Community Corner

Mentor to Help Break World's Largest Swimming Lesson Record

The simultaneous event takes place at 11 a.m. Tuesday at locations around the world, including Civic Center Park.

Simultaneous splashes in Mentor could help produce the world's largest swimming lesson on Tuesday.

The pool at Civic Center Park will be one of hundreds of sites across the world that will begin a massive lesson at 11 a.m. in an attempt to shatter the record of 19,322 participants set in 2011, according to the Guinness Book of World Records. The Mentor pool is just one of two sites in Lake County to host a lesson on the potentially record-setting day.

Click here for the map of global participants.

"We're gonna do it and try to get as many kids in there as possible," pool manager Heidi Zicarelli said. "Everybody in the world is going to be doing the same thing at the same time."

A coalition of America's largest water safety and training organizations is organizing the event, so sites like Civic Center have a detailed schedule of what to do and when to do it in order to contribute to the record.

"The actual lesson is half an hour," learn-to-swim director Emily Decker said. "Everything we have to do is minute-by-minute, but nothing's super difficult.  It's safety and basic skills meant to get general awareness out about pool safety."

Registration begins at 10:30 a.m., followed by the lesson. About 150 children are expected at Civic Center, including all participants of Mentor day camps and Rainbow Connections camp. The general public is invited to take part, as well.

"One of the top causes of death is drowning and we have so much water around here," Decker said. "We think it's so important to teach kids how to swim. It should be really cool."

The lesson will include fee-first jumps, backflips and bubble blowing, Zicarelli said.

"We want to have as many people as possible," she said. "Just have it jam packed with kids."


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