Published: August 06, 2009 03:43 pm      

Teaching a lesson to save a life

GREENVILLE — Minniequa Scott, 23, has been a certified lifeguard for more than four years with the majority of those years spent teaching swim lessons at the YMCA.

“It’s really fun,” said Scott. “It’s fulfilling, too because the kids come to you, some of them terrified of putting their head in the water, and most leave feeling more comfortable and knowing how to swim better than they did when they first came.”

Scott first got bitten by the lifeguarding bug when she was 14 or 15 years old.

“I went with my parents to this conference,” remembered Scott. “There was this kid there who was a jokester and he kept begging his dad to go swimming, but his dad kept telling him no.”

According to Scott this little boy decided to go swimming with or without his father’s permission, and that’s when the boy began thrashing around in the pool.

“His friends thought he was playing,” she said. “By the time someone jumped into the pool to retrieve him, it was too late. After that I decided I wanted to be a lifeguard so that, maybe, I could prevent that from happening again.”

In order to become certified, Scott had to swim 500 yards (200 freestyle, 100 breaststroke and 200 choice of breast or freestyle), along with successfully completing “The Brick.”

This is where the swimmer dives to a depth of nine or more feet to retrieve a 10-pound brick. They then swim to the surface and tread water for two minutes with the brick held above the head. They must also swim the length of the pool holding the 10-pound brick above the surface of the water.

Aside from this Scott also had to acquire her CPR-PR and Standard First Aid certifications and pass a test to receive her lifeguard certification.

“It was pretty challenging,” she said of the process.

After receiving her certification, she began teaching swim lessons at the YMCA, where she mainly teaches children ages 3 and up.

“The person that was teaching swim lessons at the time asked, ‘Hey, why don’t you come teach up here?,’ and I’ve been doing it ever since,” said Scott.

With the younger children, Scott begins by getting them comfortable in the water, then shows them how to blow bubbles with their head under the water and to kick and paddle with the assistance of a floatation device.

After this Scott moves on to teach them to jump into the pool and swim back to the side with no help or floatation device before moving on to the basics like the front crawl, back crawl and flutter kick. After they master these, it’s time to move on to other swim strokes.

“I really enjoy teaching, but during the classes sometimes I wonder if they’re really learning anything,” said Scott. “Then after it’s all said and done and they see me in the store or somewhere and their parents say, ‘Oh, you’re my child’s swim teacher! They really enjoyed your class and they learned so much. Are you going to be teaching again next year?’ That makes me feel good because I know I actually taught them to swim.”

Jan Williams, a longtime resident of Greenville, enrolled her grandson, David Mockabee, in the preschool class when he came down from Ohio last year to spend two weeks out of the summer with his grandparents.

“Minniequa was so laid back I wasn’t sure how it would go,” said Williams. “She got all the darling children lined up, very quietly and calmly, had each one do the head bob — all the things they need to do for a preschool class — and with everything they did she’d tell them ‘Good job.’”

Williams used to be a swim instructor at the old Greenville Natatorium when she was in high school and took her water safety instruction at the YMCA, so she knows a good instructor when she sees one.

“This summer he’s 4 years old and I really wanted him to be able to swim,” she said. “We live on a little lake and I just want him to be really safe around the water. It’s really important to me that he gets really good training.”

Thus this summer Williams is paying for private lessons, four one-hour classes, along with the swim class.

“On July 28, thanks to Minniequa, David swam the entire width of the pool with no assistance whatsoever,” said Williams. “He was so proud and we’re so proud of him. Now I feel that if he falls off the pier into the water, he’ll be able to right himself and swim to the shore.”

Scott believes it is vitally important that every child learn to swim, whether they’re taught by a parent or a certified instructor.

“Kids are always going to be attracted to water whether it’s the beach, the lake or a swimming pool,” she said. “So it’s important for them to know what to do and how to do it before they’re placed in a situation that involves water.”