The Aqua Angels of Ft. Lauderdale, Florida are unique. They’re an age-group swim club affiliated with a Parks and Recreation dept. That’s not unusual. They are predominantly black as are their coaches.

I’ll point out the significance of this in a minute. First I’ll go back to the puzzle. The puzzle is the myriad of reasons most blacks don’t swim. If this were just another sport, then the answer could be preference and we could get on with our lives.

But swimming is more than just a sport. It is a life skill–one that could literally save your life. So it’s more important than preferences. The more I read about The Problem, the more I hear about the complexity of the causes. I don’t think that’s very helpful.

One of the many solutions is to have more black coaches, who would turn out more black swimmers, who would eventually become more black coaches, and so on and so on. Getting started is half the battle.

So when I see a team like Fort Lauderdale’s Aqua Angels, or Jim Ellis’ Philadelphia Department of Recreation team, I get encouraged. Then I read on to hear that Ellis’ pool is unheated in the winter, and Fort Lauderdale has a hard time attracting lifeguards to the inner city areas, and I think, great! More hardship. More barriers.

What can you do to tear down some of those barriers? What can we do to encourage coaches to continue in this important work?

Let me think on that.

Vince Gallant, the director of Great Lakes Aquatics, the club my children last swam for, is a hero. As a middle school teacher, he had a theory about swimming improving grades. To put his theory to the test, he took a group of at risk, (ie., lower income black, Hispanic, and white kids) to the pool across the street. There was a YMCA across the street from his school at that time. His theory proved to be true. Swimming requires discipline that will serve you throughout life.

I just heard about a national program, Horizons International, that takes public school children and sends them to private schools in the summer to close the achievement gap between lower income and middle class children. Swimming is mandatory. Daily.

I wonder what studies the Horizons International programs based the swimming requirement on. Most articles I found called the evidence anecdotal and inconclusive. They point to a chicken egg scenario where they don’t know whether swimming attracts top students or creates them.

I can add to the anecdotes. My daughter had fuzzy thinking and could not grasp the concepts of times and negative splits when she was in swimming. It was stressful for her, but she concentrated and learned how to swim on the 15, and how to remember her times and share them when asked. I started using swimming examples in her math problems, partly to prepare her for her swim practice, and partly to train her mind. My son learned these concepts before he had problems in math. They may have contributed to his strength in math to this day.

I would tend to agree with those who say that the discipline of swimming makes stronger minds. I could watch it format my children’s minds.

From where I sit, swimming is all good.

Remember when I wrote about this movie? Well, if you live in Gloucester, MA or Los Angeles, CA, you have a chance to see it!

If you do see it, post a comment and let me know how you liked it.

FREE SWIM screenings coast to coast

Come see the award winning FREE SWIM (www.FreeSwimMovie.com) . . .

October 13th at 7:30PM

The Cape Ann Community Cinema (www.massbayfilmproject.org)

21 Main Street, Gloucester, MA

* come earlier for a pre-screening party at 6:30pm

October 18 at 10AM

La Femme Film Festival (www.lafemme.org)

Davidson/Valentini Theatre

1125 N McCadden Place, Los Angeles, CA

His story was already inspiring. This was no natural fish. This was a typical child who had never been exposed to water–almost drowning while trying to have fun. And then his mother signed him up for swim lessons, and the rest is history. Cullen Jones went for it. And he has an NCAA championship, world records, a gold medal, among other things, to show for it.

Now he joins the ranks of Muhammed Ali, Jackie Joiner-Kersee and Jerry Rice. Since its inception in 1987, the Chase Major Taylor Award has been presented to African-American athletes, coaches, athletic administrators and officials who not only make a significant local and national contribution to youth but also encourage excellence in future generations.

So this is a cultural icon award. May the seeds he sows today (through Make a Splash, and just his excellence) bring forth many more swimmers of his caliber.

Good job, Cullen!

Wow, I feel a hard college hangover talking about this swimming thing. We used to be down with the struggle. Fight the good fight, and all that rot. You know, against racism. It was an exciting time to be alive, those late 80s.

I make light of that struggle; its goals not clearly defined in my day. But here’s this other struggle, and it is life or death–the struggle towards 100% swim competency. Now the International Swimming Hall of Fame (ISHOF) is in the struggle, too.

Bruce Wigo, president of ISHOF says that the mission of his organization is to inspire everyone to be a swimmer. They’ve created a new section of their website celebrating black swimming history.

It features swim champions like Anthony Nesty, Olympic gold medalist from Suriname, Charles Chapman, who swam across the English Channel, and Rick White, a professional diver. It also shows lifeguards and other swim professionals.

“Black swimming history is one of the most incredible stories never told before,” says Wigo. “Who could imagine that before the Civil War, Blacks were the great swimmers and whites drowned in appalling numbers? It tells a lot about our social and cultural history and it’s a story that will fascinate swimmers and not swimmers alike.”

To find out more, visit ISHOF.org

Halle Berry is not afraid of the water. Here she takes her baby swimming, and she is set to play a diving instructor in an upcoming movie. In Deep Tide, set to begin taping this summer, Halle will play a diver who escaped a near fatal shark attack.

I don’t think I could watch that. It took me YEARS to get over Jaws! The idea of returning to the deep after being attacked by a shark? Not for the kid! I wonder if she gets a stunt double? Or will the shark?