Peter Thompson, executive director of the Youth and Family Counseling Agency of Oyster Bay-East Norwich (YFCA) and Luiz Torres of the Centro Cultural Hispanica announced they are teaming up with The Waterfront Center (WFC) for a summer scholarship program for children in Oyster Bay. Scholarship recipients will learn how to sail and explore the marine life in the bay this summer.

Mr. Thompson said, "Every person should have some skills of what to do while being on the water by nature of the location of Oyster Bay. Everyone should be able to swim, have a boat and sail in it," he said.

Scholarships for families with financial needs are being offered for all of The Waterfront Center's summer programs including Waterfront Adventures, the Young Mariner's First Mate Program, and the Young Mariner's Skipper Program.

The one and two week summer programs (which can be taken consecutively) are open to boys and girls entering grades five though nine (up to grade 10 for Skipper program), and run from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Waterfront Adventures is a one-week program from July 7 to July 11 that is designed to introduce children to a variety of waterfront activities including dinghy or keelboat sailing, kayaking, fishing, rowing, and sailing aboard the oyster sloop Christeen.

The Young Mariner's First Mate and Skipper programs are two-week jaunts from June 30 - August 22 where students spend half their time learning to sail in dinghies, in 8-foot Optimist prams and 14-foot Sunfish. The other half of their day is spent aboard the oyster sloop Christeen setting and hauling oyster dredges and lobster traps, learning navigational skills and fishing. After gaining basic sailing skills in the First Mate Program students can advance to sailboat racing in the Skipper program.

Luiz Torres suggested that children could take advantage of the Centro Cultural Hispanica's new "Time Share Program." Children receiving scholarships or their parents would volunteer at The Waterfront Center doing needed chores to earn "time dollars" in exchange for part of the tuition.

"The Waterfront Center's mission is to provide access to all, so last year we were disappointed that very few families took advantage of our scholarship program generously sponsored by the Oyster Bay Sailing Foundation. This year we are going to the YFCA and Centro Cultural Hispanica to better connect to the people in town," said Rob Crafa, executive director of The Waterfront Center.

One possible reason for the lack of scholarships last year was that, for safety reasons, the Young Mariner's programs require children to have basic swimming skills. Gail Canavan, executive director at the Boys and Girls Club of Oyster Bay-East Norwich and Peter at YFCA, both expressed a need for swimming lessons at our local beaches.

"To enable students without basic swimming skills to participate, The Waterfront Center added the Waterfront Adventures program and we are exploring bringing formal swimming lessons back to Beekman Beach," said Rob Crafa.

The Waterfront Center is searching for funding for these scholarship and learn-to-swim opportunities. Anyone interested in participating in the Center's summer programs or sponsoring a scholarship student should contact Rob Crafa at 516-624-7900.