Community Golf Instructor Case Study: St. Helens Golf Club, Tasmania
Written by Simon Weston – Development Manager Golf Tasmania
St Helens is a small golf club in regional Tasmania and, like a lot of clubs out there, had a declining female member base without knowing how to fix this issue.
Enter club member Julie Gunton.
Julie has shown what a proactive approach and initiative can do to successfully get more females into the club using the national female introductory program – Swing Fit.
Julie had seen advertisements for the Swing Fit Program and went about getting more details as she thought it was exactly what the club needed.
Given St Helens’ remote location, Golf Tasmania was unable to assist with a PGA member or local Community Golf Instructor to deliver the program, so Julie decided she would take it upon herself to become trained and do just that.
She successfully completed the requirements of the online training to become a Community Golf Instructor specialising in Swing Fit.
As Julie had no previous experience coaching, she requested that Golf Tasmania send someone to assist with the first session.
The session was very successful and each of the six very energetic and enthusiastic women in attendance provided positive feedback.
Julie, who was on hand to learn from local Community Instructor Debra Brinkley, has now developed the confidence to take the lead as coach for the rest of the six-week program.
This is a great example of a golf club being proactive and making an effort to attract more women to their club.
Golf Tasmania is hoping to see many other golf clubs follow the example set by St Helens in having a community golf instructor trained to offer one of our national participation programs.
Well done to Julie and the committee at St Helens Golf Club.