# Trying to start a kids program at the club



## Kiltmadoc (Nov 10, 2009)

My yacht club has many old salts, but a decent few of us have kids. The club also has 4 capri 14's The regatta committee has asked me and one other member to come up with a way to get the kids in the club more involved as well as use the capri's more than once per week (there's an intermittent tuesday night race series with them). Anyway, if anyone here has successfully run a kids & parents boating program, or just a kids program, I would love to hear some ideas. 

One thought i had was to have several weekend days where kids and parents would just cruise around the harbor with a tender boat available for the ones who get trapped or lost while playing with the boats.


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## SailingStNick (Dec 13, 2006)

Kids Summer Camp. One or two weeks of programs. All sorts of ways to do it - either all day all ages, or younger kids a.m. and older kids p.m. Then hold races at the end of the two weeks with a big party for everyone, including parents, grandparents, siblings, etc.

May even add a couple of evenings of family classes for adults new to sailing.

You'll probably want to get certified from US Sailing as it makes it look better for your club, and you learn so much about safety and how to run the course. Teenagers can get certified as well. Hopefully there are a few teens or college age kids that want a summer job running such a camp.


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## QuickMick (Oct 15, 2009)

might be fun to schedule weekly races, maybe one adult in each boat and some kiddos--but every week have the kids switch boats so they can make new friends?

if you want to keep it non competitive you might want to dub it a 'geocaching club,' check out this site, really pretty cool idea.

Geocaching - The Official Global GPS Cache Hunt Site


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## sailingdog (Mar 19, 2006)

Finding geocaches that are on the water would be a very cool thing to do with the kids. They don't even have to be real "physical" geocaches, but visual or informational ones.


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