Almost 90 children in Los Angeles County drown every year, the majority being minorities, according to the county's Department of Health.
A survey by advertising agency DDB Needham Lifestyles found that almost three-fourths of African Americans have never participated in swimming, and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that "fatal unintentional drowning rates" of African Americans between the ages of five and 14 is three times higher than that of white children in the same age category.
In an effort to help reverse those trends, Olympic swimmer Cullen Jones has joined with the USA Swimming Foundation and Houston, Texas-based energy company ConocoPhillips in an initiative designed to promote water safety and raise awareness about swimming, especially among minority youth.
The initiative is called the Make a Splash with Cullen Jones Program, and included a Nov. 20 stop at Bethune Middle School in South Los Angeles — the only middle school in the Los Angeles Unified School District to have a swimming pool — as part of a recent 6-city tour.
Joining Jones at the school to promote swimming and water safety were Olympic medal winner Rowdy Gaines, who engaged the youngsters in a contest that yielded the winners $50 *ConocoPhillips* gas cards, and USC alum and 2000 Olympic gold medal winner Lenny Krayzelburg, who launched a swimming program at Bethune earlier this year.
In his address to the students, Jones emphasized the importance of learning to swim.
"In L.A. alone, 85 kids drown every year," Jones said. "90 percent of them are actually being watched. Under supervision people are still drowning."
Jones also told the youngsters about his rise from the dangerous streets of Irvington, N.J., to the podium at the 2008 Beijing Olympics.
"There is a way to actually reverse the problem of drowning, and that's swim lessons," he said.
Jones' passion for swimming began at age 5 after her nearly drowned at a local New Jersey water park. Jones' mother enrolled him in swimming classes, and he went on to become one of America's top swimmers, becoming the first African-American male to win a gold medal at the World University Games, according to his website at cullenjones.com.
At the Beijing Olympics, as a member of the USA 4 x 100 freestyle relay team, he became the first African American to break a world record in swimming in an Olympic contest. He is the second African American to win an Olympic gold medal in swimming. He also held the fastest time for an American in the 50-meter freestyle event in 2006.
Jones' prowess in the water has landed him a $2 million-plus contract with Nike, reportedly the richest endorsement deal ever for a short-distance swimmer.
"I never thought swimming would change my life," Jones said. "So many people came up to me telling me I was going to change the sport. I never understood how I was going to change the sport. This is my way of changing the sport."
Following his talk, which also included a short film clip on his work with the Make a Splash Program, Jones headed to the school's pool to give five youngsters personal swim and swim safety lessons.
"I think Cullen is just incredible in terms of a person being able to understand that he is in a very unique position to impact a lot of youth around this country, especially in the African-American communities and the Latino communities," said Krayzelburg, whose KF Foundation reportedly has trained approximately 500 youngsters in water safety. "Drowning is at such a high rate in these communities, and to be able to talk about it and engage people and make a difference, it's an amazing thing what he is doing."
Jones said his program has made a big impact. This year, he said the program has gone from 77 local partners to 124.
"It's amazing," Jones said. "We've doubled the numbers of people this year that have come on board and kids that have learned how to swim. We're at nearly 150,000 kids learning how to swim. I can see that although it takes so much out of me to do this, because I'm training all the time, I can see that it's really helping."
Jones said that being a part of the program is his way of giving back to the community.
"I'm really big on trying to help those that really might not understand how important it is to learn to swim," he said. "I grew up in a place where every summer people ... went to the pool and ... sometimes we didn't know about people drowning. It's a serious problem."
Chico C. Norwood is a writer for the L.A. Watts Times.
Photos by Damien Smith.
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