Carson Valley Swim Center
The Carson Valley Swim Center is an integral part of the community that offers recreation, training, and entertainment to thousands in the Carson Valley each year. Through various programs, the Swim Center is closely linked to the county’s school district, the senior community, and its public safety departments.
School and Community Groups
The Swim Center hosts and co-teaches two Douglas High School aquatics classes each semester with an average class size of twenty-five students. In the spring of each year, the Swim Center hires twenty-five to thirty students as lifeguards for the upcoming summer. With the combination of lifeguards and cashiers, the Swim Center is one of the largest teen employers in Douglas County. Not only are the Center’s lifeguards certified in shallow and deep water lifeguarding, but also have certifications for CPR, first aid, AED (automated external defibrillator), and the administration of oxygen. Many pursue careers as firefighters, paramedics, and nurses, and in law enforcement and the military.
Groups of kids attending school field trips and other organized events visit the Swim Center throughout the year and come from Northern Nevada elementary and middle schools, Douglas County’s Adventure Camp, Northern Nevada based Boys & Girls Clubs, and from privately owned daycare centers. Three rural schools from California bus students to our facility for group swim lessons and for water safety instruction.
The Swim just isn’t about swimming. It is also a safe place where youth hang out after-school completing homework and socializing until they are picked up by their guardians.
Training and Exercise
The Swim Center conducts or hosts many types of training and exercise programs throughout the year:
• The Swim Center has over twenty lifeguards who provide swim lessons to kids. The lessons include teaching the fundamentals of aquatic skills to stroke improvement and refinement to skill proficiency, and the lessons are offered year-around. During this summer alone, approximately 400 kids received swim lessons.
• Water aerobics classes are offered seven days a week year-around and are taught by six instructors trained to meet the participants’ health and fitness objectives through safe and effective water exercise. Class sizes vary from fifteen to fifty participants and the majority are seniors.
• The Swim Center offers Adult Learn-to-Swim classes (ALTS) taught by a certified US Swimming Masters Instructor. The class targets adults at all swim levels from those having a fear of water, to those who want instruction with stroke refinement, and to those learning to swim for fitness.
• Every summer a two-week Junior Lifeguard Program is held for kids between the ages eleven and fifteen. The course includes basic water safety, CPR and first-aid, and lifeguard training. Douglas County Search and Rescue provides instruction on rafting and boat safety, and representatives from the Sheriff’s Office and the East Fork Fire Department are guest speakers.
• The Center has several instructors certified to instruct and certify others to become lifeguards. Several times a year the Swim Center conducts Lifeguard/CPR training to the public and annually provides Certified Pool Operator Training (CPO) to staff and the public. Most recently, the Swim Center’s instructors certified over twenty Douglas County School District coaches in CPR.
• Douglas County Search and Rescue (SAR) facilitates “Safety Day” during the summer lesson program that educates students on how to avoid dangerous situations when in and around water, and the facility provides space for water skills training for SAR members.
• The Douglas County Sheriff’s Office’s (DCSO) boat patrol officers use the facility for aquatics training.
• Military personnel serving in the Marines, Army National Guard, and the Navy use the facility for water rescue training and for fitness.
Physical Therapy
Physical and occupational therapy offices such as the Great Basin PT & Performance Center, Rehab Wave, and from the Carson Valley Medical Center and the Carson Tahoe Hospital treat over seventy-five patients a month in the Swim Center’s 93-degree therapy pool. Because motion and exercise in water cause less stress and injury to backs, joints, and muscles, it is the first step in providing treatment to many of their patients with injuries and other physical limitations before treating them in the clinic. For other patients, water exercise is the only form available to them because of water activity’s low stress. The center also provides a water-walking lane during all open hours for those seeking rehabilitation or an alternative to lap swimming.
Swim Teams and Swim Meets
The Swim Center hosts four swim teams:
• The Douglas High School Swim and Dive Team has over seventy athletes that train at the Swim Center and that compete against multiple Northern Nevada teams over a three-month season. The girls have over eighty consecutive wins with five regional titles, and the boys have over seventy consecutive wins with four regional titles. In alternating years, the Swim Center has been chosen to host the State Dive Competition in Northern Nevada while a facility in Las Vegas hosts the competition in Southern Nevada in the off years.
• The Douglas Dolfins Swim Team is a non-profit founded in 1964. The team has an average of eighty athletes that train year-around at the Swim Center. The Dolfins host three invitational meets a year bringing in over 250 swimmers with their families with each meet into our community from California, Arizona, New Mexico, and Colorado that support our local businesses.
• For two years, the Killer Whales Special Olympics Team has had over twenty athletes on the team practicing weekly and competing every spring against other Northern Nevada athletes.
• US Masters Swimming members use the facility several times a week throughout the year with some training to compete and others for fitness.
Recognition
• Nevada Recreation and Parks Association’s Elmer H. Anderson Parks Excellence Award
• National Recreation and Parks Association’s Excellence in Aquatics Award
• The Swim Center was voted, by our community, the “Best Place to Take Your Kids” for 9 years in a row.
• Recipient of the Loss Control Excellence Award presented by Pool Pact.
Recognition
• Nevada Recreation and Parks Association’s Elmer H. Anderson Parks Excellence Award
• National Recreation and Parks Association’s Excellence in Aquatics Award
• The Swim Center was voted, by our community, the “Best Place to Take Your Kids” for 9 years in a row.
• Recipient of the Loss Control Excellence Award presented by Pool Pact.
Did You Know
According to the American Red Cross, “52% of adults are considered unsafe around water.” Per the US Master Swimming Adult Learn-to-Swim Program, “Ten people drown in the U.S. each day, most of them adults.” Annually, according to the Center for Disease Control,” 3,536 people in the United States died from drowning which equates to 10 deaths each day and drowning is the number one cause of unintentional death for children between the ages of 1 and 4.” Also, “75% of drowning deaths of children younger than 15 occurred at a swimming pool located at a private residence.”