Episode Transcript
[00:00:01] Speaker A: NDPA presents the Water Safety Champion podcast.
Welcome back to the next episode of the NDPA Water Safety Champions podcast. I'm Adam Ketchmarchy, the CEO of the NDPA, joined today by one half of the water safety odd couple. Today I have the esteemed privilege to be joined by none other than Alan Korn. How you doing today, Alan?
[00:00:29] Speaker B: Good, Adam. And hello, Julene.
[00:00:33] Speaker A: Yeah, and Alan, it's good to see you back on the podcast. Alyssa's been eating up a lot of our recording slots, so I don't know if she's trying to become the more popular half of the odd couple, more.
[00:00:43] Speaker B: Out there or already. It's already the case.
He's the better known and better liked, and both are justified.
[00:00:51] Speaker A: Well, hey, I'm surprised we get a listenership, so it's exciting that we have a lot of voices happening in water safety. Well, let's get right to it. Today's Water Safety champion podcast guest is Julian Heffner, the executive director and CEO at the association of Aquatic Professionals and a long time friend. Jolene, how are you doing today?
[00:01:14] Speaker C: I'm great. Thank you so much for having me. I'm all excited.
[00:01:17] Speaker A: Well, we are excited to have you, and let's just jump right in. Julienne, what is your water story?
[00:01:23] Speaker C: Geez. You know, it's always interesting when people ask me that, because I started out basically at about age five. My mother gave me the opportunity to either take ballet lessons or go into swimming. And for some reason, I chose swimming and started swimming pretty much competitively from day one.
I guess I had a little bit of a zing for swimming and kind of was unnatural at it. So I started at age five in swim club, swam throughout grade school, high school, college, master's swimming, and beyond. I get in the pool every once in a while now, I just finished a brand new pool in our backyard, so I'm excited about that. But so, you know, that's kind of how I started swimming. And then it was one of those things where, you know, I guess I took it from being a competitive swimmer, you know, swimming at state and nationals. Hey, heck, a couple of my records just went down in high school years ago, which was really cool. I'm like, no record should last for 30 years, especially with all the. The new introductions of flip turns and everything else. But when I was 15, took the lifeguarding class, became a lifeguard, became a swim instructor, and then I enjoyed it so much, became a lifeguard instructor, and then went on to become an instructor trainer in both lifeguarding and water safety. And, you know, I've really had a lot of opportunities. And I always tell people in my hometown we had an 80,000 square foot man made, like, and, you know, it was a lake. You looked at the surface of the water, you could see the surface, you couldn't see anything below.
So that's kind of how I started my career in aquatics. And I still go back to my hometown and tell people, you know, it's amazing because by doing what I did, I've been able to become what I've been able to become and accomplish what I've been able to come in. And a lot of people don't really think about that, how they start. And I always tell beginning lifeguard people, you know, you're just starting out in the industry, but don't look at it as a temporary job. This could become a career and you could really make a difference. And I think that was one of the biggest things in aquatics that I really wanted to do is not just on a local level, because that's how I got involved as a lifeguard. And, you know, I've lifeguarded and run aquatic facilities from school districts, park and recommend ymcas, man made lakes and riverfront facilities. So I've had a lot of experience that way. But it really kind of took a turn for me when I was able to graduate from college. I have a degree in recreational leadership and I minored in psychology, so it kind of fit the bill. I always wanted to be a cruise director. I went into college thinking I was going to be a cruise director, and then I learned that you had to stay up like 24/7 all night long, and you never got any sleep. And I definitely need my sleep, so that wouldn't have worked for me. But that's kind of how I started in La Crosse, and then I ended up getting my full time, first full time job in my hometown, so went back to start my career.
[00:04:37] Speaker A: Well, yeah, I want to ask, because I always find this interesting with people who started young and aquatics. Did I? And I think you kind of answered this with the cruise director piece. But like, I had a completely different interest, you know, growing up, and it was going to be journalism and communications technology and all that fun stuff which still get to dabble in, you know, with the podcasts and the virtual stuff we do. But I remember there was one day where I was just like, I don't want to do that anymore. I just, I love this whole lifeguard pool thing I'm doing, and I think I want to go to school for that. My parents were a little concerned when I came home and said that. But, you know, I always find that curiously. Cause I don't think some people realized where that kind of impetus or spark happened, that I could make a career out of this. It's not just something I like doing as a summer job.
