Reflecting on 'incredible privilege' of attending European Congress for Adapted Physical Activity

Swim England’s representative at the recent European Congress for Adapted Physical Activity in Spain has spoken of her pride at representing the organisation at the prestigious event.

Lorna Goldie, the governing body’s school swimming and water safety development officer, attended the four-day congress in Seville after Swim England were invited to the bi-annual gathering for the first time.

Lorna, along with the Youth Sport Trust, Ask Research and Lead Inclusion School Parkside from Norwich, shared the learnings and findings from Inclusion 2024 in a presentation attended by delegates from across the globe.

Inclusion 2024 project aims to increase and improve opportunities for young people with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) to engage and participate in physical activity and school sport.

“It was an incredible privilege to represent Swim England at such a prestigious event,” Goldie said. “I can’t deny the fact that standing on the stage in front of so many delegates was nerve-wracking but it was also a fantastic honour.

“During the presentation, we encouraged the delegates to get involved in a few activities in order to try and give them a greater understanding of what we are trying to achieve with Inclusion 2024 and the level of engagement was fantastic.”

Swim England were the only national governing body invited to the event and although adapted physical activity was the focus delegates from a host of other sports were also in attendance.

Interesting and inspiring

Goldie added: “The conference was about adapted physical and activity, so looking at ways of improving physical activity for people with long-term health conditions and physical disabilities or for people with learning disabilities.

“The keynote speaker was Andrew Parsons, the President of the International Paralympic Committee. He set the tone for the conference with his speech, which was relating to the miracle of the Paralympics and the social impact.

“The conference was not just about sport and the competitive side of things, but looking at how to inspire people with a physical disability to see other people participating in sport and the impact that that has on their self-esteem.

“Andrew discussed the social impact as well as the health and wellbeing aspect of the Paralympics – it was incredible to see such a keynote speaker be so inspiring.”

The opportunity to network and exchange ideas and learnings with representatives from other sports was also a particular highlight of the event for Lorna.

“To see what experts in their particular sphere are doing was really good, particularly in regard to things like equipment,” she revealed.

“It was so interesting to see how just slight tweaks to a very generic piece of equipment can make huge changes to people’s lives and then taking that away and thinking, oh, how can we do that in the water as well.”