Diving into our aquatics programme

Head of Swimming, Glen Melson, describes how a dedicated programme and fantastic facilities supports swimmers of all ages and levels.

Diving into our aquatics programmeHead of Swimming, Glen Melson, describes how a dedicated programme and fantastic facilities supports swimmers of all ages and levels. I have been at ACS Cobham since October 2016. My role is to plan and deliver the PE curriculum swimming for Early Childhood to Grade 8. In addition to this I oversee the two main components of our aquatics programme: the swim school and swim team.

The swimming programme consists of two major components. We have the swim school which is our 'learn to swim' programme and the competitive swim team for swimmers in Grade 2 to Grade 12. Our aim is to develop a programme that gives swimmers a clear pathway from learning to swim to junior elite level.We have had to make large adjustments to the swimming timetable due to COVID-19. We extended the learn to swim programme to add Saturdays to accommodate our Early Childhood students. The swim team had a reduced timetable compared to previous years, but we were lucky enough to utilise the mornings for training sessions. Our Grade 7 to 12 students had the opportunity to swim three times a week with Grade 3 to Grade 6 swimming twice a week.In a normal competitive programming, we aim to start the Fall season with some local friendlies against other schools in Surrey to prepare for the London West ISA Regional events in October. This competition is relatively new for our school, but we have had immediate success with many swimmers going to the national event at the London Aquatics Centre. In the Winter season we took part in some mid-season competitions in places like Brussels and Netherlands in preparation for the junior and senior swimmers' International Schools Sports Tournament (ISST) or International Schools’ Athletic Association (ISAA) competitions that take place in March. We finish the Spring Season with some more local UK competitions against a variety of different schools.Our facilities at ACS Cobham are fantastic. We have a six-lane 25 metre pool with electronic timing system and pool spectator gallery to allow us to hold regional and international competitions. In addition to this, we have a moveable pool floor which allows us to raise and lower the pool depth to accommodate the learn to swim students and competitive swim teams. We have a range of equipment which allows us to be more specific to each child's needs and introduce and develop new aquatic skills and disciplines.

My aim is to continue to develop an all-year swim programme that is fun, motivating and engaging for our students. I think it is vital we continue to promote water safety as swimming is a life skill, but also, I want to enable students to thrive in a pool environment. The Sports Department is committed to building the key fundamental skills to allow our students to develop from a beginner swimmer to a competitive athlete, whether that be competition swimming, water polo or synchronised swimming.

Glen Melson, Head of Swimming

The best thing about the ACS Cobham Swim Team is the swimmers. They are committed, engaged and enthusiastic. Many of our swimmers will train three mornings a week, and I feel that the swimmers develop important life skills such as time management as they must balance their school commitments with their sport commitments. The energy our students bring to competitions is second to none. I am really looking forward to getting back to face-to-face competitions, to see our swimmers continue to progress and achieve success.