Is £30 per term steep for childs swimming lessons at school

[TriciaH87]

My eldest is in year 5 at a juniors with their own pool. We have never had to pay for lessons but my youngest starts here next year and the school are wanting £30 per child per term for costs. Their is over 360 children at school which adds up to over 32,500 pounds a year. Surely it does not cost that to run when there are no transport costs. The teachers do the lessons themselves so no special swimming teachers to pay. My kids are already having lessons as the school lessons my eldest recieves are poor when they di actually happen. Had an entire half term without a single lesson as pool out of use and always some reason why cant have lesson. Worried its a bit pricey when based on track records half the time they wont be swimming. Lessons only ladt 20 mins for a class of 30 when they do get one.

Ours were free. I thought schools can't charge if it is part of the curriculum?

You are paying to keep the pool going. Maintaining a school pool is v costly. By paying this fee, the school can afford the pool. I think though that you would be right to question the school. Perhaps ask the governors how much the pool costs to maintain first. You can then ask for a rationale for the cost of the lessons.

Thats what i thought until i recieved an email today. Seems very pricey to me as well. We already pay 22.50 a month for lessons at our local leisure centre and in the 3 months of going they have both gone up a grade yet in 3 years at school nothing.

I don't think it is pricey. If there are 12 weeks per term it is less than £3 per week.

The costs of running a pool are significant. There will be insurances, heating, cleaning, equipment and there may well be some additional staffing costs that you are unaware of. Simply keeping a pool going does cost thousands per year.

It maybe that previously the school managed to fund it, but with the cuts they are facing, it is a case of spend the money on books etc and ask parents to pay for the swimming, which are not required to provide more than 10 weeks of in KS2, or keep the pool going and cut back elsewhere.

Most school don't have a pool so you could see it as a real positive. Yes it's £2.70 but would be more if you had to pay for transport too. It will simply run into disrepair and close down if people don't pay.

Isn't this just a sign of funding cuts....all around us, we will need to contribute more for everything which is beyond the bare minimum, with schooling scaling back to the very bare and drab essentials. Facilities like this will become increasingly rare. Depressing!

It costs a fortune to run a pool. Presumably they need lifeguards in addition to the PE teachers?

I would assume the Governors have costed this out. It is fiercely expensive to run pools at schools and most schools have closed them. My local pool is used by two large schools (so about 1700 pupils) and a very active swimming club. They still have to get grants for refurbishment etc. I would query the cost but I assume if parents don't pay, the pool goes. Perhaps they should be more creative regarding community use.

Yes you could ask for the rationale behind the pricing. However, I'm pretty sure that the school are not trying to rip you off, but to provide a valuable service.
I'm sure they are agonising over their budget and expenditure and having to make lots of hard choices. You can challenge them about this service and the cost if you want. Lots of parents seem to think that schools make a profit out of their contributions for school trips, residentials etc etc, but the reality is e things cost a lot of money. If parents all start objecting and refusing to pay, these things will just be scaled back further and further. I know that some people really can't afford to pay, but I think that in the current climate we need to accept that actually we probably will have to pay more through one means or another and if we don't, it will our children's experience of education which becomes meaner and more limited because of it.

I'm sure it does cost a lot to run. The maths teacher probably costs a fair bit, too and parents don't pay termly for the kids to do maths. Should be no different for swimming. £30 is a lot of money for some people.

Maybe it's not every class every term?

Ha! We have to pay £40 for SIX LESSONS! Apparently it is subbed by sports premium but also pays for an extra swimming coach. We have our own minibus so there are petrol costs but I happen to know the school rate is £1.20 so not sure how the school can justify it...

Yours seem cheap in comparison!

It will be to do with cuts. If parents won't agree to sub the pool I expect it will go.

We can't afford to keep all our teachers, so there's no way on earth we could run a pool.

It will be the pool costs, which will be very very very high.

I think it sounds expensive and also unsuitable if the normal class teacher is running the lessons. Someone mentioned PE teachers but primary schools don't always have dedicated PE staff do they? Even if they do, being a PE teacher doesn't mean you are qualified to teach swimming. It's no wonder your DD hasn't progressed. I know it's part of the NC and that the pool will cost a fortune to run but I am dubious about the value of school swimming lessons unless well-run. My DC went to a primary school with a pool (the pool had been there for years, can't imagine many schools are built with pools nowadays!) and neither of them learned anything useful in swimming lessons there, we paid for out of school lessons as did many other parents. Although they had a good swimming teacher, the lessons weren't long enough by the time everyone got changed and the classes of 30 were divided into 2, with a rough division of stronger and weaker swimmers. The problem is that children in the same class had wildly different capabilities so even within a group of 15 you had some who couldn't swim at all and didn't even like the water and some who could swim the length of the pool and attempt different strokes, with the result that the lesson wasn't tailored to meet the needs of anyone really.

I think you'll find a lot of parents won't pay so they will be well off the £32k...

Less than £3 is pretty good for a swimming lesson, and for lots of the kids, it will be the only lessons they get. Loads still leave Primary not being able to swim.

Unfortunately for your school, they have a fabulous resource, which is expensive to run, especially in this time of cuts. Their request to parents to pay is pretty much the only thing they can do. Sadly they probably won't get enough money in and over time it will fall into disrepair, but that will take a while.

It's one of the Indicators of deprivation these days. Children of the haves get swimming lessons outside school and children of the have nots don't and many leave primary school not being able to swim. Round here lessons are about £6 for half hour in a group of about 7. The school lesson at less than £3 is a bargain, but groups will be bigger and progress slower.

I think it's a shame that lots of parents get feisty every time a parental contribution is requested - for a day trip, for some visiting players, an item for the fete........some people really do seem to think the school is out to make a profit from them. Budgets are so tight now and things being pared back to the bare minimum. Making a bit of a contribution is a reality these days. It's not the schools fault and no point in moaning about them - it's the funding systems.

I suppose the school could close the pool down, take year 4 for one term a year to the local pool and charge you for the transport there ( which they can do) and you might save a bit of money. But whether it would be worth it, I don't think so!