There are things in life that individuals have to learn to increase their chances of survival in our modern world. Essential skills such as reading, writing, communicating, and doing math. These skills are taught to most of us at a young age in school; however, skills such as swimming are not taught to most of us.
Unfortunately, there are some factors that can prevent one from learning how to swim. These factors include fear of drowning, living in a landlocked country or state, the high cost of swimming lessons, health problems, or cultural/religious beliefs. Not knowing how to swim is a major problem that impacts our society. According to the CDC:
- Over 4500 people drowned annually from 2020 to 2022.
- Drowning is the number one cause of death for children aged 1-4.
- Drowning rates for Black people were 28% higher in 2021 than in 2019.
- About 63% of Black people reported never taking swimming lessons.
- About 72% of Hispanic people reported never having taken swimming lessons
Our school has been especially impacted by the loss of one of our students, Elijah Osborne Rogers, who died in a drowning accident. This is even more of a reason to raise awareness of the importance of having swimming lessons.
Fortunately for our school building, we have an indoor swimming pool located in the basement. However, our school hasn’t really utilized this pool to teach students how to swim in the past couple of years. One of the main reasons for this is the lack of funding for our school.
According to Ms. Sandusky, the principal of PSC, our school used to receive funding from the NYC health department, which would pay for our lifeguards and PE teachers. However, this funding has stopped for unknown reasons. Our school budget is already scarce, and we can not afford to pay for lifeguards with this budget. However, that won’t stop our principal from trying her best to bring back swimming class for PSC students, and we can help by speaking out and advocating about this issue.
There are after-school programs for swimming classes that students can apply to for free, but not everyone is free at the end of the school day. If a swimming period becomes part of a student’s grade or curriculum, that might help encourage them to at least know the benefits of knowing how to swim or spark an interest.
We should all learn to swim because it can help prevent drowning when we’re in a pool or at the beach during vacation. It helps us mentally by building confidence and reducing stress. Also, it’s a great form of exercise that helps increase cardiovascular endurance, build muscle, and lose weight.
Learn to swim not only to save yourself, but also those whom you love.
