Letter To The Minister Of Education

Miles Sargent

52 Orchard Rd West

Ngatea, New Zealand

07 867 7305

Office@ngatea.school.nz

28th May, 2018

Minister of Education

New Zealand Government

Molesworth St

Pipitea, Wellington



Dear Minister of Education,

I am writing to you to try and persuade you to not take swimming out of the
schooling Curriculum.

Why? What is your meaning. Why would you take away such a key subject. At my school we have
house groups.
All of the school is split into four groups:

• Kapui
• Orewa
• Weka 
• Patiki

Over the whole year the groups do tasks and sport days to accumulate points and swimming is one
of them. These days are quite fun and by getting rid of swimming it makes it harder for teams to win
points and it takes away the fun.

By taking swimming away you are preventing: kids from learning to swim, learning survival skills in
the water,
fitness and as I said earlier, having fun.

This might seem crazy, but. What if a man went on a cruise and for some reason he had to abandon ship. The lifeboats were full, so he would have to keep afloat. But he hadn’t learned how to swim, he would drown and die. His kids and wife would be sitting at home waiting for him to come home. When they open the door, expecting to see their father, they see a policeman waiting there to break the bad news.

If you don’t agree with me, keep this in mind. If kids don’t learn how to swim the drowning rate will
go up drastically and some families will be sad and childless. If you get rid of swimming you would
probably create ignominy from the public. Last year there were 104 drownings and that was when there was
swimming lessons, if you took away swimming you couldn’t  imagine what it would be like.

Thanks,

Miles Sargent