Drowning is a silent epidemic that claims an estimated 360,000 lives every year, many of them children. Drowning is the 3rd leading cause of unintentional injury death worldwide. These are wasted lives and preventable deaths.

Did you know?*

• Globally, drowning claims more than 360,000 lives every year
• One person loses their life by drowning every 90 seconds
• Children aged 1 to 4 are most at risk.
• Over half the people who drown are under 25
• Most drownings occur in low- and middle-income countries.
• These losses of life are largely preventable.

*World Health Organization

What We Do

We provide free swimming lessons and drowning prevention education to underprivileged children who live along the earth’s open water: rivers, lakes and oceans.

SwimTayka objective:

• The advancement of health and the saving of lives by the provision of swimming lessons for children and teaching and training in all aspects of water safety.

How Does SwimTayka Work?

SwimTayka connects organisations in low resource waterside communities with volunteer swimming instructors and drowning prevention educators from around the world, in order to develop and promote free swimming and drowning prevention lessons for children. Volunteer programmes run from one week up to two months and include instruction in basic water safety, swimming, first aid and clean water education.

Our Approach

• Connecting passionate people with existing NGO’s and Charities
• Dealing with the issues at a local level
• Creating partnerships – which work
• Leaving a legacy of confident swimmers and clean water stewards
• Encouraging established teaching methods around drowning prevention and swimming teaching
• Teach the teacher and develop sustainability.

Our Solutions

The practical solutions we have developed include:

• Connecting together qualified instructors to teach swimming
• A water education programme that is easy to follow and teach
• Free education lessons for children in low-income communities
• Connecting Swimming professional with existing NGO’s and Charities
• Building safety values
• Developing a five-year plan

Achievements

We are proud of what we have achieved, here are just a few of them:

• Reaching out to over 8,000 children
• Programmes in Peru, Brazil, Mozambique, Bali, Jamaica, Dominican Republic, Bahamas, Vietnam and Tanzania
• Over 30 volunteers working towards the greater goal

Where we work

We work in counties that need teachers and education, working closely with NGO’s and Charities that already have an established relationship with the community.

You may have been on holiday to beautiful beaches, swum in the clear turquoise waters, snorkelling or diving from boats but what you don’t realise is that many of the local people cannot swim.  They play in the waters every day, they have the confidence in the water, but they don’t know how to swim or survive.

Working with communities that live along the earth’s open water: rivers, lakes and oceans no matter where they are, we provide the children with free swimming lessons, drowning prevention education and education in clean water stewardship.

Funding

Nothing can function without money, unfortunately.  We keep our costs down as low as possible to give maximum benefit to our programmes. We are proud to say that overall we have spent under £50k in our last year.

We continually seek external funding, as without this funding we could not do what we do.

We hold fundraising events which are all related to our cause, which include Swimming the English Channel in a relay team, or being sponsored for a local swimming race, or even a triathlon.

Our supporters and volunteers are the backbones of SwimTayka, and we continue to look for support from individuals, trusts and foundations, and other donors who fund our work.

A diverse and sustainable funding source will help us to grow and save more children from accidental drowning around the world.

Our Staff & Volunteers