.

There are plenty of good reasons to sympathise with schools that discard the swimming pool. Not only are they expensive but it is arguable that swimming is one of those life skills better left to parents to organise. Judging by the high number of children who learn to swim at private lessons, many are accepting the challenge. It is also arguable that the private swimming schools are more effective than any state school could ever be if only because their ratio of teachers to pupils is much smaller.

Of course, these arguments are cold comfort for people who cannot afford private tuition and, in any case, miss the essential national importance of having a population with a basic ability to swim. For all of our great love affair with the water, we have a lamentable safety record. The drowning rate in New Zealand is twice that of Australia, and there seems to be broad agreement among water safety experts that swimming standards are steadily declining.

One study has found three-quarters of schoolchildren are unable to swim 200m, the distance generally reckoned to be necessary to get themselves out of trouble.

It is hard, therefore, to disagree with experts such as Kevin Moran from Auckland University who argue for greater recognition for swimming in the curriculum, with formal standards and assessments. The objective should not be to produce world-beaters in the pool but people who are savvy about the water and have sufficient ability to keep themselves safe.

Of course, a requirement that swimming be formally assessed as part of the curriculum would make the dilemma facing schools more acute. There would be a cost but, given our close connection with the sea, it is one that is worth paying.