Kids LEAP Into Pools

After spending some time sitting poolside during his swim lesson, 8‑year-old Tylon challenged himself to actually get in the water and practice floating and kicking his legs.

His advice for others learning a brand new skill, just like him? To ​“take a deep breath and take your time.” 

Tylon was one of a dozen students taking part in a summer camp run by LEAP (Leadership, Education and Athletics in Partnership, Inc.), a youth athletics and tutoring nonprofit.

The participants of LEAP’s summer camp are being taught to swim as part of the organization’s new summer and fall initiative that aims to teach 1,000 New Haveners to swim.

Thanks to a $160,000 grant from the Roxanne and Henry Brandt Foundation, LEAP has partnered with the YMCA, New Haven Public Schools (NHPS), and the Police Activity League (PAL) to pilot a free swim program this summer.

“We want to get to a place where all children in New Haven, whether in LEAP or not, learn to swim,” LEAP Executive Director Henry Fernandez said on Wednesday. 

A dozen LEAP students who are part of the ​“Fair Haven South” summer group joined their counselors to take a bus to the organization’s 31 Jefferson St. swimming pool Wednesday at around 2 p.m. Each of the LEAP summer sites alternate visitation of the pool every week for 45 minutes, Monday through Thursday.

Tylon spent his Wednesday lesson working with a trained instructor to better his floating skills because this summer was his first time ever swimming. 

“I want to learn to swim and not be scared,” he said. 

He said much of the instruction Wednesday was hard, especially learning to float on his back. He worried that his instructor, who was holding him up under the water, would drop him. But luckily that didn’t happen, and he said that the successful lesson taught him that ​“swimming can be fun.” 

Currently, LEAP’s swimming program has 800 – 900 kids enrolled, Fernandez said, as part of a combination of LEAP’s seven camp sites, PAL, and other community youth who can also learn to swim Monday through Thursday between 5 p.m. and 7:45 p.m.

The current stage of community swim lessons end Aug. 1. Registration begins Aug. 18 for the next round of classes, which will start Sept. 2. Click here for sign-up information. 

In addition to the Jefferson Street pool, the Howe Street YMCA has also made a pool available for lessons. On Thursday, the pilot opened its third pool location at John Martinez School.

Fernandez added that, historically, Black and brown communities have not had equal access to public pools where they could learn to swim. ​“We can’t allow that to continue,” he said, noting that Black children drown five times more often than white children. 

A team of LEAP instructors and lifeguards are assigned to all three sites daily. The community swim program is open to New Haveners of all ages, whether they want to take up a new sport or seek health benefits.

LEAP Swim Program Director and certified pool operator Elvert Eden led the program’s swim instructors through more than two weeks of training earlier this summer to prepare them for the pilot that kicked off June 23. 

Each instructor works with one to three kids at a time to help them build up their skills. 

The summer programs use the three pool sites daily from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. to teach the 7- to 15-year-old summer campers. The students typically work with the same instructors so that they can be more comfortable and grow confident in their new skill. 

Level-one beginner students are typically learning to be confident in water and are assisted with each skill-building activity. As they develop in levels, they learn new swim skills with less assistance. While referring to a levels chart, Eden said a level-one student who is still building confidence would work toward treading water for 10 – 15 seconds while a level five student would try to tread water for around 2 minutes. 

Eden also works with swim instructors weekly to continue building their endurance and stamina by working out outside of instruction times, he said.

Jefferson Street pool head lifeguard and New Haven native Samera Reid has worked at LEAP for the past three summers. She said she enjoys helping New Haven kids develop a skill they’ll be able to use for the rest of their lives. 

She watched Wednesday’s swim lesson carefully from poolside as instructors led students through the backstroke, breathing underwater, diving, kicking their feet, and floating on their backs. 

Reid recalled learning to swim at 31 Jefferson St. as a child. Her goal is to help kids grow from not wanting to be in water at all to swimming confidently and safely. 

Around level three, students can move from the shallow end to the pool’s 5- to 7‑feet-deep areas. 

While assistant head lifeguard Alejandra ​“Ale” Cruz never thought her first job would be as a lifeguard, she said she loves working with the summer swim program. Cruz graduated from New Haven Academy and now attends Southern Connecticut State University. She learned to swim when she was around 3 years old and was a part of a co-ed swim and dive team throughout high school that partners with New Haven, East Haven, and Sacred Heart swimmers. 

She said she most enjoys seeing students come back to swim lessons more excited and confident than when they first started. Two weeks ago, she comforted several students who did not want to touch water. On Wednesday, those same students got back in the pool to work with instructors.

In one corner of the pool, instructor Jason spoke in Spanish to a group of three students moving from level one to level two. At the six-foot end of the pool, instructor Charlie taught third-grader Jhoel what a dive looks like. Jhoel stood poolside while Charlie was in the pool with a white pole. Jhoel practiced his dive into the water then swam to the bottom of the pole to retrieve a red ring and bring it back up to Charlie. 

Jhoel said that although he already knows swimming basics, his instructor Charlie makes learning even the hard new skills fun.