[00:05:28] Speaker C: Well, you know, the interesting part is being a competitive swimmer. And I was decent. I mean, I wasn't Olympic level, but, you know, I held my own and could do a really good job. I actually got recruited by a number of colleges, and I was getting offered scholarships.
UNLV, University of Wyoming, Laramie, Milwaukee. So, of course, I picked the one school that I couldn't get offered anything at, which was UW lacrosse. But the reason I went to UW lacrosse was because they had a professor there that could get people into the cruise lines. Now, I mind you, I'd never been on a cruise in my life, so I had no clue what that was. But they also had a recreational degree, so it kind of fit in. And when I kind of switched into that recreational leadership, I always. That was my degree, but kind of took a little bit of a turn. I knew really early on what I wanted to do, and I think a big part of that was just I loved being involved in sports, and I loved being involved in swimming. And when I started being able to teach people how to swim and be a lifeguard, it just kind of lit a fire, I think. And, you know, we always talk about the passion aquatics people have, and I think I've been lucky that I've had that from day one, I think.
[00:06:44] Speaker A: Yeah, absolutely.
[00:06:46] Speaker B: We kind of. Adam, we kind of buried the lead here a little bit. When Julian was introducing herself, she said she just put in her own personal pool. Now, that's interesting to me that what someone who was an expert in running pools, the safety features of pools, what they've seen that they like, what they've seen that they don't like. What does your. What. What does your pool look like? What did you choose to do in order to make it a safe, fun environment?
[00:07:16] Speaker C: Yeah, you know, it's interesting because a lot of the pool professionals I met with, you know, I'm talking to them for the first five minutes, and they're like, let me guess, you've done pools all your life, and I'm like, yes, yes. And, you know, I had a. Had a bit of a run in with one of the inspectors because I disagreed with what they require here. Only we are in Queen Creek now in Arizona, and I absolutely love it. But when we were in Mesa, they required alarms on all the doors, self classic latching, self closing, but then alarms on the doors and the windows. So, you know, every window of ours going to the backyard had an alarm on. We don't even have any children. I don't even know if any children will be at our facility, at our home ever. But, you know, right away. So the alarms were on everything. In Queen Creek, they only require the self latching, self closing doors. So I'm, like, arguing with them that I don't think it's safe enough, you know, because this door opens, it closes. I have no idea that I ever opened. So he's like, well, you know, you can put more things on it. I'm like, oh, who can I go talk to about this? Because, you know, it was very concerning to me because Arizona has a high, very high drowning rate, and every single community has different rules and regulations. So, you know, most of them don't require any type of offense at all around it. Now, we have a six foot black wall all the way around our yard. We have the self latching, self closing gate. I also have a code lock on the outside of it. So if you're a child, you're not getting into our backyard in any way, shape, or form. But most places around here don't do that. So, you know, you go around the neighborhood, nobody else has a lock on their gate but us, of course. My husband's like, oh, my gosh. You just put a gory, like, orange lock on your gate. And I'm like, yeah, we did. And it's staying there and nobody leaves it open. And there's a sign on it that the door can't be left open if our landscapers are in or whatever. So, you know, those type of things. But it's really interesting how I. I don't want to say anything bad about it, but I think there needs to be a lot more work. And when I was talking to the inspector, I said, I'd love to come to a meeting and let you know, you know, some things that should be in place. Although our neighbors, you know, post on the Facebook page how, oh, my gosh, it's terrible. We have to do this. We have to do that. I'm like, oh, my gosh. Here's a free drowning prevention program, you know, really trying to educate them.
[00:09:56] Speaker B: Well, yeah, Adam and I can help you with that when you're ready to motivate, because we've got all the example legislations, the codes. I've got a stack of them here. I know this is an audio podcast, but I'll hold it up anyway that, you know, you can steal from in order to improve either your locality or your, but it's, of course, I, I'm not surprised that when you're talking with your code official you wanted to do what was required plus a little bit more, even though you don't have young children in your home.
[00:10:26] Speaker C: Oh, correct. And he said the same thing, you're allowed to do anything you want. I'm like, yeah, I know, but here's the thing. I was trying to explain it to him and then he goes, well, you know, you're right, I have small children at home. And then we got into that discussion. So I'm like, there needs to be more layers of protection. You know, we always talk about those layers of protection and we're always, you can never put enough in place.
