Lifesaving Sport: Start of Season Updates

Thank you to everyone who attended our 2024/2025 Sport Season Kick-off webinar on Wednesday, September 18th!  For anyone who wasn't able to make it, this communique will summarize the key discussion points, messaging, and next steps.

Since the webinar, we've had some exciting updates and news, so even if you attended on the 18th, we highly recommend reading on to see what else is in store for our Sport community! 

Meet Our New Lifesaving Sport Specialist!

Though we're sure many of you know her already, we're pleased to introduce our new Lifesaving Sport Specialist: Amy Swedlo!

Amy has been involved with Lifesaving Sport in our province since 2016 as an athlete, official, coach, sport coach trainer, and national trainer. She is passionate about improving user experience with our website and brings a wealth of professional experience with product design, testing, and quality assurance. Amy's educational background includes a BASc in systems design engineering from the University of Waterloo.

Amy will be your primary contact for any and all things Sport-related! If you have a question about anything discussed during the webinar, or in this communique, you can get in touch with her by emailing Sport@Lifesaving.org.

Monthly Lifesaving Sport Discussion and Q&A with Amy

Starting in October, we'll be offering webinars for our coaches and officials on a monthly basis. In these informal sessions, you'll hear updates to ongoing projects, and have an opportunity to chat with Amy about any difficulties or confusion with the website, resources, or the season in general.

Please know that these webinars are completely optional and therefore won't be recorded. With that said, you're welcome to attend as many of the sessions as you wish.

The first session is scheduled for October 15 from 2:30pm - 3:30pm, and registration is currently open! A full monthly schedule will be distributed at a later date.

Register Here!

Season Startup Guide

During the webinar, we discussed the process of using our sport website to perform the following tasks:

1. Activate the club – this will generate an $80 invoice for the 2024/2025 Club registration fee.
2. Add club administrators and coaches.
3. Add new athletes.
4. Set athlete status to “pending” for athletes that will compete in the 2024/2025 season – this will generate a $20 invoice/athlete for the 2024/2025 athlete fee.
5. Manage waivers for athletes and coaches. 

We understand that this process can be a bit daunting, especially if you've never done this before. As such, we've created a document that walks through each step in detail. If this is your first time running a Lifesaving Sport club, or if you're unfamiliar with using our sport website, we highly recommend that you view the document on our website.

Changes to Competition Registration

Some changes are coming to the sport website for competitions with respect to how athletes are registered for meets based on competition age vs actual age. These changes should go live in mid October; so we are asking clubs to hold off on creating new competitions (and by extension, entering athletes into competitions) until these changes go live.

Once the new changes are live on the site, detailed instructions will be available for both creating competitions and entering athletes into sanctioned competitions.

2024/2025 Competition Schedule

The current competition schedule for 2024/2025 is available on the Competition Information page of our website.

We're also excited to announce that we have confirmed the location for this year's provincials. This year, provincials will once again be held at Calgary's Brookfield Residential YMCA at Seton. 

Going forward, we are committed to securing long-course facilities for future provincials. In terms of the next five-year cycle, since both the 2024 and 2025 provincials were in Calgary, we are looking at potentially having the 2026 and 2027 provincials in Edmonton, and 2028 in either northern or southern Alberta. 

Dates and Locations Confirmed for CPLC and CSLC

On September 24, 2024, Lifesaving Society Canada announced that the dates and locations for the next five Canadian Pool Lifesaving Championships have been confirmed.

In addition, details on the Canadian Surf Lifesaving Championships have also been confirmed for 2025 and 2027, with more information to come.

Lifesaving Sport Concussion Policy 2024

Concussions can happen anywhere, at anytime, and to anyone. As coaches, athletes, and members of the sport community, it's important to be equipped with the knowledge to identify and manage concussions effectively. 

As a condition of being considered a club in good standing with the Lifesaving Society ABNWT, each club is required to ensure that concussion education information is being shared with athletes, parents/caregivers, officials, and coaches.

This process is described in detail in our Sport Concussion Policy 2024, where you'll find our concussion education resources for this year. Please review this form, and ensure that everyone in your Lifesaving Sport community receives the resources.

Once your club has completed the concussion education policy requirements, please confirm by filling out the Concussion Compliance Form.

Other Updates

Club Name Change

If there are any clubs wishing to change their club name as it appears on the Sport website, please submit name change requests to Sport@Lifesaving.org by Friday, October 11th. Our website developer will make the changes after the deadline. 

Requests from High River, SLS Centre, and YMCA Calgary have already been received. 

Updated Meet Templates

For the 2024/2025 season we have eliminated the option of hosting an open competition. Instead, our website now has templates available for short course meets (all ages) and long course meets (14 and up). 

These new templates have current record files. The record files will be updated throughout the season as records are broken.

New Lifesaving Sport Ribbons

New Lifesaving Sport ribbons will be available in our shop this October! These ribbons will feature the Lifesaving Sport logo, with placings from 1 to 8. 

Our JLC branded ribbons will still be available in our shop at a discounted price while supplies last. 

Lifesaving Sport Coach 1

We are officially retiring the 8-hour version of the Lifesaving Sport Coach 1 course. All material for this version of the course has been removed from the website, and our Policies and Procedures manual will be updated to reflect this change.

The 12-hour version of the course will continue to be available. This course follows the leadership competency model and includes the Instructor Award Guide format that has become standard for all leadership courses offered at the branch.

Additionally, the JLC Lesson Plan will be removed from the Sport Course 1 packs, and will instead be available separately in our Resource Library.

ABNWT Competition Manual Review

We will be reviewing some specific rules in the current ABNWT Competition Manual to provide clarity for the 2024/2025 season. 

• Medley Relay clarification
• 100 Tow and 100 Carry - ILS or ABNWT rules
• SERC - ILS or ABNWT scoring
• Addition of Pool Lifesaver Relay
• Clarification on event distance for LC Obstacle and Super Lifesaver for the 14-15 age group

An addendum to the competition manual will be available prior to the start of the competition season. Officials will be briefed on any updated rule changes resulting from the review of the above items.

Provincial Records

As some of you may be aware, last season we had some issues with our Sport website not displaying the correct, or most up-to-date records from provincials and other competitions. We have been working hard to resolve the issue and correct any inaccuracies, and we sincerely appreciate your understanding.

Going forward, if you notice any records that seem incorrect, you can now submit a request for review, and we will update the record if applicable.