Photography by Susan Jackson
Ruthie Zarren was on maternity leave from her job at Enron when the company imploded. “It was the best thing that ever happened to me,” she says.
She waited until her son was 4 years old before returning to the workforce. “I had been looking around for what I wanted to do,” Zarren says. “There are private swim clubs all over the country. I decided this is what I wanted to do. It fit my passions, which are water and children.”
She opened the first Little Fishes Swim School (155 Hanley Industrial, 314-647-7946, littlefishesswimschool.com) in 2008 with a single 9- by 17-foot in-ground pool. In January 2013, she moved the school to its current location in Brentwood, with three pools, all saltwater at a steamy 90 degrees. “Shivering is not your friend when you are trying to relax,” she says. Enrollment jumped to 1,500 kids per week. And this March, Zarren opened a second facility out west (17359 Edison, Chesterfield) with another three pools. The weekly classes are each 30 minutes long and cost $107 per month for weekdays, $117 per month for weekends, with a two-month commitment required.
For kids from 6 months to 3 years old, the parents accompany their offspring into the pool. For the older students, who are learning more complex strokes, parents wait behind a picket fence. The staffing ratio is two coaches to every five swimmers.
Toys are everywhere. There are ducks in every conceivable outfit, floating Thomas the Tank Engines, swimming Barbies and diving Kens, shark fins… “For kids to learn, they need to be engaged and have fun,” Zarren says. “We have 6-month-olds swimming underwater. And we are graduating 3- and 4-year-olds whose strokes are beautiful.”
Get Your Kids Swimming
Zarren notes a few tips to help convince your kids that being in and around the water is fun:
• The earlier you start, the earlier they will swim.
• The more children are in the water, the faster they will learn to swim.
• Get your kids used to having their faces and heads underwater. Absolutely, positively splash water in their faces so they get used to it.
