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People swim in Walnut Hill Swimming Pool, Wednesday, July 2, 2025, in Dallas.<\/p>\n
Chitose Suzuki\/Staff Photographer<\/p>\n
One of the joys of summer comes from spending time around the water. From lakes to pools, it offers a refreshing escape from the relentless heat.<\/p>\n
However, that joy can quickly be taken away if precautions are not taken to be safe around the water.<\/p>\n
The Centers for Disease Control report roughly 4,000 drowning deaths each year in the United States. For children 1 to 4, drowning is the leading cause of death. For children 5 through 14, drowning ranks as the No. 2 cause of death.<\/p>\n
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In Texas, 88 children died of drowning last year.<\/p>\n
While the data presents a startling reality, we don\u2019t have to accept that the future will bring the same terrible outcomes. Each drowning death is preventable, and in Dallas there are programs in place to help combat these statistics.<\/p>\n
The Step Into Swim program, or SIS, an initiative of the Pool and Hot Tub Alliance that helps new swimmers feel confident and safe around the water, \u00a0started in 2012. In the years since it began, the program has helped over 300,000 people learn how to swim.<\/p>\n
Rowdy Gaines, a three-time Olympic gold medalist and swimming analyst for NBC, is the vice president of development for the PHTA and runs the SIS initiative.<\/p>\n
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\u201cOur mission is to save lives and create more swimmers through swim lessons,\u201d Gaines told us. \u201cSpecifically, we are targeting those children and families that would not normally be able to afford them.\u201d<\/p>\n
In Dallas, there are six SIS locations throughout the city. Here, children are able to receive free and low-cost swim lessons. Perhaps you know a family that could use such a program. If so, we strongly urge you to help them find their way to lessons like these.<\/p>\n
What SIS is doing is not just important, it is necessary. According to the CDC, roughly 28% of people living below the federal poverty line do not know how to swim \u2014 nearly double the national average. Providing low- or no-cost lessons helps remove barriers to access that are typically associated with swimming.\u00a0<\/p>\n
SIS is a great option. We also encourage people to check with their local park and recreation department, where low- or no-cost options are also available.\u00a0<\/p>\n
This is a practice that all swim schools and swim programs should find a way to offer; learning how to swim should not be a luxury.<\/p>\n
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While drowning may be one of the leading unintentional causes of death for children, it is also one of the most preventable. By enrolling children in swim lessons, the likelihood of drowning decreases substantially \u2014 by roughly 90%.<\/p>\n
The mission of initiatives like SIS is crucial to lowering childhood drowning. There is nothing that can take away the importance of learning how to swim when it comes to long-term safety. Gaines agrees, and he believes that the reason to enroll in swim lessons is simple.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cIf you look at the statistics, you would want to put your child in swim lessons,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Have thoughts about this?\u00a0Send a letter to the editor\u00a0using our letters form<\/a>\u00a0or email\u00a0letters@dallasnews.com<\/a>.\u00a0Letters should be no more than 200 words and include the first and last name of the writer and city of residence.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"People swim in Walnut Hill Swimming Pool, Wednesday, July 2, 2025, in Dallas. Chitose Suzuki\/Staff Photographer One of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":325452,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[27,29,28,90221],"class_list":["post-325451","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-texas","tag-texas","tag-texas-headlines","tag-texas-news","tag-tp-editorials"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/325451","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=325451"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/325451\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/325452"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=325451"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=325451"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=325451"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}