ISLA Presented The Global Drowning Tracker© to Congress

HUNTINGTON BEACH, Calif. - May 29, 2013 - PRLog -- Founded in 2008, ISLA's mission is to prevent drowning worldwide by building a culture of water safety. Comprised entirely of volunteers; the organization provides training, equipment, and emergency personnel to communities in need around the world

International Water Safety Day was designed to educate the youth in becoming safer in and around the water while spreading global awareness of this ongoing pandemic.

The goal of the May 15th briefing was to bring awareness to the complicated public health issue of drowning in America and around the globe.

Shaun Anderson and Nate Tschohl of USA Swimming organized the event with the intent of presenting a focused and unified message on the importance of drowning awareness, water safety, and swim education from different representatives of the drowning prevention community.

Reyes and Koon both presented as part of a larger group that included Debbie Hesse from USA Swimming, Wanda Butts from The Josh Project, Connie Harvey from The American Red Cross, Mike Espino from The YMCA, Kevin McCartney from The Boys and Girls Club of America, Alicia McConnell from The United States Olympic Committee, Scott Wolfson  from The Consumer Products Board, Kim Charis from The Center for Safe and Healthy Schools, and Dr. Newton Jackson from the American Association for Physical Activity and Recreation.

Reyes and Koon had the privilege and honor of representing the National Drowning Prevention Alliance (NDPA) and ISLA at the briefing. They presented on the drowning epidemic worldwide, the present statistics that reflect the drowning situation in America, NDPA drowning prevention work, ISLA lifeguard development projects, and the Global Drowning Tracker®.  

The Global Drowning Tracker© website reveals the drowning epidemic and provides people anywhere in the world access to view the rate of which drowning occurs, and provides them the ability to report a drowning through the Internet. The Global Drowning Tracker© is also equipped with SMS text messaging technology, which enables anyone with cell phone service to take action. For more information, visit the website at: www.Drowningtracker.com.

The ISLA team pushed the importance of complete and reliable drowning data, as it is vital for drowning prevention groups, foundations, or agencies to be able to improve their own programs and targeted intervention efforts.  The Global Drowning Tracker® was brought up on a screen to show the present members how to use it.

The ISLA team also had the opportunity to present the NDPA and The Safer 3 Water Safety Foundation’s Safer 3 Early Education Drowning Prevention Program, a free early childhood education curriculum that focuses on the importance of the Safer 3 program: Safer Kids, Safer Water, and Safer Response. The NDPA Safer 3 Early Education Drowning Prevention Program is currently in use by several New York Public School Districts and United States Marine Corps Community Recreation Section installations.

"The International Water Safety Day congressional briefing was a phenomenal opportunity to network with important members of the drowning prevention community and show a few of our elected representatives the innovative drowning tracker technology that we have put forward," said Will Koon. "It was is an honor to be part of such a distinguished group of professionals doing amazing work to curb drowning rates in this country and around the world."

Read more about the congressional briefing at http://www.islasurf.org/isla-in-washington-d-c/.

To learn more about ISLA and their drowning prevention projects, please visit the website at http://www.islasurf.org.