And you know, that was kind of the discussion I had with them. So hopefully we can take that, you know, a little further down the line.
[00:10:58] Speaker A: Well, this is one of the unique challenges Alan and I talk about quite a bit is the fact that, you know, just given our government structure in the US, a lot of this is left up to the local communities, the townships, the cities, the villages to decide for themselves. And oftentimes it's left in the building code process. There's not further ordinances or, you know, regulations put in place. You know what Alan and I would probably think about it, state statute law, a lot of that does not exist, you know, across this country from a water safety perspective. And you know, when you think about there's 3000 plus counties in this country, we need 3000 plus joulines out there at the local level willing to go to their local, you know, town council or city council meeting or meet with their county commissioners to say, look, I care about this. And this is, you know, solvable if we just put a few of these items in place.
[00:11:54] Speaker C: Well, I think, you know, it's unfortunate and I've said this from day one, being involved in aquatics, there's so much gray area, you know, this county does this, this county does this, this county does nothing, you know, and it's too bad. And I really, and I'll wait because you're going to ask me in a perfect world what I can do, you've said. But you know, I really, there's one wish that I have down the line and we can talk about that later of what, you know, what really needs to occur in aquatic safety. And you know, Adam, you and I have discussed this quite a bit. You know, we have, and I just wrote an article on it. You know, drowning prevention education has so many different layers. You have specific layers for NDPA. AOAP has our free respect, the water drowning prevention campaign. We have a variety of layers. They're all very similar, but nothing's wrong.
Some people will say, oh my gosh, you shouldn't do that. You shouldn't do this, you can't do. We need to do this.
Let's put as many layers of protection in place and support everybody, no matter what those layers are, because layers fail. And we all know that. And everybody says, oh, we need that constant, direct, uninterrupted supervision at all times. Well, that's the one that fails. We need to have that in place, but that's when that fails. So we need to have those extra layers and whatever they may be, we have to have those in place and we need to support each other. So whether your layers might be different than our layers, we're promoting your layers all the time. You know, we just introduced new psas that we're working on and I can talk about that a little bit later if you have another question.
[00:13:32] Speaker B: But yeah, your layers have it's respect resp. And each one has one. The first one is recognition, which is not on the abbey's hope one. It's not even on the NDPA one, but it's a good one. To kind of, before you get into the nitty gritty, is to understand your surroundings. Recognize the r in respect. Recognize, is there a lifeguard? Is there enough lifeguards? What's the conditions? If it's open bodies of water, what is the condition and quality of the parent? So you're absolutely right, there's more to it than just supervision. Layers and fencing. All of that is important, but there's other ways to get the message out there. And your respect program does that. It's a little different than some of.
[00:14:21] Speaker C: The others, and it is. And I think it, what was created by a great group of individuals. I mean, they worked on it for a number of years and they've adjusted and changed it, but I think it was just trying to be, I shouldn't say as all inclusive as possible, because there's layers missing in ours too. But I think to really try to cover as much as we possibly could and getting the information out there, and especially because a lot of the people that use our program are people that run and operate aquatic facilities and they're training other people. You know, if you've looked at ours. We've got PowerPoint presentations. We've got the psas. We were blessed to work with Matt Biondi, Elizabeth Beisel, Dana Volmer, and we're going to be working with summer Sanders this upcoming year we're excited about. We've got some new books that are coming out for our AOAP water watcher program, which so many people have. Water Watcher programs, it's amazing. And then being able to really just share those with, you know, the children's books and those PSAS cards. Whatever you can do.
Adam, for NDPA and you guys, I mean, everybody has so many different wonderful programs. We've been trying to share those on our website as much as possible. Also, for any of them, we have a request going out shortly to any and all drowning prevention organizations to see if we can share links to their websites on ours because we, we want that everybody's information out there, not just ours.
[00:15:54] Speaker B: Permission granted.
[00:15:56] Speaker C: What?
[00:15:56] Speaker B: Permission granted.
[00:15:58] Speaker C: Thank you.
