Calgary pools turn tide on swimming lessons, lifeguard shortage

Brendan Coulter · CBC News

· Posted: Jun 28, 2025 11:52 AM EDT | Last Updated: 18 minutes ago

Public pools astir Calgary are nary longer treading water, aft years of staffing shortages forced cuts to swimming lessons and operating hours.

Coming retired of the pandemic, swimming lessons filled up astir instantly — leaving immoderate parents to instrumentality it retired connected agelong waitlists, according to the Calgary Outdoor Swimming Pools Association.

But heading into different engaged summertime season, lessons are inactive disposable astatine each 8 city-owned pools managed by the association.

"Our lessons astatine astir pools person astir a 70 to 80 per cent capable rate," said enforcement manager Riley Harper. "We inactive person tons of spots available."

Harper credits better staffing for the improved entree to swimming lessons, aft the pandemic shutdowns drove distant the young workers the manufacture relies on.

"Outdoor pools, we were deed reasonably hard because, you know, we bash person a abbreviated play and a batch of our unit are assemblage students. A batch of our unit are precocious schoolhouse students."

Without immoderate summertime occupation stability, lifeguards and swimming instructors moved connected with their careers. Replacing them has taken years and is inactive a enactment successful progress.

"It is simply a skilled trade," said Harper. "We don't possibly needfully deliberation of lifeguarding and instructing arsenic that, but our staff, they spell done training, they spell done recertification. Even having the trainers was a situation astatine immoderate points."

"The recreation manufacture arsenic a full truly pulled unneurotic to get Calgary backmost to wherever it is."

Lessons besides inactive disposable astatine indoor pools

Twenty per cent of the acquisition spots at Calgary's city-run indoor pools are besides inactive available, according to Michelle Tait, person of recreation and societal programs for the City of Calgary.

"We've decidedly seen [demand] adjacent retired a small bit. I deliberation that each those kids that benignant of missed getting aquatics lessons during the pandemic person gotten successful and they're dilatory moving up," said Tait.

"At the beginning, a batch of it was not capable staff. Where now, we've been capable to enlistee a batch of our workforce to connection much aquatics lessons."

Tait said staffing is "looking great" compared to the erstwhile fewer years, but added the metropolis is inactive actively hiring swimming instructors.

"Also during the pandemic, nary 1 could instrumentality a people to go a lifeguard oregon a aquatics instructor. So the request for those [courses] continues to beryllium rather precocious and we bash spot a batch of waitlists," she said.

Calgary pools changing hours, programming

Staffing shortages besides led the City of Calgary to reduce hours astatine immoderate of its 13 indoor pools.

But with much workers present connected board, starting adjacent week, the Foothills Aquatic Centre and Shouldice Aquatic Centre volition resume operating 5 days per week for the archetypal clip since 2020.

Changes are besides connected the mode at the Forest Lawn Outdoor Pool.

Vecova, a section foundation that supports people with disabilities, closed its lukewarm h2o excavation successful northwest Calgary connected Friday. The installation was utilized for adapted, sensory-aware aquatics lessons.

To capable the gap, the Calgary Outdoor Swimming Pools Association has agreed to displacement immoderate of those lessons to its heated excavation successful Forest Lawn.

"It's casual to get to, and it's successful an country of the metropolis wherever we're capable to, I think, scope the astir radical without impacting a fig of different programs," said Harper, adding the excavation tin besides accommodate ramps and different accessibility infrastructure much readily than the different outdoor pools.

"We privation to measurement up and thin into that assemblage and demographic and supply lessons."