AWSOM Project

🇻🇳 LESS THAN TWO WEEKS TO GO 🇻🇳

Our 2026 AWSOM Project team is ready for Vietnam!

This year, 18 swim teachers, lifeguards and support team members from across Australia will come together to deliver swimming and water safety education in the Mekong Delta.

🏫 Each morning we will be visiting primary schools, delivering fun and practical water safety education.

🏊 Each afternoon we will be in the pool, working directly with children to build swimming and water safety skills and help prevent drowning.

This year our team also includes experienced allied health professionals, who will work specifically with children with disability and provide specialised training and support for local school teachers and swim teachers.

The countdown is on. Keep an eye on our socials as we share the people, places and moments from our 2026 journey.
🇦🇺✈️🇻🇳💙💦

🇻🇳 AND WE ARE BACK IN THE POOL!
🏊‍♀️🏊‍♂️

Our 2026–2027 Survive and Thrive Sponsorship Program for children living with disability has officially launched 🥳.

New school year. New swimming lessons. Plenty of smiles. And a whole lot of fun ahead! 💙

Over the coming year, these children will take part in weekly swimming and water safety lessons, learning at their own pace in a safe, supportive and inclusive environment.

Swimming builds much more than skills in the water. Our program helps children develop water safety skills, confidence, health, communication and social connections, while having fun and being included as valued members of the community 🥰.

A huge thank you to our sponsors who make these lessons possible, and to our wonderful Vietnamese teachers and partners who bring the program to life every week.

But …. some children are still waiting for a sponsor to help make their swimming lessons possible. You can sponsor a child here for just $62 👉 https://www.awsomproject.com/surviveandthrive

Here’s to another year of swimming, learning, laughing and growing together. 🇻🇳🇦🇺💙

It is with heavy hearts that we remember Tracey Ayton — a remarkable woman whose dedication, compassion and determination truly changed the face of the swimming industry 💔.

Tracey was a tireless champion for water safety in Australia, giving countless volunteer hours over more than 20 years to help make children safer in and around the water. Her contribution to our industry was immense, but perhaps even more special was her commitment to ensuring that every child had the opportunity to experience the joy, confidence and life-saving benefits of learning to swim.

Through Little Heroes Swim Academy, Tracey devoted so many years to teaching and supporting children with additional needs and their families. She created a place where children were understood, encouraged and celebrated — and in doing so, built a legacy that will continue to touch lives for years to come.

Tracey’s generosity extended far beyond her own swim school. She shared her knowledge, her time and her passion freely, strengthening our entire swimming community and inspiring so many of us along the way.

Our heartfelt condolences go to Rod, Brett, Dean, Tracey’s family, her Little Heroes team, and everyone who had the privilege of knowing and working alongside her.

The swimming community has lost an extraordinary advocate, colleague and friend. Her contribution will not be forgotten.

Fly high, beautiful lady. 🫶

We are deeply saddened by the passing of Tracey Ayton, CEO and cofounder of Little Heroes Swim
Academy and long-time water safety warrior with ASSA. Tracy gave countless volunteer hours over the last 20 years to help keep kids safer in and around water. She will be deeply missed by the Water Safety committee and our whole swimming community. Our sincerest condolences to Rod, Brett, Dean, and her family. Fly high, beautiful lady.”

Siria Thomas – Northern Stars Swim School — and echoed by all within ASSA and SwimSchoolers who had the fortune of sharing time with Tracey 🫶

Read the tribute from ASSA President Jon Harker https://zurl.co/YQ4cK

We also encourage those who can to donate to Little Heroes’ ‘Keep the Doors Open’ appeal, helping her team continue this much-needed service for our swimming community. The link is in the first comment.

🛟 $62. One child. A whole year of swimming lessons.

Sponsor a child with disability through our Survive and Thrive Program in Vietnam.

Your $62 AUD sponsorship provides weekly swimming lessons for an entire year, including transport to and from the pool.

