Swimming Success Swimming Lessons

I usually just go to Unilocal to read reviews but I decided to write a review about this company to warn others that if you book a swimming lesson with this company and decide to change the time for any reason, do not expect to get an email reply or an answer from the company phone number. Just like a previous review that I have read, this company is VERY POOR WITH COMMUNICATION.
I recently booked an 8 session swimming lesson for my child and realized that the time slot that I booked for the lessons was too early and I wanted to change it to a later time. I checked the website to make sure that the time I wanted was available and it was. I called the company using the number that was listed on the website. All I got was a recorded message stating to email the website to better get a hold of them. I emailed the company numerous times to request for a swimming lesson time change but I never received a reply back after three days. I eventually received a call return within a few days but, by that time, the time slot that I originally wanted to change it to was taken. I cancelled the swimming lesson and received a full refund.

Swimming Success guarantees success. I was referred by a friend and at first skeptical at learning to swim in 8 days but figured at least he can learn to dog paddle or float so he won’t drown. I have taken my then 5YO to local YMCA and had him get acquainted to water with various float/​float suits but he would refused to go in anywhere that he cannot touch the bottom. So come first day, a lot of whimpering and «no thank you». Then 2^nd day no more whimpering. In fact 2^nd day, he was excited to go. Then by 3^rd day, he was kicking ans waving his way from one end to another and I realized that they weren’t kidding about 8 days guarantee. I was just assuming that this would be get acquainted with water but no this was really learn to swim. By the 4^th day, my 5YO jumped off from diving board and swam to the shallow end on his own, and there was no doubt in my mind. By last day, he has learned how to do freestyle and backstroke and have swam entire length of the pool many times. And as a reward he got to go on the slide.
I am stern parent so my son knew he couldn’t whine his way out of the lesson. I saw couple parents hang out around the corner, out of sight, during the lesson. Lesson is 25 minutes long and there’s barely any downtime except to catch a quick breath. It seems like there a set regiment to builds on from kicking with head up, then kicking with head down, then kicking with head down as kid is pushed toward the wall to kick on his own… and instructor keep on building up until the kid is able to swim on his own. Throughout the build up, kids gain confidence by swimming toward the wall on his own or jumping into the water and swimming toward the instructor. My son was able to go apply what he learned right away and enjoyed rest of the summer in the pool unrestrained. By his next summer, he was able to dive to the bottom of 8 ½ ft pool and comfortable at deep end.
As many people said, this is by far the best money spent. My friend who referred me had her 3 kids in YMCA swim class but they were not really learning anything. With Swimming Success 2 of them learned in 8 days, and 1 took 10 days.
I live close by so we went to Katie’s home near CV Park. Pool is nice and heated so kids are comfortable. You do need 8 straight days at a set time. Make sure you get there bit early so your kid can start right away. Bring water. There is plenty of parking. Beginners are not allowed to use swim goggle. And hit pool right away so your child will get to use what he learned and retain and improve his skills.
I have recommended Swimming Success to everyone I know, especially people who have sent their kids to YMCA and did not succeed. YMCA works for some kids but not all. I firmly believe that Swimming Success works for all kids. My younger one will go through the class as soon as he’s big enough.

I never give bad reviews but I just had to communicate my bad experience with this course. It is definitely not customer service driven. Off the bat, my 4 year old daughter was placed with an instructor that she did not like but it was too late and decided to go through with it. She was in a pool full of crying children and was more distracted than anything. By the 8^th day, she was still crying and when pushed off the edge would sink to the bottom. The only thing she got out of the 8 day program was kicking for a short 3 seconds under the water. The instructor didn’t seem to know what to say to me, he just told me she didn’t pass and to contact Karalynne for continued lessons. I reached out to her after her last session (told her that my daughter didn’t want the same instructor) and she didn’t get back to me for a week and said she only had one time slot available, basically take it or leave it. I told her she couldn’t do that time slot and that it was ridiculous that she didn’t have anything else open for the rest of the summer. She told me she had a spot open on July 25^th at a reasonable time, but when I confirmed on July 27^th, she tells me that she only had the original instructor she didn’t like, I said no. Then I tried asking for lessons again on Aug 3^rd, she tells me yes for the following week with a different instructor. We happened to leave to Palm Springs that day and were willing to leave early to make it to the lesson, until she emails me that day to tell me she filled it with a paying student. I was so disappointed but kept asking for lessons, but all she said she had for makeups was Scott. How am I not a paying customer for her to change on me the last minute? Do not expect to get continued lessons a) with a different even if your kid didn’t like original instructor b) at a time that is reasonable for you. Horrible communication all around, I should have read all the negative reviews here on Unilocal

Omg amazing! My 4 year old was afraid to get his eyes wet but within 1 lesson with Mackenzie he was putting his face in. Day 3 he was swimming by himself! I’m thrilled and we still have 5 more lessons to go!!!

