New pool

[Pete]

With a new pool in the pipeline. Hopefully 8 lane 25m. What would you like to see in the way of facilities? Pool, space, swimdown, spectators. :eek: :confused: :idea: :idea: :idea:

[BigFish]

How about a PA system that everyone can hear everywhere around the pool side. Wow, wouldn't that be something.

[swimmer]

it is a waste of time and money building another 25 m pool innthe south east - wel allready ahve has;emere and guildford as good 25m competition pools. WE NEED another 50m pool - 8lane and deck level, with a seperate swim down pool, and plenty of room for swimmers and spectators. we do not need any more 25m pools, wot we do NEED is 50m pools.

[Phil Tanner]

A dais for the announcer with a clear view of the pool AND the display panel for the state-of-the-art timing system, and one of those screens that shoots up at the press of a foot pedal, like they have in building societies to thwart robberies. Make that two - one behind as well.:)

[swimusa]

aren't there any universities that would have the ability to build a 50m pool on their campus? Thats what the US does, especially at state supported schools.

[BigFish]

Well, this is by no means to be taken as a reflection of the sporting ambitions of most UK universities. But I've been to two (not wanting to name names) the first was very close to Manchester and were just building a (I think) 25 yd pool as I was leaving. The second was right next door to Ponds Forge which they used once per week for a disorganised lane swimming session. I never saw much in the way of organised training so joined local clubs instead.

Do the rest of you former/current UK students have any more promising memories?

[mammamedley]

From my memory most who could not beat them joined them and got scholarships in US and competed in NCAAs! It would either make or break 'em!

[Michael]

Originally posted by swimusa
aren't there any universities that would have the ability to build a 50m pool on their campus? Thats what the US does, especially at state supported schools.

From what I can gather The University of Northumbria is heavily involved in the planning and financing of the planned 50m pool in Newcastle.

It's actually going to be built on one of the car parks :eek: !

Add to that Loughbrough and Bath and we have erm... 3 out of around 200 interested! :confused:

There's hope yet!! :devil:

[Steve]

Interestingly enough (considering as a university they're usually much more interested in academic pursiuts) Cambridge are planning a new 50m pool combined with sports centre on their major new West Cambridge Development.

Feasibility details are available on the website: http://www.sport.cam.ac.uk/westcambridgedevelopment/brochures.html or in less detail http://www-building.arct.cam.ac.uk/westC/sports/sport.html

But here's a sneaky peek for those who can't be bothered to download all of the PDF's :rolleyes:

http://www-building.arct.cam.ac.uk/westC/sports/sports.jpg


Looks good, but don't get too excited, I wouldn't expect it to be built until 2005 at the earliest

[swimusa]

I understand that British universities are rather cheap in tuition, meaning you get more for you buck, um, pound. If you go to Oxford, your most prestigious university, a student from the UK would pay 3865 pounds (I don't have the pound symbol on this American computer) or $5598.85. Harvard, our most prestigious private university costs $37,750 or 26,058.81 pounds. (Both figures include room and board). University of Virginia, our most prestigious public school costs $12,055 (8321.51 pounds) if you live in Virginia and $25,870 (17,857.34 pounds) if you live outside of Virginia. Maybe if Britain would increase the set standards of tuition to these universities, or make them private, they will have the resources to build better complexes on campus, including athletic ones, and more 50m pools would pop up, outside of Manchester, Sheffield, Newcastle, Edinburgh, and now Cambridge. Simple economics, greater investment equals better byproduct.

[mammamedley]

Does that mean only 'rich kids' get uni education?

[swimusa]

Nope, we have an extensive financial aid program in the US provided through loans by the Department of Education, a Cabinet post under the White House. On top of that, athletes who are good enough are given athletic scholarships. Georgina Lee, Joanna Fargus, Matthew Kidd all have these scholarships, but you don't necessarily have to as good as that to get one. Those who are smart enough academically are given academic scholarship. There are also need based scholarships offered by most universities. With the advent of the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT), our equivalents to your Cambridge & Oxford (Harvard, Yale, Brown, Penn, Princeton) became less and less for the rich, and more and more for the academically gifted. Though the Kennedy family has never been declined admission, even now. Lady Gabriella Windsor is enrolled at Brown so wealth still has something to do with it.

