CSC News: CSC, county and partners honored nationally for Schools in Pools program

In partnership with Palm Beach County government and the school district, Children’s Services Council of Palm Beach County earned a national award for their collaborative Schools in Pools program.

The program provides free, in-school swim lessons to elementary school students at Pioneer Park Aquatic Center in Belle Glade. Schools in Pools removes barriers to access and delivers critical water safety education to hundreds of students, including those with disabilities. 

The collaboration between CSC, the county’s Parks and Recreation Department, the Drowning Prevention Coalition and the School District of PBC, was recognized by the National Association of County Park and Recreation Officials for excellence in programming and planning initiatives. 

Belle Glade traditionally has one of the highest drowning rates of any municipality in Palm Beach County. Even though the population is less than 18,000 people, four children drowned in Belle Glade in the four-year span from 2021 to 2024. Two of the drownings – one in December 2023 and the second in February 2024 – involved kindergartners with autism who attended Gove Elementary School. 

The drownings acted as a catalyst for Gove Elementary’s principal and Palm Beach County Parks & Recreation to seek in-school swim lessons at Pioneer Park Aquatic Complex in Belle Glade. The drownings occurred around the same time that Children’s Services Council was examining drowning cases involving children with autism. That work expanded to a statewide study, which determined that of school-aged children (ages 5-17) who drowned in Florida from 2021 to 2025, 61 percent were autistic. 

The project at Gove Elementary now serves as a model for the newly formed Glades Swim Initiative. The Initiative is a collaboration of Palm Beach County Parks & Recreation, the Palm Beach County School District, Palm Beach County Fire Rescue, the Drowning Prevention Coalition of Palm Beach County and Children’s Services Council of Palm Beach County.

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