Wider Horizons

Jeffrey Scott, 15, was a little unsteady in the sand and a little suspicious too, hesitating even to take off his socks.

Although he’s lived in South Los Angeles his entire life, until Thursday he had never been to the beach.

Cristina Davidson, 13, said she doesn’t get to the beach much. “My parents are really busy. They’re always working really hard.”

By the end of this summer, though, Cristina is determined to bodyboard, maybe even learn to surf at Venice Beach with the help of professional instructors.

Jeffrey and Cristina are participating in LA Surf Bus, a nonprofit program designed to get kids who wouldn’t ordinarily have the chance to go to the beach -- much less learn to surf -- out to the ocean once a week during their summer vacation.

To skeptics, bringing at-risk youth from troubled areas such as Compton, Watts and the San Fernando Valley to the beach and teaching them the fundamentals of surfing seems like an unlikely way to address their difficult circumstances.

But for Mary Setterholm, LA Surf Bus founder and the 1972 national women’s surfing champion, a day at the beach might be just what these children need. When she was growing up, she turned to the ocean to escape her “gnarly” home life.

She’d do anything to surf, she said, often riding her bike down Olympic Boulevard from downtown Los Angeles, while chaos reigned at home.

“I’d go to the ocean, ride the waves, and everything would just be better. It just had these tremendous healing powers for me,” she said. “So now that I can, I’m trying to do that for other kids.”

Setterholm, 49, said she hopes that her program, now in its second year, will offer children a chance to feel what surfers call the “stoke” of the ocean.

Every bit a surfer with her bleached-blond hair, tan, baggy sweatshirt and vocabulary, Setterholm is determined to get children to the beach.

Last year, the program brought 1,600 youths over an eight-week period to the Santa Monica, Venice and El Segundo beaches. Setterholm is hoping to reach more this year. “It’s real grass-roots, you know. Kids are telling other kids,” she said.

Setterholm has enlisted the help of the county, which buses children from around the city five days a week. Los Angeles city recreation and parks groups help organize the beach trips.

Those involved say that it can be tough to persuade youths from these neighborhoods to try surfing.

“The cultural response is that surfing is for white folks and rich people. But then we tell them it’s free, and that changes things,” said Robert Robles, a recreation and parks coordinator.

No kid is turned away for lack of swimming ability. With permission from a parent or guardian, children just need a lunch, a towel and a swimsuit. Setterholm’s Surf Academy provides the wetsuits, boards and instruction.

Setterholm remembers a turning point that convinced her she needed to create LA Surf Bus. In 1998, she heard about a young girl from a rough neighborhood who ditched school to go to the beach one day and drowned.

“Hearing about that made me really upset. It’s the haves who are safe at the beach, and the have-nots who are really in danger of drowning the most,” she said. “The whole point of this is teaching ocean safety too.”

Youths are slowly coaxed into wetsuits, many of them confused about what exactly they’re putting on. It takes some awhile to make it from the shore to the ocean on this first trip, many kids stopping along the way to try a handstand or build a castle.

Setterholm and her staff of six carefully watched the 30 or so children attending the first session, using games to determine their water ability. They talked to the kids about the waves and kept them in shallow water.

“This is so gross,” said Omari Mundy, 10, of Inglewood, wiping salt from his eyes. “And this suit is so tight.”

Gradually, instructors showed the youths how to use the bodyboards and when to coast on the wave.

For Amanda Aguiar, 14, of Echo Park, the first day of LA Surf Bus was also one of personal triumph. After about an hour in the water and with a few quick words from Setterholm, Amanda was up and standing on a surfboard -- for about 30 seconds.

“I never thought I would go surfing like that. I felt like a professional surfer. It was just so awesome,” she said, running back into the water.

Setterholm expects her staff to serve as mentors to the kids. She dreams of expanding her program and its budget of about $58,000, which comes from donations and profits from her surf school.

“We’re going to change the face of surfing,” she said.