The Bloomington-Normal YMCA and the American Red Cross are teaming up to introduce a new program to provide free swimming lessons and water safety training for children. The collaborative effort seeks to equip children with essential skills to ensure their safety in and around water.
B.J. Wilken, Bloomington-Normal YMCA CEO, said the Boys & Girls Club of Bloomington-Normal identified 30 children to take part in the four-week course. YMCA instructors provide the safety training in the water, while the American Red Cross teaches a safety curriculum called Whale Tales.
“For the YMCA, this is one of our hallmark missions: to teach kids to swim. Naturally, we have the infrastructure built out for all of that. As part of our personal mission, we turn no one away due to their inability to pay for our services,” said Wilken.
Wilken said the YMCA offers the free course to ensure all children have access to water safety training.
"What really prompted this was the fact that there is a disparity in swimming among kids, particularly among children of color," Wilken said, noting that children of color are 7 1/2 times more likely to drown than white children.
Dakota Hoskin, 10, of Bloomington said she's a good swimmer. She's comfortable in 12 feet of water and aspires to be an Olympic swimmer someday. She's learned a lot through the safety course.
"I like how they teach me to float on my back and teach me new things that I haven't been taught before," she said.
Instructor T.J. Supan said the safety courses typically begin by having children try the back float to demonstrate they can stay above the water.
"That's kind of the most important job of teaching swimming, which is the fact that safety comes first and making sure their airway is always open," Supan said.
He and the other instructors try to make the lessons fun and make sure the kids are learning. Supan shared that progress can be slow, but it is evident the kids are learning and getting better each day.
“I’ve seen kids the last couple of weeks where progress is slow, but you can definitely tell they are getting better," he said. "Sometimes they get frustrated, and sometimes that might lead them to have improper form, but we try to reinforce that it’s OK to not get whatever we’re doing right when we do it; it’s OK to have a little learning curve to it.”
Lyn Hruska, executive director of the Central Illinois Chapter of the American Red Cross, said the agency's cartoon-based safety curriculum is intended to help make children water literate. She noted Friday's lesson was to always wear a life jacket when going out on a boat.
"The message being don't just throw it in the boat, but put in on and make sure it fits properly, that it has the U.S. Coast Guard approval and that kids know how to test it so they know it fits properly," Hruska said.
Bloomington swimming pool contractor Reliable Pools provides funding to make the lessons free for the children.
Wilken said the feedback from the community has been positive, and the kids have enjoyed it, noting that donors are pleased with the program.
“What we’re really hearing in the community is from donors. Donors who might have learned to swim at a YMCA or have a story about learning to swim at the YMCA and it saving their life, so they want to give back to a program like this,” Wilken said.
The course runs through Aug. 2.
