Early in 2022, Belgravia Foundation was awarded funding from Swimming Australia’s Community Swimming Partnerships Program Partner under the SportAUS Participation Grants Program to expand and upscale All In! across a minimum of 10 Australian Belgravia Leisure venues. This trial is an extension of earlier work completed by the same collaborating group in 2020/2021, which was heavily affected by COVID-19.   

All In! is a national project of Belgravia Foundation, with Belgravia Leisure as innovation partner.  The program aims to build swim instructors confidence and capacity to welcome, support and include people of a disability and diversity into Belgravia Leisure’s aquatic experiences; ultimately increasing participation.    

All In! comprises of three critical components:       

1. Swim Teacher Online Training:   
   Qualified swim teachers complete online training tailored around people with intellectual disability and autism spectrum disorder, in addition to, cultural competency training.   

2. Subsidised Swimming Lessons:   
   8-week swimming program with participants enduring 1 x 30-minute swimming lesson across eight weeks at a heavily subsidised rate.   

3. Mentor Project:   
   The Mentor Project compliments All In!, helping transform how Belgravia Leisure train their swim teachers, with several mentoring and mentee resources and locally available support to empower swim teachers to feel more confident and inclusive of all.  

The national All In! trial concluded in April 2023, with the results signifying that this innovative program has the capability to directly address previously seemingly intractable challenges related to inclusion into learn to swim and aquatic programs.  These challenges include cost of training, accessibility of training, alignment with evidence-based practice, and addressing the training needs of learn to swim and the aquatic team as expressed and revealed through research by these people.   

Throughout the trial, 178 learn to swim teachers were engaged, 76 mentors were established and an 8-week subsided swim program took place for 446 participants across Australia.  

Evidence captured through pre and post surveying highlights that there has been an increase in the confidence and capacity of Belgravia Leisure’s swim teachers to better welcome, support and include people with a disability and people of diversity into aquatic experiences. This confirms that the training provided is cost effective and has the ability to be scaled-up and sustained.  

The commitment of both Belgravia Foundation and Belgravia Leisure to the premise and promise of All In! remains very strong. All In! highlighted aquatic venues enthusiasm to inclusion, commitment to leadership at a local level and enabled new partnerships and collaborations.  

Belgravia Foundation would like to thank Swimming Australia for their collaborative approach and contribution to All In!. Belgravia Foundation welcomes the opportunity to discuss how they can be an active support to offer, assist and translate All In! to other operators of learn to swim programs in Australia and New Zealand.