<p>"In fact, in this country, in this day and age, its a sin that there are still a lot of adults who can't swim." I do think that all people should learn to swim, it is very important but saying that it is a sin is extreme. Many inner city youth do not have access to pools to learn to swim in thus never do learn. I know for many in the prep school mindset cannot fathom this but in many cases when people do not know how to swim, it is solely for this reason.</p>
<p>Deerfield Academy's first pool (now the wrestling gym) was donated by parents of a student who drown in the river because he couldn't swim. </p>
<p>The school my kids attend has swimming lessons for K-5. New Upper school students (6-9) takes a "test" and if they don't pass they get lessons. Not sure what the test is, but the philosphy of the school is that swimming is a basic life skill - not necessary to know how to be a technically correct swimmer, but you need to be able to survive.</p>
<p>As a lifeguard I was not saying that it is not a life skill I was just saying that the comment fun is fun made is rather shallow.</p>
<p>There are probably 200 public pools in NYC and I can't imagine that there aren't a lot of public pools (indoor and outdoor) in every major American city.
Every year you read in the NY papers about inner city kids drowning in a pool or getting caught in a rip tide, so yes, it's a sin that their parents, guardians' schools, YMCA's or Boy's and Girl's Clubs don't find a way to teach them basic swimming skills.</p>
<p>My comment is "shallow"? You go into the pun Hall of Shame.</p>
<p>My parents were very serious about swimming because we spent a lot of time at the beach, in pools, on boats, etc.. I started taking swimming lessons when I was 7 months old. Seriously!</p>
<p>In the South, cities would fill in the public pools rather than integrate them. Others converted them to privately-owned facilities. That gave rise to neighborhood swim teams and swim leagues. Not surprisingly, there are no public pool swim teams.</p>
<p>For many years -- and recently enough to have an impact in terms of tradition -- New York City's swimming pools were not integrated. The city's negro residents followed an unwritten rule that they had to swim only after hours. The preferred poor man's aquatic recreational activity in NYC well into the 1970s (if not continuing to this day) is the open fire hydrant. Remember those commercials with Abe Beame imploring residents to go pick up special sprinkler caps for fire hydrants at the fire station, to minimize loss of water pressure?</p>
<p>Mine, too, blairt. We've always lived near water. I just think that having to tread water for twelve minutes is quite a lot to require of someone for a regular school swim test.</p>
<p>I just got the orientation brochere from Exeter. They say the prep swim test is right after lunch on one of the first days. I think they want to watch us get cramps so they can laugh at us later.</p>