[00:15:59] Speaker A: Well, but I think that's a really important point too, because, you know, in the last episode with Connie Harvey, we talked a lot about the different ways that drownings happen to different communities. Right? And you know where Abby's hope is based in Minneapolis. There's a huge somali community in Minneapolis that, um, you know, to every community, every culture, every piece of this country operates differently. And that's the melting pot that is the United States of America. But with that, not everyone message is going to work or apply to everyone else. And that's where it was funny. It actually came up in my conversation with Connie. We kind of laughed about it, where so oftentimes people think that we are all competing against each other. And so often what I think people are surprised about when I say this in the water safety space specifically is we don't compete against the American Red Cross or AOAP. If you use their programs, fantastic. If you use Abby's hope, as long as you're having the water safety conversation, your resources are based on sound information.
It's all about what's going to fit the demographic and the community you're serving best. And that's what I think the glorious part of having all of these different programs and resources out there are.
[00:17:19] Speaker C: And that's you just hit it on the head. And I think, Adam, a big part of our partnership is because of that, because we're just trying to get the message out there. And, you know, we talk about that all the time in collaborations and, you know, it's unfortunate because, I mean, you've seen it. We've seen it. The arguments online sometimes about, no, you can't do this, or yes, you should be doing this and you're not doing this right, and you're doing this. Let's all just do something. Let's put something in place and support everything that's out there now. Things that are unsafe or, you know, we might question some things, but we are trying to just put all these layers of protection in place. And I do expert witness work for fatal and non fatal drownings. And it is just heart wrenching. I mean, I've talked to you about this. I'm getting the point where I just don't know if I can do it anymore because it is so heart wrenching.
It's something that is so important to get the information out there.
But we really need to try and make a difference. And that's why we're here. We're all trying to make a difference in drowning prevention and anything that I can do to help anybody, that's what I'm all about. And that's why I do what I do to try and make a difference and try and help people out. And we always say, you know, we're a one stop shop for aquatic professionals. But I get phone calls all the time from, you know, individuals and communities asking me about, you know, maybe questioning something that maybe their local aquatics program is doing that maybe they don't agree with, or maybe they have a question about and they don't feel they can ask.
You know, of course, I'm always saying you should go straight to your, your community and talk to them about it. But here's the standard of care in the industry or something along that line. But I think that's why it's so great when we see so many people working together.
[00:19:18] Speaker B: Julie, I've gotten to know your organization better because of the very productive and effective partnership now with the NDPA, and our combined conference coming up in February next year will be our second or third one that we're doing together.
But you, it's my understanding, and I know this is correct, that the vast majority of your membership are professional aquatics facilities.
What are the unique safety or even management issues or factors for a professional aquatic center as opposed to your personal pool or the residential pools that drownings happen? You know, I'm thinking bathering load and chemical storage, but you would know better what is kind of unique to that, to your profession and your membership?
[00:20:06] Speaker C: Sure. Well, I think you mentioned a couple of them. Yes, we're talking about, you know, we've got a much, we have a bather load. You know, it's not our backyard pool where we might have 1020 or a family gathering of people or just a few people. You know, we have a lot of people coming into our facilities. And I think, you know, talking about that chemical safety aspect of it, you just brought that up as well. But, you know, a big thing that I think is one of the biggest challenges that recreation and aquatic professionals have. Our consistency in what we do, so.
And by that, what between all pools? So it's consistency in enforcing rules and regulations. What are those policies and procedures? You know, how old should it may a child be before they can be at the swimming facility by themselves? How tall do they have to be? What are we doing for weaker non swimmers? Because a lot of our facilities start at 4ft deep. We have young children coming to our facilities. So what do we do for those individuals? I am a big proponent for having life jackets for weaker non swimmers and requiring that coast guard approved life jackets are put on everybody. Some people don't agree with that. However, if we're floating them at our pools, they're not under the surface of the water. So I'm a big proponent to that. Our whole association is. We give out life jacket grants. But I think one of the biggest things that we find, because I go to so many different pools that are run either being through my expert witness work or just as an aquatic professional, that goes to a lot of pools, the guards that are working sometimes are enforcing rules differently. So I may have policies and procedures that nobody that can't, isn't a strong swimmer, can't be here, or you have to be within an arm's reach of your child at all times. If they can't stand or whatever the rule is, it doesn't really matter. I go at 01:00 this afternoon, and that rule is being enforced. I go at 05:00 tonight. Nobody's enforcing those rules and regulations, so why do we have those policies or rules in place? And I think that's one of the biggest things that we have a problem with facilities. Another thing that is huge is I think, and I'll put my hat on where I used to run facilities, your supervisors don't understand why we do what we do. They don't understand why we have to have those safety rules in place or those policies and procedures. And you like what?
