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LJ 21 Integrate Life Jacket Education into K-12 Water Safety Programming

Key area

Life Jackets

Integrate education that meets national minimum life jacket educational standards into K-12 water safety programming.

Spectrum level: Strengthening Individual Knowledge and Skills

Evidence level: Medium

Implementation levels: Community County National State

Rationale:

Knowledge related to correct use of life jackets is an important aspect of water competency and should be included as part of water safety programming for K-12.

Anticipated Impact:

After implementing this recommendation, you can expect to experience the following outcomes.

  • A standard instructional curriculum leads to systematically reach a large number of students in K-12 education settings.
  • A standard instructional curriculum leads to more accurate and consistent access to water safety skills and messaging.
  • A standard instructional curriculum leads to a decrease in drownings in both boating and non boating situations.

Evidence:

Water safety literature identifies life jackets as an essential part of water competence, and recommends that life jackets are promoted, that instructions on, and practice with proper fit and wear are provided, that donning should be practiced in all programs, and that all water competencies should be practiced with a life jacket. Additionally, life jacket competence, with practice, should be incorporated into programs that focus on swim and survival skills training. There is evidence that having the experience of practicing skills with a life jacket can dramatically change perceptions (of risks and benefits).

Research suggests that life jacket education messages should be standardized consistently across the field and safety instructions should be specific to individual boat types. Stakeholders identified varying information and the lack of consistent and accurate training for swim instructors as issues. Additionally, there is evidence that many canoers and kayakers receive no formal or informal instruction on life jacket wear.

Successful education interventions are: - Specific in their content - Targeted in their reach - Delivered in settings appropriate to the target age groups - Contained information tailored to the specific devices provided. - Stakeholders suggested schools as an important place for education about life jackets, and research indicates hands-on kinesthetic learning (e.g. putting on a life jacket) creates familiarization and muscle memory. Results from the ambassador component of the Kids Don’t Float Program in Alaska found that children respond favorably when a teen is teaching water safety and modeling life jacket wear in a classroom

Increasing life jacket wear requires: - Consistent messaging - Role modeling - Pediatricians discussing life jackets with families, as water safety education is often taught by families, and families may not have institutional knowledge. - Educating about the benefits and appropriate uses of different life jacket types - Using a personal flotation device (PFD) instead of air-filled swim aids

Educators in safety, lifesaving, and swimming increasingly agree that promoting the use of life jackets in non-boating-related activities is needed. However, it is important to ensure all caregivers are aware of the proper level of supervision required near any body of water, stressing that life jackets are not a substitute for appropriate supervision. Future studies should evaluate effective ways to increase life jacket use through boating safety courses, use in swimming lessons, and other education and training programs.

Evidence Sources:

Stallman R.K., Moran K., Quan L., & Langendorfer S. (2017). From swimming skill to water competence: Towards a more inclusive drowning prevention future. International Journal of Aquatic Research and Education, 10(2) Article 3, 1-35. https://doi.org/10.25035/ijare.10.02.03

Moran K. (2019) Can you float? Part 2 - Perceptions and practice of lifejacket use among young adults. International Journal of Aquatic Research and Education, 11(3) Article 4. https://doi.org/10.25035/ijare.11.03.04

World Health Organization. (2017). Preventing drowning: an implementation guide. https://www.who.int/publications/i/item/preventing-drowning-an-implementation-guide

Cox K.L., Bhaumik S., Gupta M., & Jagnoor J. (2022). Facilitators and barriers of life jacket use for drowning prevention: Qualitative evidence synthesis. Journal of Safety Research, Feb(80), 135-147. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jsr.2021.11.010

Bennett E., Cummings P., Quan L., & Lewis F.M. (1999). Evaluation of a drowning prevention campaign in King County, Washington. Injury Prevention, 5,109-113. http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/ip.5.2.109

Wallis B.A., Watt K., Franklin R.C., Taylor M., Nixon J.W., & Kimble R.M. (2015). Interventions associated with drowning prevention in children and adolescents: systematic literature review. Injury Prevention, 21(3), 195-204. https://doi.org/10.1136/injuryprev-2014-041216