🏊 Help a child learn to swim and be safer in, on and around water.

Sponsor today: https://www.awsomproject.com/surviveandthrive

The team at Healthways Aquatic Centre - Ringwood and Healthways Recreation Centre - Mont Albert North have done it again. Making a difference, changing lives, saving lives! Thank you ❤️

👕 A TEE THAT DOES MORE 💙

Our brand new 2026 AWSOM Project Supporter Tees have landed!

For $50, you get an amazing tee AND help fund our drowning prevention work in Vietnam.

👕 100% cotton
💙 Limited-edition 2026 design
🎨 Designed by Lola Tuite Designs
🌊 100% of proceeds support AWSOM Project

Every tee sold helps us keep doing what matters most - providing swimming and water safety education and reducing drowning in Vietnam.

Wear it. Share our message. Support our work 🥰.

Pre-orders are open now 👇

https://www.awsomproject.com/product-page/2026-supporter-tee

2026 Supporter Tee | awsomproject Become a truly AWSOM supporter. This limited edition tee lets everyone know you support our AWSOM work to prevent drowning in Vietnam. Made of 100% cotton, in a lovely 180 gsm medium weight, these tees are for anyone in the community to wear proudly! We'd love your support to sell as many as possibl...

168 children. 168 opportunities. One simple act can help save a life 💙.

This September, children across Vietnam will return to school and, for 168 children with disability, it will also mean the start of another year of swimming and water safety lessons through AWSOM Project’s Survive and Thrive Program.

For many of these children, this is an opportunity they simply would not have without the generosity of sponsors.

For just AUD $62, you can sponsor one child for an entire year, providing:
🏊 Weekly swimming and water safety lessons
🚌 Transport to and from the pool every week
🛟 The chance to develop skills that will help keep them safer in, around and on the water

But your sponsorship does much more than teach swimming.

It builds confidence. It encourages independence. It creates opportunities for children to participate, learn and thrive alongside their peers. Most importantly, it helps equip children with essential life skills in a country where drowning remains a major public health issue.

When you become a sponsor, you will receive a personalised sponsorship card introducing you to the child whose journey you are supporting. You will know exactly who your generosity is helping.

Together, we have committed to ensuring that 168 children can participate in this year’s program.

Will you sponsor one?

👉 Click here to sponsor a child: https://www.awsomproject.com/surviveandthrive

Every child deserves the opportunity to be safer in, around and on the water 🫶.

25 July | World Drowning Prevention Day

Today, on World Drowning Prevention Day, we stand with the World Health Organisation in recognising that every child deserves the chance to be safe around water 🛟.

This is more than a day to raise awareness. It is an opportunity to help prevent a drowning.

Children in Vietnam, particularly children with disability, face a significantly greater risk of drowning and are often excluded from lifesaving water safety education.

This World Drowning Prevention Day, you can make a direct difference by sponsoring a child through our Survive and Thrive program 🫶.

For just $62, you can provide a child with disability access to lifesaving water safety education and drowning prevention skills. It could change a life and potentially save a life 💫.

Turn awareness into action. Sponsor a child today and help every child survive and thrive ❤️.

Sponsor here 👉 https://www.awsomproject.com/surviveandthrive

World Health Organization (WHO)

Drowning takes more than 300 000 lives a year - 30 every hour - and almost a quarter of them are children under five. Globally, it is among the ten leading causes of death for children aged 5-14 years.

More than 90% of drowning deaths occur in rivers, lakes, wells, domestic water storage vessels and swimming pools in low- and middle-income countries, with children and adolescents in rural areas disproportionately affected.

The theme for World Drowning Prevention Day 2026 is “Unite to turn the tide.”

The Global Strategy for Drowning Prevention calls every sector and every level of society to one goal:

Unite to reduce drowning by 35% by 2035.

Closing the gap depends on all of us doing our part – every person, in every place, in every context.

(World Health Organisation, 2026)