The 'Surf Bus' takes inner city kids from Los Angeles to the beach so they can learn how to surf and play!

SCAQ swimmer Bill I. sent me this article from Pete Thomas over at the L.A. Times regarding a very nice surfer named, Mary Setterholm, who has started a non profit to help inner city kids who in some cases have never seen the ocean to come out and play in it. Imagine living 10 miles from the sea and never having an opportunity to see or experience the ocean? Mary Setterholm couldn't live with that so she started the "Surf Bus." That is so cool!

Snippet from the article: "... At the South Seas House, about 40 children are kept orderly by activities director Carlton Stubbs. That's a condition they will not violate on this special morning.

Once on the bus, though, they loosen up. Many chatter and smile. A girl in the back hoists a sheet of white notebook paper with a smiling blue stick-figure and the lettering, "We Love Surfing."

Some, however, remain quiet, as if going off to war, so foreign and daunting is the mysterious ocean.

Stubbs, who has been involved with the L.A. Surf Bus for four years, says the program offers obvious physical benefits while enabling the children "to overcome fears of swimming and to discover the calming effects of the ocean. ..." [Link]

This is an amazing idea and an even bigger accomplishment in my opinion. Exposing inner city kids to the beautiful beaches we have here is very important on so many levels. Kids become motivated to swim, to surf, to see and experience beach culture with it's affluence and beauty, and to share it with people with different races and income brackets.

Believe me, it is way "outside their box." 50% of Los Angeles inner city kids will not graduate high school. I am certain that experiencing something this magic will make motivate many to learn how to swim and surf and by exposing them to something better could make a difference in school. It costs a lot of money to live near the beach.