Ramos W., Beale A., Chambers P., Dalke S., Fielding R., Kublick L., Langendorfer S., Lees T., Quan L., & Wernicki P. (2015). Primary and secondary downing interventions: The American Red Cross circle of drowning prevention and chain of drowning survival. International Journal of Aquatic Research and Education, 9(1), 89-101. https://doi.org/10.25035/ijare.09.01.08

Quan L. (2014). Personal flotation devices. In J. Bierens (Ed), Drowning Prevention, Rescue, Treatment (2nd ed, pp. 225-229). Springer-Verlag. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-04253-9_33

Quan L, & Gilchrist J. (2022). The epidemiology and prevention of drowning. Boulton M.L., & Wallace R.B.(Eds.), Maxcy-Rosenau-Last Public Health & Preventive Medicine (16th ed.). McGraw Hill. https://accessmedicine.mhmedical.com/content.aspx?bookid=3078&sectionid=257531213

Quan L., Bennett E., Cummings P., Trusty M.N., & Treser C.D. (1998). Are life vests worn? A multiregional observational study of personal flotation device use in small boats. Injury Prevention, 4, 203-205. http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/ip.4.3.203

Stempski S., Schiff M., Bennett E., & Quan L. (2014). A case-control study of boat-related injuries and fatalities in Washington state. Injury Prevention, 20(4), 232-237. https://doi.org/10.1136/injuryprev-2013-041022

McKnight J.A., Becker W.W., Pettit A.J., & McKnight S.A. (2007). Human error in recreational boating. Accident Analysis and Prevention, 39. 398-405. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.aap.2006.09.004

Moran K., Quan L., Franklin R., & Bennett E. (2011). Where the evidence and expert opinion meet: A review of open water recreational safety messages. International Journal of Aquatic Research and Education, 5(3), 251-270. https://doi.org/10.25035/ijare.05.03.05

Outdoor Foundation. (2019). Special report on paddlesports and safety. https://americancanoe.org/wp-content/uploads/documents/sei-educationalresources/2019specialreporton_paddl.pdf

Mangione T. (ed). (2021). Summary of suggestions for increasing life jacket use. Unpublished survey notes from online survey conducted with persons indicating interest in life jackets via https://www.watersafetyusa.org/nwsap.html

Bauer M.E., Giles A.R., Marianayagam J., & Toth K.M. (2020) Kids don’t float…and their parents don’t either: using a family-centered approach in Alaska’s kids don’t float program. International Journal of Aquatic Research and Education, 12 (4), Article 9, 1-5. https://doi.org/10.25035/ijare.12.04.09

High Risk Populations Addressed:

Populations whose risk of drowning decreases the most with the implementation of this recommendation may have one or more of the following characteristics.

  • Children who are at risk due to a lack of knowledge and resources in their communities
  • Teachers, caregivers, health aides, and other secondary audience members
  • Individuals with disabilities

Evaluation Metrics:

Indicators of long-term impact:

  • Increased number of trainers and students taught
  • Increased number of classrooms reached
  • Increased number of partners utilizing an accredited national education standard for life jackets
  • Increased number of states and school districts requiring a water safety curriculum inclusive of life jacket content
  • Increased number of courses reviewed and audited
  • Normalization of life jacket use
  • Decrease in drowning rates

Indicators of intermediate impact:

  • Increased observation of life jacket wear rates among boaters and swimmers using existing methodology
  • Expanded life jacket wear surveys to include swimming areas.
  • Increased evaluations (test scores, and instructor surveys)
  • Knowledge and behavior change
  • Knowledge and behavior retention

Indicators of initial impact:

  • Curriculum established through the National Association of State Boating Law Administrators (NASBLA) Education Standards Panel
  • Curriculum developed based on national standards
  • Dissemination of new standards to partners nationwide
  • Evaluation of students and instructor surveys begin to be collected.

