For the first time, we can see how well schools across England are doing at teaching children to swim, school by school. The picture is not a comfortable one.

A BBC Freedom of Information request to the Department for Education has produced a school level breakdown of swimming attainment for last year’s Year 6 leavers, covering 16,355 state schools. It shows that 72% of pupils could swim 25 metres and 70% could perform a safe self-rescue by the time they left primary school.

Roughly one child in four is finishing primary school unable to swim the length of a standard pool.

The Gap That Should Concern All of Us

The national averages hide something more worrying:

• In schools with the highest proportion of pupils on free school meals, only 55% could swim 25 metres
• In schools with the lowest proportion, that figure rose to 87%
• Around half of children in the highest free school meal schools could perform a safe self-rescue

In other words, the children least likely to have access to private lessons are also the least likely to leave school able to swim.

The Department for Education has acknowledged the gap and said it needs to change. Swim England has described swimming as a life skill rather than just a sport, while pointing to the pressures schools face: competing demands on curriculum time, rising transport costs and access to suitable pools.

You can read the STA’s full response to the findings here.

BBC Findings Put School Swimming Back In The Spotlight

Why School Swimming Alone Rarely Gets a Child to 25 Metres

We deliver school swimming sessions across the Dover area and we see the reality of it every week. School sessions do a great deal of good. They introduce children to the water, they build early confidence and for some children they are the only swimming they will ever do.

But there are limits, and parents deserve to understand them:

• Most school groups receive around six weeks of 30 minute sessions
• A school session can involve up to 15 swimmers with one teacher
• Children are sorted into two broad groups, those who have never swum before and those who can already swim
• There is no stage by stage progression and very little individual attention

For a child who arrives with real water confidence, that is enough to keep things ticking along. For a child who has never been in a pool, three hours is simply not enough time to learn a skill that could one day save their life.

Please Don’t Pause Your Weekly Lessons

Every year we see the same pattern. A school block starts, families pause their weekly Learn to Swim place to avoid doubling up, and only half of those swimmers come back once the school sessions have finished.

Six weeks away undoes months of progress. Children lose the water confidence they had built, stroke technique slips, and many end up repeating work they had already mastered.

Reminder for Parents: If your child’s school swimming is coming up, keep your weekly place. The two sit alongside each other perfectly well, and your child will get far more out of their school sessions for having kept going.

What Good Progress Actually Looks Like

Children learn to swim through regular, repeated practice in small groups matched to their ability.

Our lessons run all year round, in small groups organised by stage rather than by school year. Children move up when they are ready, water safety and self-rescue are built into every stage from the beginning, and parents can see exactly where their child is against clear outcomes in appDot and on our Learn to Swim Pathway.

School swimming and weekly lessons are not alternatives. They work best together, one giving exposure and confidence, the other giving structured progression.

A Positive Change This September

From September, water safety education becomes a statutory part of the curriculum in England, so pupils will receive age-appropriate teaching on recognising hazards and making safer decisions around water throughout their school journey.

It is an important step, but it complements practical swimming rather than replacing it. Knowing that a river is dangerous is not the same as being able to get yourself to the side of it.

Booking a Place

We teach across our venues in the Dover area, from first time swimmers through to competitive squads, with private lessons available for children who need to catch up or build confidence at their own pace.

If your child swims with us at school and you have been wondering whether weekly lessons are worth it, this data is your answer.

• Sign up for weekly lessons
• Book a one off private lesson

Learn More About Our Stage Criteria

For full details on what’s covered in each stage, visit:

• Learn to Swim Pathway
• Stage 1 Criteria