[00:22:51] Speaker B: That's a training issue, it sounds like to me.
[00:22:53] Speaker C: Well, it's a training issue, but if it's my boss telling me I'm not allowed to enforce that policy and procedure because it might have upset somebody in the community or an alderman or council member called and complained about it. So now I'm not allowed to do that.
That becomes a huge issue. I get calls a lot from aquatic professionals. I used to be the aquatics director at Fond du Lac school district, and I ran that facility. My nickname was the whip. I mean, you weren't doing anything you weren't supposed to do, and this is why. And it was safety. I left, and then there was some change in management, and there was a new superintendent of schools. And I'm not trying to throw, you know, throw them under the bus, but I will now. They've changed. Now they allow their swim coaches to be in there with no lifeguard on duty. There was no way that anybody would have been in. I didn't even teach lifeguarding classes without a separate lifeguard on duty. You need to have that separate set of eyes that is doing nothing else but constantly providing that constant, direct, uninterrupted supervision at all times. And you get a superintendent of schools that tells you, no, we're not doing this anymore. The swim team can go in there anytime they want. You give them a key, the swim club can go in there anytime you want. If you don't have lifeguards during the day because you can't get them, you're still going to let people lapse them. Oh, my gosh. That is a fatal drowning waiting to occur, whether it's from maybe a massive heart attack someone has, or a drowning. And that's where I think some of our biggest concerns come in the industry now, because it's not necessarily the people that are running those facilities directly and being the aquatics director in charge of it, it's their supervisors telling them now that we're not going to do that anymore. And what I have to tell them is document it, document everything, and go, and here's a report, and this is what you need to do. And I provide them with all the information on all the fatal and non fatal drownings that are occurring during PE classes or swim team practices, and doing whatever I can to help them out. But I think that's one of our biggest challenges that we see in the industry, is that it might not be me who's running the facility directly. It's my supervisor telling me I can't do that.
[00:25:16] Speaker A: Well, you know, I'm going to toss out. I mean, I think both of you know, I was the aquatic structure for my university for quite some time, and I'm still faculty at the university, but I was asked at the early days of the pandemic, if I wanted to continue, and my answer was an emphatic no, please take my name off that wall and I will move offices. And it's not that I didn't love running the lifeguard staff or the pool. And, you know, granted, it's nice not having that, as Jolene knows. You know, it's, it's definitely something that you just have on your soul 24/7 when you're running an aquatics facility. But, you know, the number one reason I dropped it and I, hopefully no one at administration will listen to this until I'm tenured next year. But, you know, the true reason is administration looked at me and said, we're cutting you down to one lifeguard on duty at a time. And my rule was we had two or three on duty at one time. Not maybe watching the pool, but Julie knows to do a lot of the rescues and, you know, especially extrication and their CPR and first day care. Those skills are designed to be done with two or more people, not as a single, you know, person. And I wasn't going to be charged with running a facility like that. But I know it's easy for me to say because I had, you know, other employment opportunities and other things I was doing. But I get this question all the time from operators, is what should I do? I'm in a rock and a hard place. My policymaker or my supervisor won't support me. My, as you point out, Julian, I often hear from PE teachers in my network. You know, my school district won't provide a lifeguard for swim class anymore. But now I'm still supposed to teach swimming. And I've got 25 kids in the pool at one time. And, you know, my number one answer is don't. Don't do it. But you're looking at someone saying, well, then quit your job. And that's also a difficult predicament. So I agree with you. This is a major, that's a major issue that we face.
[00:27:01] Speaker C: And I think it is one of the biggest ones, Alan. It really is, because I'm getting calls constantly about it. And we have had so many people leave the aquatics profession in the last few years. And Covid had something to do with that, but a lot more now because of that. And exactly what Adam said. You know, we're cutting back to one lifeguard or we're cutting back. We're not having lifeguards. Don't be responsible for it. You know, document it. And I've had people and you don't want to leave facilities without somebody that knows what they're doing, running them. But if you know what you're doing and you're running it, and people won't let you run it safely, that makes it very difficult. And that's why I tell people, you know, document, document what you're doing, document why you're doing it. Let them know, I'm sorry, I can't do that. And this is why.
