Helping to make the Memphis community stronger

Make A Splash

The goal of the Make A Splash summer program is to teach students to become safety conscious around water, which can ultimately form a basis for accident prevention. The program is open to community groups such as local churches and Boy and Girl Scouts and has two main components:

• Free 45-minute swim lessons for under-privileged children Monday through Thursday during the months of June and July.
• Free one-week youth swim lessons offered during the summer for qualifying non-profit organizations through the community outreach swim lesson program.

Since 2008, almost 700 children have participated in Make A Splash at the Fogelman YMCA.

Interested non-profit agencies or others wanting more information should contact Angela Wallace, Associate Executive Director, at awallace@ymcamemphis.org.

D.E.W.S. (Downtown Elementary Water Safety)

Initiated in 2008 in response to the lake drowning deaths of two elementary school students, this program provides free water safety and drowning prevention to Downtown Elementary students in K through Third grades.

To help prevent similar tragedies, the YMCA of Memphis and the Mid-South teamed up with the school during the 2007–2008 school year to teach all of its students how to practice water safety.

"The Downtown Elementary Water Safety program was designed by the aquatics staff at the Fogelman YMCA to turn a negative into a positive and to hopefully prevent any more water-related tragedies in our community," said Michael Moore, aquatics director at the Fogelman Y.

Building on a program initiative grant—seed money allotted for new programs—the YMCA staff raised the necessary funds to provide the program all Downtown Elementary students.

School principal Marcia Wunderlich arranged a class schedule beginning with sixth-graders and working downward in age through the pre-kindergarteners. Each student attends two 30-minute sessions covering topics from pool, lake and ocean safety to boating safety. Each child receives a study guide to review with their parents, a take home quiz and a certificate of completion.

"The YMCA is teaching skills that can prevent accidents, which is so important, because we absolutely do not want to lose any more of our children," Wunderlich said. "I believe students at all schools should be taught water safety techniques they can retain and possibly rely on one day."

The YMCA would ultimately like to see the program grow to other schools in the Memphis area. Moore recently taught water-safety lessons to students at Immaculate Conception Pre-School in Midtown.

"I am confident that this will save someone's life one day," Moore said. "It could save a student's life or a student could save someone else's life one day."

Heartsaver First Aid/CPR

Healthcare Provider First Aid/CPR

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