Nearly half of all year 6 students are falling below Australian swimming and water safety benchmarks for their age group and their swimming skills are not improving in high school, new research shows.
National guidelines recommend all Australians “should be able to float or tread water for two minutes and swim continuously for 50 metres” by the age of 12. But Royal Life Saving Australia found teachers estimated that 48% of students were unable to perform these skills and 39% of students were still unable to by year 10. By age 17, the benchmark recommends 50% of students “be able to float or tread water for five minutes and swim continuously for 400 metres” – but the report warned that teachers generally observed “little improvement” in swimming skills after year 7.
During the 2024-25 summer season, 104 people drowned in waterways and swimming pools across Australia, up by 5% from the previous summer, with a lack of swimming skills known to be a significant factor. Ten of these reported drownings were children under 14.
The Royal Life Saving Australia chief executive, Dr Justin Scarr, said Australia, especially in the wake of disruptions during the Covid-19 pandemic, was at risk of “creating a generation with extremely poor swimming skills”.
He told Guardian Australia “a range of factors” had contributed to the decline in skills, “including that many parents enrolled their children young and at significant cost, which means that they finished way too early to develop a complex swimming and water safety skill set, which might include the ability to swim at least the length of the pool”.
Many children stopped lessons between the ages of seven and nine, the research found, and one in 10 children between the ages of five and 14 had never had a swimming lesson.
“The financial cost of lessons excludes many people,” Scarr said. “They’re simply too expensive for many people, particularly those people living in outer metropolitan areas and in regional towns.”
Another factor, Scarr said, was that many people assumed schools would provide a safety net in the form of swimming lessons. But while the report said school-based programs were offered in all states and territories, it noted “the objectives, mode of delivery, reach, funding and successes varie[d] greatly”.
The research showed 31% of schools did not offer learn-to-swim programs at all, citing cost, staffing shortages and time limitations as major barriers.
It also found that one in four schools did not hold swimming carnivals and where they did take place, teachers reported that 50% of students did not participate.
Dr Amy Peden, a senior research fellow at the University of NSW school of population health who specialises in drowning prevention, said the findings were not particularly surprising.
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“We are seeing some kids missing out on swimming lessons altogether, either because they are not offered or they cannot afford it – or what seems to be the issue here is kids leaving swimming lessons before they can do these minimum skills, which are designed to keep them safe throughout their life,” she said.
“It is very concerning from a drowning prevention point of view that these kinds of minimum skills – and that’s what they are: minimum – aren’t even being met.”
Noting that teacher respondents taking part in Royal Life Saving Australia’s research came from all parts of the education system, including state schools, private schools and some regional schools, Scarr said opportunities to develop swimming skills at school were “more likely depending on the economic means of the school”.
“You are much more likely to participate in swimming and water safety lessons in wealthier suburbs and private schools than you might in less economically advantaged suburbs,” he said.
Royal Life Saving Australia advocated for four measures to ensure no child misses out on learning the swimming skills they need to survive: an increase in funding to existing schools and vacation programs; grants targeting people vulnerable to drowning; better access to lifesaving programs to boost water safety skills; and addressing infrastructure gaps by building and refurbishing public swimming pools and swim schools.