But we have had a lot of people leave the aquatics as careers in the last few years, and I don't see that changing in the near future.
[00:28:03] Speaker B: In a shameless plug. I'm doing a presentation at our combined conference on liability prevention at aquatic facilities. I'm an attorney by training and in part by practicing. That's one of the sessions that I'm going to do. When you talk about documentation, just like a nurse and a doctor documents the chart, it's good to document and we talk. I talked at least five, six minutes about that in that presentation. A lot of the sessions that I go to in the conferences that we all go to, we're hearing a lot about lifeguard shortages. This is probably a softball, but confirm for us it's a real thing out there, lifeguards, for lots of reasons. You just talked about one I didn't even think of. But it's trouble staffing these pools, which means less hours, closed pools. You're seeing that in reality out there.
[00:28:54] Speaker C: We're seeing it a lot now. I will say in the last year, we've seen a little bit of a change. We just did a salary survey, and that was a big thing. You know, here we are paying lifeguards $7 and some cents an hour or $8 or $9 either an hour. But I can go, and I'm not picking on the fast food industry, but I can go to Burger King and make $15 an hour or $20 an hour, get paid for my training, get paid. Well, I'm doing my training. And lifeguards were expected to pay for their training, not getting, you know, paid for taking the course, paying for the course on their own.
But we have seen a little bit of a change now over the last year. A big part of it has to do with providing training for free, providing people an hourly rate while they're taking their training. Now, that's if they can initially pass the swimming skills test, because we're going to have people come in and test them quick and see. But we're seeing that, I think, take a turn, you know, and we've got a lot more facilities that are now open. They're opening more of their facilities and they're getting more lifeguards. A big thing that I'd like to see, and I've talked to the coalition about this and I've seen it with other things, but really having lifeguards listed as first responders everywhere lifeguards should be, they are first responders. So we should have them listed as, and noticed as first responders and get the recognition for that, not just being 16 year old babysitters.
[00:30:28] Speaker B: Yeah. It's not a summer job. It's a professional job.
[00:30:30] Speaker C: It is.
[00:30:31] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:30:31] Speaker B: And nomenclature has a lot to do with that.
[00:30:34] Speaker C: Yeah. And I have a, I do a presentation called lifeguarding. How do we want the public to perceive us? And it's all about professionalism as lifeguards and how we act on the stand and how we look on the stand and what we do on the stand. People see that, you know, I'm a big opponent for not allowing, you know, lifeguards and bikinis and those type of things. And again, I'm going to get hammered for this for some people, but it's a uniform. You know, we are there in a uniform and we don't want to be looked at as just somebody that's there for a tan. And I think that is part of what we're missing in our industry is that professionalism. And if you're looked at as a professional, you act like a professional a lot.
[00:31:18] Speaker B: You're going to get treated like a professional.
[00:31:20] Speaker C: Correct.
[00:31:21] Speaker B: Follows respect follows even if policy follows.
[00:31:25] Speaker C: It does. And that's, that's another thing we're missing in our industry. And if I could change one thing as, from the lifeguarding industry, it would be that perception of how we want our lifeguards to be perceived by the community.
You know, now with everybody having a video camera on their, their phones, you know, they're videotaped all the time. And, you know, how, how are they supposed to be acting from the day they walk in the door? And that was a big thing that I really worked on with my teams. You know, I never said, you're my employee. You are my team members. How can we look as a professional team and app, and it makes a huge difference. Now, granted, it depends on where you're located. You know, you go to California to a swimming pool, you know, they're, heck, they're practicing, you know, competitive swimming in little tiny, you know, swimsuits and stuff and whatever they, that's just normal for them. But, you know, I'm from the midwest, so, you know, it, it's just a big thing that I like to say is, is you're going to be treated how you're perceived, and let's really get perceived as professionals.
[00:32:35] Speaker A: Julie, before we wrap up today, could you talk a little bit about who AOAP is as an organization and maybe how you found your way to AOAP in your current role?
[00:32:45] Speaker C: Sure.
I'm really just, I love AOAP. I mean, obviously, I've been part of it since the beginning.