Implementation:

Consider the following to ensure successful implementation:

  • Integrate with education recommendations from the Water Safety, Water Competency, and Swimming working group, recognizing the need to also focus on supervision, barriers, and other layers of protection.
  • Prioritize school based curriculum given the large numbers of children who never learn to swim in formal programs.
  • Accredit the curriculum based on American national standards to include guidelines for boating and non-boating activities, in water, and, or on dry land. -Suggest including in learn-to-swim curriculums that students practice controlling buoyancy both with and without flotation aids, allowing children who have only been in water in puddle jumpers to feel effects of water without one.
  • Consider that hands-on education is important in both dry-land and in-water environments.
  • Emphasize the importance and value of dry-land instruction when in-water instruction is unavailable.
  • Focus on life jacket use for both boating and non-boating activities.
  • Evaluate the developed educational program before it becomes widely adopted.
  • Evaluate long-term retention of knowledge and skills to determine appropriate intervals for retraining, refreshing, and reinforcing use. -Build off of the experience of those teaching other injury areas in schools. Dr. Michael Tipton talks about the value of school-based education for drowning prevention on a podcast called Life Solved.
  • Enforce and encourage more widespread use of life jacket education within swim lessons at the National level. Swimming in a life jacket offers a different technique, and benefit.
  • Encourage the American Academy of Pediatrics to review current language and position on life jacket use
  • Create education programs utilizing American standards to educate consumers on life jacket types, their specific uses, proper fit, and inspecting for serviceability for both boating and non-boating water recreation at the state and local levels.
  • Integrate with a school’s in-classroom curriculum and swim lessons at the local, county, and state levels.
  • Consistently include messaging that life jackets do not replace the need for supervision and should be considered one layer of protection
  • Teach water competency in home schools, camps, and other settings as well.
  • Explore different options for implementation through school districts that currently employ water safety and learn-to-swim education. Some school districts have this built in at multiple grades with different skills and foci such as 3rd, 6th and 9th grade. The Wenatchee, WA school district, for example, requires a swim test in 9th grade and then helps the kids who fail the test to learn how to swim.
    • Emphasize the grassroots ownership of this curriculum and the standards, while highlighting fidelity of use of the standard, and tracking.
  • Address the learning styles, and developmental stages of different age spans, of the K-12 age group.

Challenges to Implementation:

When implementing this recommendation, you might encounter challenges related to the following factors.

  • Until the development of a national minimum educational standard for life jacket education is developed, efforts to integrate into K-12 water safety programming should follow current best practices
  • Messaging around flotation aids vs puddle jumpers vs U.S. Coast Guard (USCG) approved life jackets may be difficult to streamline.
  • Puddle jumpers are not standardized, sometimes used as instructional devices, and often people believe they lessen the need for supervision, which is incorrect. Changing the perceptions of puddle jumpers as instructional tools and a substitute for supervision may be a challenge.
  • Overcoming the perception that a USCG-approved life jacket automatically turns a child face up will be a challenge.
  • The lack of a Federal agency in charge of drowning prevention and water safety may make the development of a national standard difficult. -Overcoming the perception that life jacket education can only be taught in water may be a challenge.
  • Ensuring that educators do not only focus on boating uses for life jackets, and also educate about non-boating applications, may be a challenge. -School adoption of curricula related to water safety may be difficult.
  • Helping schools overcome barriers to including this education (time, budget, and manpower restraints, providing teachers training, etc.) may be a challenge.

Potential Facilitators:

The following factors might facilitate the implementation of this recommendation.

  • Explore and build upon programs like Kids Don’t Float in Alaska, which includes an education program for elementary students, an ambassador program for high schoolers to teach youth and engage the community as youth leaders, and a training program for local partners such as caregivers, camp counselors, paddling instructors, etc.
  • Partner with USCG Auxiliary, local and state drowning prevention task forces, networks and coalitions, Safe Kids Worldwide, National Drowning Prevention Alliance, America’s Boating Club, etc.
  • Education efforts should be in conjunction with mandatory wear, communications, access, technology, and enforcement.

GAP Recommendation:

Note: We chose to embed the need for evaluation as an integral part of the Action Recommendation vs also calling it out as a gap.

  • Track locations of courses taught to overlay location of drownings and study whether the victim had this education.

-Include evaluation of whether this standard curriculum changes behavior and the retention or re-education timeline to ensure information is retained and used.