[Chris]

Dad of 22 month old girl, just looking to start up some swimming classes and this was within the terms and conditions

Are such policies quite common? While point 7 means it won’t stop us being able to attend, even if it’s only the two of us without mum, it feels rather ‘unfair’ (for lack of a better word). Point 5 in particular bothers me, why should women be able to take boys <8 into the female changing area but it’s expressly forbidden if the genders are reversed.

[Scott Biba]

I agree with your assessment. Definitely gender bias here. I don’t get point 2. Why do young males 8-12 have to go to the children’s area? At least it’s nice that they give you an out with point 7.
Curious if this place has family swim where parents and children would be changing together, or if it’s just kids lessons. Guessing that since they have adult and children’s areas that I could take my kids swimming there with me swimming too. They don’t say anything about adults changing in the children’s area, which would essentially negate the point of all the other rules.
When I take my 5 year old B/G twins swimming, we all change in the same locker room. Daughter takes her shower with her swim suit on and then I take her into a toilet stall to change. All the boys, young and old, shower and change in the same area. They request that girls over 5, if not accompanied by a female adult, be taken to bathrooms to change. But they don’t make a big deal out of it.
I can pretty much guarantee that if I were in that place, I would simply break the rules if not for point 7. But even with that if it were me and my 5 year old son, we would both be showering and changing in the regular male area and not using the children’s area.

[Scott Biba]

It also isn’t clear if the children’s area is divided for girls and boys. But in point 1 young females are taken to the children’s area attached to the male changing area. So boys 8-12 are changing in the same room as young girls?

[Chris]

The separate children’s area thing is confusing in itself, but for context (having seen the facilities) there are two separate children’s areas, one in the males and the other in the females. In reality it’s a similar communal area around a corner/partition from the ‘main’ changing area – my wife tells me it’s the same situation in the females. Adults (by which I mean parents) can and do change in the children’s area, so it isn’t restricted to just a children’s changing zone.

This is a pool at a local gym, so I’m not sure if there are other family swim sessions at other times, with or without a gym membership. Maybe has something to do with the weird rules.

[Author]

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