A core group of us were involved in another organization, and we help them run an annual conference and their aquatic section and stuff. And out of the blue, in February of 2011, they decided they weren't doing it anymore, and we're going to change things up. So a core group of us, a few of us decided this, and this is too important to our industry. We have to continue it. So in 2011, a core group of us started the association of Aquatic Professionals, applied for our 501 C three. Farhad Madani was very involved with that from Texas as well, and Kathy Luker from Lincoln Aquatics, handful of other people also, I can't name everybody, but we got together and set it up and we're ready to run our first conference in 2012. And our exhibitors that we were friends with, our attendees at the conference, we had an amazing first year, and we've grown since then. I was a volunteer for the first two years, 2011 till 2013, as I was also the deputy director for the Wisconsin park and Rec association. And I ran my own business, safety first products. And after two years, I'm like, okay, you guys, I can't do this. All we need a full time, you know, executive director. I've been able to save you guys tons of money. Now we've got some money in the bank. We could pay somebody. And our board at the time decided. They met and offered me the position, which I hadn't even been considering it, but I was so passionate about it and started in 2013 as a full time executive director. And it's just been amazing what we've accomplished as a team, as a group, as an association, just with our partnerships. And I think that's one of the biggest things. An Adam will attest to this, because I've been working with him for six, seven, eight years to try and get our partnership to where it is today. But it's, you know, that's the biggest thing. So we're all about collaborating. And over the years, if you look at how large our conference has gotten now, and the attendees and the exhibitors. And not just that, but our aquatic professional designation that we have now, and our collaborations with the American Red Cross, Starfish, aquatics, to name a few. Tap total aquatic program. We partner with them on things. We're partnering now with the council model Aquatic health Code. They're holding their vote on the code in conjunction with our conference starting this year. It's every three years, but they'll be doing that. We've got a map track, we're doing an aquatic technician workshop training during the week. We've got various other partnerships that I've been dealing with over the last few weeks that are looking at joining us in some shape or form.
I talked to the American Camp association, I've talked to some other groups as well. So it's just really exciting to see what we're able to accomplish together.
[00:36:05] Speaker B: What was your attendance in 2011, and what is it now?
[00:36:11] Speaker C: Don't quote me on the numbers. I don't know, 100%, but we had about, I think we had 39 companies in the exhibit hall, and because they jumped on board and trusted us, and we had a little over 100 attendees. Last year, we had 152 companies total, and we had, well, 750 attendees for us and then 250 for NDPA. So we sat rated about 1000.
And I just see us growing more and more. We also do online trainings. We do free online trainings for members, non members. We do lots of different webinars that we offer as well, but it's just really neat to see. And it's kind of exciting because you can go to conferences and there might be more attendees, but not in aquatics.
Everybody that walks in the door is in aquatics. Everybody that walks in the door is doing some sort of drowning prevention education, running their facilities, however they do. And I think that's just one of the most exciting things. And now with our partnership with NDPA, and having families united at our conference, I talked to Adam. This was something that I think we were really missing. You know, we had all the professionals there, but families that have been affected by, you know, fatal or non fatal drownings or. We've never had these conversations. We've never been able, as operators, to have conversations with families. And as difficult as it is, it's imperative because our operators need to realize, because a lot of them, nothing's ever happened at their facilities that substantial. And that's great. We don't want it to, but we really need them to take away the fact that things can happen. And this is why you train your staff, and why you have to train your staff the way we do and be as passionate as we are. And that was one of the biggest things that from our AOAP attendees last year. This year is great because it's going to be more combined. You can do anything you want, basically. But I had so many of them come up to me after walking down that NDPA aisle in the exhibit hall and talking to so many people and seeing your banners up in the registration area and just the heartfelt emotions that they had and the understanding of this is why we do what we do. This is why we need to do a better job.
Even though they might be doing a good job, things can always happen. So to me, it still gives me goosebumps to really think about all the comments we heard last year about just how amazing it was. And that's the important thing about these collaborations and partnerships.
[00:39:05] Speaker A: Well, and I will say, Julian, I think that's why you and I worked so long to try and make this happen. Because, you know, what's interesting about NDPA, I mean, we have so many different sectors we serve, I think is the right way to say it because there's so many, from healthcare to first responders to policymakers and communities, to public health officials, to coalitions around the country, we're all trying to get water safety information out there. But, you know, I was so excited to bring our two events together just for that reason, because the aquatic professionals already care about this. Right. And it's, it's that further collaboration and connection. I mean, if one, you know, facility operator walked down that aisle in the exhibit hall, met with one family foundation and have, you know, use their materials, you know, shared the story, you know, collaborated, that's a huge win in my book.
