About AST Swimschool
At AST Swimschool, we’re passionate about one thing: helping every swimmer feel confident, safe and capable in the water. From babies and toddlers to children and adults, our bespoke programme covers water confidence, safety skills, all four strokes and deeper water techniques, across Somerset and North Devon.
Established in 2008
AST swim school was established in 2008. Debbie Stenning, owner and director, started her career in 1987 as an assistant and qualified in 1990. She has always shown a deep interest in the sport, swimming competitively as a youngster to more recent years competing in triathlons.
Through the years she has furthered her knowledge and training through the Swim England and STA programmes, such as Disability swimming and her Diploma in Baby swimming. Debbie and her staff regularly attend ongoing training courses and conferences to ensure their teaching is of the highest standard possible.
Small swimming classes with high teacher to pupil ratios
Debbie began with a small pool and 20 swimmers and now runs eight pools across North Devon and Somerset with over 800 swimmers enrolled. We offer small classes with both a Teacher and an Assistant for focused support.
Our bespoke programme follows STA and Swim England criteria, starting with water confidence and safety and progressing to strong, competent swimming, including strokes, starts, turns and key survival skills.
Children can join from six weeks, with small groups and high teacher ratios ensuring a caring, nurturing learning environment.
We're passionate about delivering engaging, fun lessons
Debbie and her team are committed to delivering fun; engaging lessons. Many of our instructors have grown with us over the years, and all are fully qualified, DBS checked, first aid trained and rescue trained, ensuring a safe and supportive environment.
Children learn different elements of swimming each week, using a variety of equipment to build confidence and avoid reliance on any one aid.
We are also trained to support children, teenagers and adults with additional needs, offering both group lessons and 1:1 support where required.
Meet Our Team Leaders
Our fully qualified and welcoming instructors make learning to swim a positive and enjoyable experience. With years of experience teaching children and adults, our team ensures every swimmer progresses with confidence.
Debbie
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Debbie
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Emma
Emma found her passion for teaching after retraining following the birth of her second child, and has been with AST since 2016.
She is qualified to teach from babies to Stage 10 (squad swimmers) and her passion is teaching the Stages (independent swimmers aged 4 years plus, from non-swimmers to 500m+ swimmers).
Emma teaches at Wellington School pool on Mondays, Wednesdays, Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays, plus at Pitfield Apartments, Willand on Monday and Wednesday mornings.
Debbie
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Debbie
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Meet Our Team Leaders
Our fully qualified and welcoming instructors make learning to swim a positive and enjoyable experience. With years of experience teaching children and adults, our team ensures every swimmer progresses with confidence.
Debbie
Wendy
Wendy is our most experienced baby, toddler and pre-school instructor and has been teaching with AST Swim school for over 10 years.
She believes in the importance of letting little ones develop at their own pace. She loves to engage with them on an individual and personal level so that both the children and their adult feel safe, supported and in control in the pool.
Wendy teaches at The Brainwave Centre in Bridgwater on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays, Fridays and Sundays, plus at St Georges school pool in Taunton on Wednesdays.
Emma
Emma found her passion for teaching after retraining following the birth of her second child, and has been with AST since 2016.
She is qualified to teach from babies to Stage 10 (squad swimmers) and her passion is teaching the Stages (independent swimmers aged 4 years plus, from non-swimmers to 500m+ swimmers).
Emma teaches at Wellington School pool on Mondays, Wednesdays, Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays, plus at Pitfield Apartments, Willand on Monday and Wednesday mornings.
All Stars Swim Programme
This programme is for all children/teenagers/young adults who need support in their learn to swim journey.
This is a very bespoke scheme of lessons written with individual outcomes for each swimmer.
It will be a group session, where a parent/carer will be in the water with the swimmer
**For all abilities**
Our teacher will be there to support you as your child works there way through our Learn to swim levels.
We are opening these classes to children from ages 5 plus, who cannot access main stream lessons due to needing 1:1 support.
Each swimmer will get:
their own plan for their learning outcomes
Visual aids will be available for additional support
Relaxed environment
AST SwimSchool is passionate that everyone should learn to swim and is fully inclusive.