Photo Credit: Vance County Schools
Safety Around Water (SAW), which started out as Save Our Kids, is a joint program between Henderson-Vance Recreation and Parks and Henderson Family YMCA in North Carolina. The program is in its seventh year and has allowed more than 3,350 children to participate in swimming lessons and safety-training classes, with continued support from the Triangle North Foundation, which has donated $48,000 in grants to help with the program’s expenses.
Val Short, Executive Director of the Triangle North Healthcare Foundation, Inc., says her company continues to invest in this program because it “is comforting to know that at some point in the future, every student in Vance County will have received the benefit of this very important program that enables second graders to overcome their fear of water and teaches them skills to be able to respond to water emergencies. We … are glad to support a program that has such an important and far-reaching impact on the safety of kids in our communities.”
A Goal In Mind
The program, which began as basic swimming lessons, has evolved into a water-safety program. Each session begins at the children’s school with lessons that include basic pool rules, how to call 911 and what to say, and backyard pool safety, to name a few. After an in-school safety lesson, participants go to either the Aycock Recreation Center pool or Henderson Family YMCA pool to take five swimming/safety lessons. The main goal is for students to be able to save themselves or help a friend in need if the occasion arises. Each participant is evaluated on the first and last day in the water to see how much they have improved. After the final evaluation, participants may have a free swim; this is an important rite of passage because we not only want the children to be safe in water, but want them to be able to have fun and enjoy themselves in a different environment.