[00:40:05] Speaker C: Yeah, and that's what it's, that's what it's all about.
[00:40:09] Speaker A: Yeah, totally. Well, Julene, let's. I'm going to give you our final question of the podcast, which is I am handing you our famous figurative water safety magic wand, and you could change one thing in water safety, big or small, what would that one thing be?
[00:40:28] Speaker C: I think one of the biggest things is that I would really love to have one for every county, every state, every community, have one standard of care in the industry for water safety. In people's backyards, going to pools or at camps, requirements that are put in place, rules and regulations, policies and procedures, the same types of layers of protection for backyard pools, and just having the support on a federal level for everybody that we're all, all those layers of protection have to be put into place, whatever they may be, because my goal would be to never have another drowning happen again.
Do we say that's possible? Who knows? But I think that would be the biggest thing that I'd like to see in my lifetime, that we come down to a very, you know, state of the art. Everybody has to do this. So we don't have school districts that are doing their own thing or community pools that are doing their own thing or supervisors that can say, no, we're not going to do this because it's not required. Because their only time they're doing it is when it's required by law. Because I didn't do that. I just was deposed on a case and they didn't even ask me about the entire situation. They were trying to come after me and make me not look like an expert. They're like, well, who do you call? I'm like, people call me. They're like, yeah, but who do you call and ask questions to? I'm like, people call me. So it's, you know, they were trying, that's all they were doing is trying to get me disqualified as an expert. It didn't matter that somebody drowned in their facility with their clients.
They didn't even mention that at all. So my passion came out and I was like, this is so disgusting. We're not even talking about what's at hand to change it so it never happens again. We're talking about so you don't have to pay out any money, so let's try and disqualify me. And that shouldn't be the way it is. So having those rules and regulations and policies and procedures that are in place, this is the way you do it. You can't not do it. That would be a perfect world for me right now.
[00:42:45] Speaker B: I was just going to say, Adam, your magic wand wishes I'm holding up. Even though this is an audio, the action plan, and that's contained in there in about six or eight different ways. So other people, smart people, are consistent with you and share your magic wand wish.
[00:43:06] Speaker C: Fantastic.
[00:43:07] Speaker A: Well, and I was just going to say, from a policy perspective, this has been one of our biggest challenges. But Alan was central to getting the Virginia Graham Baker pool and Spa Safety act passed. I remember I was at my very early days in the profession, but you heard some kicking and screaming from people in aquatics and in the pool and spa industry. This is going to irreparably harm the industry. The cost of having to change every pool drain out and every little piece with it. I don't know of a single facility that shut down because of EGB, they changed their pool drains and kept operating, and it created a safer environment. And I'm sure, Alan, you know, all the, you know, pieces of having and the challenges of sometimes lobbying for those types of regulations because we are, in many ways, an anti regulation country, and there's a. There's a big stem of that in our country. But I point to VGB. It made pool safer. It really did. We haven't had a single, you know, fatality from an entrapment since VGB was passed in a public pool.
[00:44:21] Speaker B: Yeah, it's a perfect example of exactly what Julene was talking about. A consistent, across the board standard instead of something different in her community in the District of Columbia and so forth, if it weren't science backed solution. So it's a good way to sprinkle some fairy dust here. Julene, that's a good magic wand suggestion.
[00:44:45] Speaker A: Absolutely. Well, Jolene, thank you so much for joining us on the Water Safety Champions podcast. You are a true water safety champion, and we are thrilled, I personally am thrilled to get to work with you on a regular basis. And if you haven't yet checked out the 2024 AOAP NDPA conference, you can go to AOAP's website, which is aquaticpros.org, or you can check out ndpa.org dot watersafetyconference.com, and they'll all lead you to the conference. We've got an amazing lineup of speakers, exhibitors, attendees in Reno, Nevada, February 12 to the 15th at Grand Sierra Resort. I'm super excited. It's going to be a fantastic event, and we hope you all check it out and join. If you join AOEP and NDPA as a member, you can get an exclusive member discount for joining or attending the conference. So, Jolene, thank you so much. Allen is my co host. Thank you. We'll see you on our next episode of the Water Safety Champions podcast. Until then, stay safe out there.
