Established in 1994 by the Adapted Aquatics Committee of
the International Swimming Hall of Fame this award honors an individual who has
made significant and substantial contributions to the field of adaptive aquatics
(aquatics for persons with disabilities) as a participant, athlete, teacher,
instructor, coach, organizer, administrator or media representative.
Anne Green has done much to nurture disability
swimming programs throughout the world. She
is the current Swimming chairperson of the International Paralympic Committee (IPC),
and has held this position since 1992. In
this role, Ms. Green has dedicated herself to providing swimmers with
disabilities fairness in classification, equal access to elite competition, and
impartiality in rules and regulations.
Ms. Green’s involvement in the sport began in the early
1970s, when she taught and coached swimming in Perth, then later went on to open
her own private swim school where she taught swimmers with and without
disabilities. She became very
interested in disability swimming and has held many volunteer positions related
to it since the early 1990s. Nationally,
Ms. Green worked for Australian Swimming from 1990 to 2001, as the Manager of
“Disability Sport and Indigenous Populations,” and at present, still
consults for the organization. In
this position she focused on developing budgets and strategic plans, as well
acting as a liaison with government bodies, disabled sports organizations, and
indigenous groups.
Ms. Green served as a coach of the Australian National Team
for numerous events including 1990 World Disabled Championships; 1992
Paralympics; 1993, 96-97 World Deaf Games; and the 1998 BT Nationals.
Internationally, Ms. Green has served on several committees
including her election as the Chairperson of the Swimming Executive Committee of
which she is serving her third consecutive term. Under her tenure, IPC Swimming has entered the electronic age
with a new website specific to swimming. The
site features online classification manuals; a world rankings database; world,
Paralympic and regional records, as well as many other materials specific to
disability swimming. She has been
responsible for drafting many of the IPC rule changes that have helped the sport
mature and improve. She has worked
to refine the functional classification system for swimmers with physical
disabilities and to train classifiers who can implement that system worldwide. Additionally, she works with international scholars to facilitate
research on stroke techniques and classification systems.
She travels internationally to help scrutinize meet
formats, inspect facilities, monitor actions of meet officials and educate meet
workers. No details escape her
notice. Academically, she has written “Coaching Methods When Working with
Swimmers with a Disability” (Australian Sports Commission), contributed to
“Coaching Athletes with Disabilities: General Principles” and co-authored
the IPC “Swimming Classification and Technical Advisors Manual.”
Additionally, Ms. Green served as the Technical Delegate
for all three IPC Swimming World Championships and Technical Delegate for the
two most recent Paralympic Games.
She has made significant strides in developing
classification policies as well. Through
extensive research and development she has revised and updated the
classification manual and procedures, and has given classification seminars on
six continents.
Anne has made it a priority to put the athletes first and
involve them in all aspects of the sport. She
included an athlete on the Swimming Executive Committee before the position was
mandated, was instrumental in getting disability swimming included in the
Commonwealth Games, and has diversified the IPC committees and subcommittees to
include individuals of various backgrounds and enthnicities.
Anne’s work is routinely characterized by expert
knowledge, respect for swimmers with a disability and effective mentoring of
people in the swimming community.
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