Portable Pools Offer Lessons at 40 Schools

For three decades, thousands of youngsters in the Los Angeles Unified School District have learned water safety from the district’s summertime Learn to Swim program.

This summer is no exception.

About 10,000 elementary school students--many from the San Fernando Valley--will take half-hour lessons this year at the program’s portable pools, said Don Wertz, senior recreation director in the youth services section of the district.

The district began the program in 1964--at first rotating one portable pool among the district’s schools. This year, 10 pools will visit 40 sites.

The pools--the first of which opened Monday--stay two weeks at each location. Each is staffed by four Red Cross-certified staff members trained in, among other things, CPR and first aid, Wertz said.

Classes begin each weekday at 10 a.m. and end at various times depending on the location.

The classes are not necessarily swimming lessons, but are instructional sessions on water safety, Wertz said.

The schedule for the Valley’s elementary schools is:

* Apperson Street in Sunland--continuing through July 9.

* El Dorado Avenue in Sylmar--continuing through July 10.

* Toluca Lake in North Hollywood--July 10-23.

* Camellia Avenue in North Hollywood--July 11-24.

* Calabash Street in Woodland Hills--July 23 through Aug. 5.

* Cantara Street in Reseda--July 24 through Aug. 6.

* O’Melveny in San Fernando--July 25 through Aug. 7.

* Germain Street in Chatsworth--Aug. 6-19.

* Valerio Street in Van Nuys--Aug. 7-20.

* Tarzana--Aug. 9-21.

Over the years the district has received calls from parents who told stories about their children using the lessons to save their life or the lives of others, Wertz said.

“I haven’t been to a school where they didn’t say it was an unbelievable program,” he said.