The province is lookng at lowering the minimum age of lifeguards to 15, which city staff say would help address some – but not all – staffing shortages at City of Guelph pools.
“I’d say it’s happy news,” said Breann Robb, aquatics recreation supervisor for the City of Guelph.
Currently the Ontario’s Health Protection and Promotion Act regulates all lifeguards, and aquatic instructors have to be at least 16.
“I don’t know what the roll-out plan is so as this is a proposed idea I’m not sure what the timeline is. Certainly we don’t have anything on our end that we’re actioning right now with that news,” she said.
“We are still actively recruiting staff.” said Robb.
The fall, spring and winter months are the times where the city does require additional staffing.
During the summer current staff have the opportunity to stay on and staff who are students have more daytime availability.
“With the change of the age of 15 it unfortunately wouldn’t address daytime staffing issues that we have,” said Robb. “But it certainly would help us with our evening lessons and our guarding as well as on evenings and weekends.”
To address staffing shortages, the city is recruiting individuals with their Bronze Cross and standard first aid qualifications. Other leadership courses like national lifeguard and swim instructor are subsidized in price by the city.
The Lifesaving Society, the organization providing lifeguard training, lowered the required age to attain the national lifeguard certification to 15.
“We have decreased the cost to staff. So once you’re on-boarded with us there is a reduction in the price of future certifications allowing staff to develop and grow their qualifications with us,” said Robb.
The learn-to-swim program is one program that would benefit from a lowered minimum age for lifeguards and instructors.
“We’ve seen an increase in demand for the learn-to-swim program and so that is where our year-end staffing unfortunately isn’t meeting that demand right now,” Robb said.
Staff at age 15 would be considered junior staff “so we would definitely see the importance in pairing them with experienced instructors and lifeguards if this change were to take place.” said Robb.
