Maryland is known for producing Olympic-caliber swimmers, yet drowning remains the second leading cause of death for children ages one to four in the state. How can Maryland switch its focus from training the next Olympians to teaching life-saving water safety skills to all of its youngest residents?

In the US nonfatal drowning injuries have spiked by 17% in 2021, with 6,800 reported injuries in 2021 compared to 5,800 injuries in 2020. The country’s youngest individuals are the most heavily affected by these injuries with 80% of children treated in emergency departments for pool nonfatal drowning injuries were younger than five years of age.

This upward trend has been attributed to a decrease in access to swim lessons due to the pandemic, financial and racial barriers. America’s National Institute of Health found that participating in formal swimming lessons is associated with an 88% reduction to the risk of childhood drowning. 

“Learning to swim at a young age as well as learning how to have safe behaviors in, on and around the water help mitigate the risk factor any time there’s a body of water,” Rockville Swim and Fitness Center Superintendent Evan Goldstein said. “Simply through the function of increased exposure to skills and steps to stay safe, people develop a skill set to be mindful of hazards in their community.” 

The goal of early swim lessons isn’t to teach a child how to swim butterfly or do a proper dive, rather children need to have the ability to float, tread water, and swim to a safe point. Harvard researchers have determined that children do not have the cognitive skill to swim until age four however they advise earlier lessons can be useful to give children skills to use if they were to fall into water.

“My mother signed me up for swim lessons at the local community pool when I was little,” Rockville resident Elizabeth Cooke said. “These lessons taught me the basics of skills involved in swimming which later inspired me to join the swim team as I got older.” 

However, throughout the country the ability to swim is heavily divided along racial and financial lines. The Red Cross reports that White Americans are twice as likely to know how to swim as Black Americans. Additionally, research done by Gilschrist and Parker found that Black American males ages 5-19 years old were far more likely to drown than any other population. These statistics are representative of a history of swimming being kept off limits to Black Americans during the era of Jim Crow laws. But even after desegregation, swimming remains harder to access due to financial and location barriers. 

“The families that have been part of the sport for a long time understand the complexities of it. They are typically prepared to handle the expenses as well,” Rockville Montgomery Swim Club Coach Akshay Gandhi said. “But families with socio-economic standings are typically unable to jump in and navigate the sport effectively. There are some scholarships as well, but again it is more hoops to jump through that make the process more challenging.”

In order to help combat these barriers, the City of Rockville is working to provide programs that help to bring children directly to the aquatic facilities. They offer a reduced price membership program which allows for individuals with low incomes to qualify for a deeply discounted membership. In addition, the Youth Recreation Fund removed financial barriers to participate in swim classes. These programs work with local community centers to help set children up with proper swim attire as well as transportation. All these programs are offered to any and all City of Rockville residents. 

“Swimming pools are large complexes and they’re expensive to maintain. Unfortunately, they can’t be present in every community in every neighborhood,” Goldstein said. “By taking the transportation and financial roadblock out of the equation and bringing these children to the site, we were able to serve a population that might not have been able to get here for a variety of reasons.”

Outside of Maryland, USA Swimming has launched a Diversity, Equity, Inclusion program which aims to open the sport to individuals who have been historically kept outside of the sport. The program consists of a committee of individuals whose aims are to diversify the demographics of the sport. 

The average cost of swim lessons in the country is 205 dollars a month.