In previous years, we have provided quarterly reports purely focused on participation numbers from our accredited Discover Sailing Centres. This year we are aiming to provide a wider scope of information that hopefully interests and informs Sailing Clubs, including membership statistics, communication insights, qualifications data and again participation numbers from accredited Centres around the country. In addition to the numbers, we are also wanting to share some feedback that we receive, that is direct from a participant of a learn to sail or powerboat course, or has done one of our other training courses. The aim is to share and promote success, as well as highlight the scope of activity that is taking place across the country.

Although at this early stage we are 35% down from the previous year’s participation numbers, there is definitely a lot happening! Having rolled out a new IT platform, revSPORT, to all accredited Clubs and Discover Sailing Centres, we understand people may be adjusting to new processes and ways of administering courses. For this reason, it makes sense that some administration of courses may be slightly delayed and will not be reflected in this quarter’s report. Moving forward, we predict administrators around the country will continue to learn about the new system and refine their processes so people are entered into the system in a timely fashion and are visible as ‘complete’ participants in the future reports.

Congratulations to the Clubs that are in the Top 10 counts for the different programs and we look forward to seeing the movement within these Top 10 lists across the year.

One item that needs our attention is the unbalanced gender split of males and females across membership, qualifications and course participants. Across all aspects, it’s approximately 70% male and 30% female. With initiatives such as ‘Women and Girls in Sailing’ and a renewed focus to get more females sailing, we’re hoping to shift those numbers to ensure a more balanced sport in terms of female participation. One pleasing observation is that with a third of our membership being under the age of 24, this group has a better balance of approximately 60% male and 40% female – we’re along way from where we need to be, but it is encouraging that the next wave of young sailors are proportionally better gender-balanced than other demographics involved in the sport.

We value your feedback – Do you like these reports? What else would you like to see? Any direct feedback can be emailed to: chris.tate@sailing.org.au