[Bazza]

Originally posted by swimusa
Nope, we have an extensive financial aid program in the US provided through loans by the Department of Education, a Cabinet post under the White House.

Yeah we have a loan system too. The average student has debts of £13,000 I believe when leaving Uni. Whilst you don't have to pay it back until you're earning a reasonable amount, you start paying interest from the very first term, so I guess the longer you leave it, the more you owe. Medicine/Dentistry/Veterinary type courses are much more expensive. Some people apparently leave with debts in excess of £30k.:eek: :mad:

[lane4]

Any doctors, dentists or vets who build up 30k debts will surely be able to pay that off within a couple of months of starting work? ;)

[swimusa]

I should have gone to GBR for my education. 30,000 pounds in debts? What a Godsend. My tuition + room & board for 1 academic year (2 semesters) is about that high. Harvard Law School and Harvard Medical School cost more than that for 1 year. Hmmm. But in terms of paying them back, you have 2 types of loans: subsidized and unsubsidized. Subsidized loans are where the government pays the interest on the loan until 6 months after completeing your degree (unless you continue on to Master work). Unsub, the interest accumulates. You are forced to start paying these loans back 6 months after completion of your degree, at increments best suited to your monetary situation.

[Bazza]

Originally posted by lane4
Any doctors, dentists or vets who build up 30k debts will surely be able to pay that off within a couple of months of starting work? ;)

Well I'm not sure about that, but I'm guessing swimming coaches can't!:devil:
SwimUSA - at least attending university in the US seems to mean something. Over here my view on things is that the government said they wanted more people to go to university at 18, and all they did to achieve this was move the goalposts, lower the standards and hence reduce the meaning of it all....:(

[Unfit]

i'd definitely agree with that. people seem to go to university because they can't think of anything else to do. they end up doing some completely irrelevant degree with which they can't go into a career and end up unemployed! i'm all for the new vocational colleges which actually enourage people to take up a career - not just go to university to 'get a degree'.

[Michael]

Originally posted by lane4
Any doctors, dentists or vets who build up 30k debts will surely be able to pay that off within a couple of months of starting work? ;)


Now now! You know the doctors in the UK don't get paid anything near what they deserve!!!

Oh no! :eek: I need to find a politics forum!!!!!!! Someone help me..............

[swimusa]

i'd definitely agree with that. people seem to go to university because they can't think of anything else to do. they end up doing some completely irrelevant degree with which they can't go into a career and end up unemployed!

Unfit, this may alarm you, but 70% of college educated Americans do not have a career in their degree area. And many go to college because they don't know what to do otherwise. In the US though, it is very hard to find a good paying job without at least a Bachelors degree. It is now getting to the point, where you cannot make it without a Masters. But they make up the top half of Americans. Most of our unemployed are minorities without a college degree, especially African Americans. Our state schools tend to lower their standards, especially from within their state. University of Virginia and University of North Carolina pride themselves on how selective they have to be. Why? Because they are required by Virginia and N. Carolina to admit 85% of students from their state. 15% is open to out of state, so they are very selective.

[Unfit]

i'm afraid that it doesn't alarm me - it's going the same way here. my friend doesn't have a degree (was in the forces but was medically discharged) and recently applied for a job. he didn't get it, possibly because virtually everyone else had a degree (it was not a job that required much intellect, just common sense and a good attitude which my friend has loads of!). i do think it's a shame that to get anysort of job these days you seem to have to have a degree - even if it's in a completely non-relevant subject. oh well - it was inevitable since the UK seems to always follow the trends of the US!!

[Swim21]

Originally posted by lane4
Any doctors, dentists or vets who build up 30k debts will surely be able to pay that off within a couple of months of starting work? ;)

Getting synical in your old age Ian!!

