Like every year, the Tous à l'Ô association offers the “I learn to swim” program in the form of courses spread over the different school holidays for children from priority neighborhoods so that they learn to swim and feel like fish in water.
From February 12 to 23, around forty children from Quartier d'Orléans were able to discover the joys of swimming on Galion beach during the first “Savoir Nager” course of the year. Led by Boris Villemin of the Tous à l'Ô association, the Ministry of Sports' system will delight young budding swimmers who will acquire during the course the skills required to move around in the water in complete safety. In collaboration with the Sèm Ta Route association in Quartier d'Orléans, the February 2024 course welcomed around fifteen children from the Social Up Rising Center, an internal structure of the Sèm Ta Route association, and two educators who lent a hand strong in managing groups on the sand, discussions and the running of each day's program. The partnership between Sèm Ta Route and Tous à l'Ô is not new, the two structures work together all year round, every Wednesday afternoon, with a single objective: teaching children to swim. “We invest in the overall development of our children and give them the tools necessary to succeed in life,” a representative of the Quartier d’Orléans association told us. The children from the Up Rising Social Center joined their classmates from the Omer Arrondell school in Quartier d'Orléans who were also participating in this first introductory swimming session thanks to a grant from the Collectivité de Saint-Martin. As usual, bus transport was set up by the Tous à l'Ô association, picking up the children every morning in Quartier d'Orléans to take them back there after the swimming session. Supervised by state-certified lifeguards, the children passed the federal “wildlife” test at the end of their training. The twenty new swimmers who passed this test with flying colors are now registered on the French Swimming Federation website, confirming their license status. If in the future, these children wish to take a competitive exam that requires this license in their professional career, it will already be validated. The others who unfortunately did not take the test nevertheless leave with a certificate of learning and participation in the “Knowing Swimming” course. The graduation ceremony took place last Friday morning on Galion beach with children happier than ever, proud to have successfully completed this exciting aquatic adventure. Each year, on an island territory which lacks infrastructure for learning to swim, more than 150 children are involved in courses set up by the Tous à l'Ô association. _VX
https://faxinfo.fr/en/natation-une-quarantaine-denfants-apprennent-a-nager-avec-lassociation-tous-a-lo/
