Somerset Lifetimes 2020

Staff Forrest Butcher Class of 1994 Director of Aquatics/ Head Coach There is not a lot of history between

ALUMNI

my student life at Somerset and becoming a staff member, just a few short years. After graduating in 1994, I began university here on the Gold Coast continuing to train and compete in swimming before taking an opportunity to swim for a University programme in the United States in 1996. Following my return to the Gold Coast to finish my degree, I visited the College where our magnificent new aquatic facility had just been built. It was amazing to see how grand a project the design and build was for Somerset. Not long after I began part- time coaching at the pool. In 2000, just before graduating university, I was successful in applying to become the swimming Head Coach at the College and looking back now, as the saying goes, ‘the rest is history’. The best part of my role is connecting with the students and our swimmers at the Academy. There are great stories and results at every age and every level. I feel so much satisfaction in seeing our Team support and guide the students to be better and to watch their development. Success does not have to be measured in gold medals or pure results, rather, in the outcomes of each individual and against those individual’s goals. At Somerset, we have helped many lose their fear of the water, many more become a competent swimmer, helped swimmers make an APS team

and even be selected onto an Olympic Team. The reward is all the same and getting the satisfaction of knowing the part I, and we, as a Team play in helping others. Having worked at Somerset for over two decades, it is without a doubt, the staff and families of the College that make it such a great place to be. It really is a vibrant, welcoming and supportive community with friendly faces which create the feeling of being part of a really large family. The College has an amazing built environment, but it’s the people within and outside the walls who make it come alive. There’s always a smile or friendly wave in passing or a genuine ‘good to see you’ that makes you feel at home. During my time at Somerset I have come to see a lot of change and development. In the early days, I recall demountable buildings, where commercial sized kitchens and retail space now sit, and across the road there were cattle and a dairy farm, where housing estates now sit. At the pool I now see an amazing grandstand and function room where once a grass hill, complete with seasonal bindies and ants once was. And although the College has expanded and developed from within, it continues to expand its reach into the community. The swimming pool has always had strong ties within the wider community being one of the only sports which invites both Somerset and non-Somerset families into its programmes. It has

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