The “SOS Sink or Swim” program seeks to teach every Talbot County child under 15 to swim. Photo by Richard Carson/Carsonphotos.com
The Miles River Yacht Club Foundation has made grants totaling $33,270 in its Spring 2014 grants cycle to seven organizations offering youth-oriented competitive sailing, boating and swimming, and other maritime educational programs. In its first three years of grant-making, the Foundation has supported 21 Chesapeake Bay area non-profit organizations with $134,292 in grants.
Receiving support are St. Michaels Community Center for the MRYC Foundation’s signature “SOS Sink or Swim” program offering scholarships to children to learn to swim at the Bay Hundred Community Pool; Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum for general support of its youth sailing program; Annapolis Community Boating for student scholarships for its “Spirit of America” camp exposing children to the Chesapeake Bay; Midshore Riverkeeper Conservancy for 300 scholarships to its “Waste in Our Waterways” elementary school program; Miles River Yacht Club Junior Sail Camp for three 420 sailboats; Dorchester County YMCA for four scholarships for the Chesapeake Science Investigators Camp at Horn Point Laboratory; and Sultana Education Foundation for its sailing educational program on board the 1768 Schooner Sultana for students from seven schools in Dorchester and Talbot counties.
Grants have been given in prior grant cycles to Chesapeake Region Accessible Boating (CRAB), Freedom Rowers, YMCA of the Chesapeake, Girl Scouts of the Chesapeake Bay, MRYC Marlins Swim Team, Phillips Wharf Environmental Center, Easton High School Navy JROTC, Horn Point Laboratory, Del-Mar-Va Council of the Boy Scouts of America, Critchlow Atkins Childrens Center, St. Mary’s College of Maryland sailing team, Miles River Sail and Power Squadron, Gunston School rowing program, and Pickering Creek Audubon Center.
The MRYC Foundation receives support from several hundred individuals, businesses, companies and foundations, and from its Spring and Fall annual fundraising events. It also has established an endowment fund and planned giving program.
Elementary school students clean up the Chesapeake Bay as part of the Midshore Riverkeeper Conservancy’s “Waste in our Waterway” elementary school program.