[swimusa]

It is getting ridiculous. And then, here at least, the best jobs go to those who are educated at an Ivy League school (Harvard , Brown , Yale , Princeton , Columbia , Dartmouth , Cornell , and Penn . The easiest way to get into those schools are $$$ and connections. From what i hear, Oxford and Cambridge are the same way. I'm just waiting for a British NCAA :p

[Steve]

Originally posted by swimusa
The easiest way to get into those schools are $$$ and connections. From what i hear, Oxford and Cambridge are the same way. I'm just waiting for a British NCAA :p

[rant]:mad:
I'm sorry, having been lucky enough to go to Cambridge that couldn't be further from the truth. I'm not going to pretend that it doesn't happen, but that is by far an overwhelming minority, and even the rich kids have to get the A-level grades, so it still isn't easy. It's just that sort of attitude, which puts people off applying in the first place
[rant over otherwise this will become edcuactionclub.co.uk and lane4 will get annoyed...;)]

As for a British NCAA, we have one (sort of) in the form of BUSA, although probably not as tough...

[Bazza]

Originally posted by Steve Buckley
As for a British NCAA, we have one (sort of) in the form of BUSA, although probably not as tough...

Well that's an understatement if ever there was one!;)

As for the Cambridge thing, Steve's right - I know somebody who went to Cambridge, and he was about as far from the stereotype image as you can get. Just extremely intelligent is all.:rolleyes:
Besides they'd never have let Steve in otherwise! :devil:

I couldn't help but notice though that you still can't spell education Steve!!:p

[Swim21]

One assumes that you have never experienced the BUSA LC or SC Champs then!!

The standard of this meet is now quite high, with 10 of the current commonwealth games team competing in this years champs!!

[Bazza]

No I haven't, and whilst that fact is VERY impressive, the fact remains that the standard is nowhere near as high as NCAAs. You only have to look at the results to see that. And before you ask, no I have not competed in NCAAs either!:rolleyes:

[Swim21]

Well isn't that true of Swimming in the USA anyway??

[Chris]

I went to the BUSA long and short course competitions between 1994 and 1997. As I recall the main intention of the meets at that time was to get as drunk as possible (myself obviously not included :beer: ) and for the blokes to wear women's costumes .....

Maybe things have changed a little bit since then :D

Mind you, Loughborough were the dominant force then, Bath I imagine have taken over that mantle now.

[Swim21]

Loughborough have won both LC and SC this year with strong challenges from Bath and Scotish Teams.

The standard is much higher than previous years, the Loughborough Team alone has 5? Internationals

Ps the SC Champs are back were they belong - Weston-s-Mare

[Swim21]

Originally posted by Chris
blokes to wear women's costumes .....


Most Blokes wear women's costumes these days, they just call them body suits.

BUSA were oviously 10 years ahead of their time.

Except for the Ladies relay race were the last swimmer swam topless (1996 I think). That method of streamlining has not yet been proven to be as successful!

[Unfit]

my memories of the scottish champs were of blokes who seemed obsessed with swimming naked. and of course the medals ceremony was always enhanced by having the relay teams moon the audience! also i seem to remember that the teams were more competative doing the driking games in the bar afterwards than in the pool. aahh - those were the days.

[lane4]

I can confirm that the BUSA champs in the 90's were all about drinking incredible amounts of alcohol. Thankfully, this handicapped a number of my competitors and I was able to win on 3 occasions. :D

[Chris]

Originally posted by Swim21
Except for the Ladies relay race were the last swimmer swam topless (1996 I think). That method of streamlining has not yet been proven to be as successful!

Ahhhh, those were the days ;)

[swimusa]

For the record, we have to make our standards high, otherwise the meet would be horded. You are talking about a country of 281 million people. A fair share swim. NCAA's cuts are faster than US Nationals

[Bazza]

Originally posted by Chris
As I recall the main intention of the meets at that time was to get as drunk as possible (myself obviously not included :beer: ) and for the blokes to wear women's costumes .....

As far as I know, Chris, it still is...:beer:

[swimleeds]

At the last two BUSA champs, the competitors could be classifies into two sections, the athletes and the socialites.

[swimusa]

What is with you British people and drinking for sporting events? Yes, we do it at baseball games, but that is to survive the 6 hours of boredom. But you seem to do it eveywhere, cricket, golf, soccer, hockey, ice hockey, tennis, croquet, swimming, judo, ...., ....

[Bazza]

Are you calling croquet a sporting event?!?!:joker:

[swimusa]

Why not, it is played at the All England Lawn Tennis & Croquet Club. Apparently there is a Championships for croquet played there too.