These swimming lessons are by far the best thing I could have done for my son. Instructors are amazing with the kids and these kids do learn to swim.

This is by far the best $ 250 that I have spent ! Katie was my son’s swim instructor and she did an amazing job teaching my son swim! She was very hands on, friendly and patient with my son. Katie did not waste any time in the water. You will be happy with what Swimming Success has to offer. I am happy knowing that my son can finally swim! Yipee!

Never tried due to poor communication! Don’t leave people hanging just because you are busy!

Swimming Success is not for everyone. My child just finished an 8-​day course. She is 5yo (nearly 6). She was able to get in the water, but afraid to submerge her head and generally couldn’t swim. After 8 days, my objectives were met (she submerges now, can jump from the side and can kick and swing her arms), but she cannot put everything together and swim independently. Though she meets the objectives of Swimming Success (can jump into the pool and swim back — barely though!), I’m afraid the program may have caused more harm than good. The instructors are nice and do not yell at the kids. But despite being 1 – 1 lessons, the instruction is not individualized for your child. Their great pedagogical insight seems to consist of giving kids no choice — they must comply with their instructor. Clearly it works for many. But think CAREFULLY about whether this is a good idea for YOUR child. I knew it was a risk for me, but I really wanted her to start swimming. However, I wish I had listened to my gut. For example, I was amazed that on the 8^th day, when my daughter clearly is having trouble swimming on her own, they didn’t just focus on that. They insisted she jump from the side and swim to the instructor. It was obvious that even that was a stretch. But then, they forced her to jump from the diving board and swim to the side. It seemed unnecessary to me. Why move her to something scarier, when she’s barely competent at the predecessor task. My daughter was saying to Kate, «I’m scared. I don’t want to do this. Is the class almost over?» and generally stalling. And Kate finally looked serious and said «Jump in.» When she noticed that my child kept swimming to her rather than the wall, she went onto the diving board with her and forced her to jump knowing there was no one in the pool to help her. No acknowledgement of how scared she was, that this is hard and part of the process of swimming. No validation of her feelings. Swallowing lots of water gets a simple «Uh oh», or «Silly, billy! Keep your mouth closed». And then they keep going and your child does it because she has no choice. My daughter seems fine when the lesson is over. I don’t think she’s permanently scarred, and she really wants to learn to swim. My conclusion is that 8 days was not enough for her, and pushing her so far out of her comfort zone might have been harmful. And it turns out I signed her up for a summer camp with daily swim instruction. Their curriculum doesn’t guarantee anything, but doesn’t force kids, uses more fun and games and relies on her self-​motivation. It will take longer, but after this experience, I’m certain that I want my child to learn at her own pace in an environment that’s more fun.

My almost 5 year old has done this program twice each of the last two summers and again last week. The program and consecutive days accomplishes more than any other swim lessons I’ve tried.
That said, the program has gone downhill. It used to be taught by college competitive swimmers on college break and now it feels like Karalynne wants to teach more kids each session and so is using less experienced teachers. Twice i’ve signed up looking for a male teacher as my son horses around and twice I’ve been switched to other teachers prior to the first lesson. This year I got a sweet girl graduating high school who was too nice. My son tends to do better with the guys or tough girls — Kate is great if she’s available.
Karalynne has too many kids at one time now and this past summer banished my son and his high school teacher to the shallow end to learn to tread water. Um hello, he could cheat and stand up!!! Between this and changing teachers (by program not me) mid way through, this most recent session was a waste as the new teacher spent two sessions on learning how to kick before realizing my kid can swim freestyle.
All of that said, my son does learn a lot in a short time in spite of these problems. The reason I’m writing this review for 2 stars is because on day 6, one of the kids in the pool had diarrhea all in the pool. Instead of evacuating the pool, cleaning, shocking and allowing the chemicals to do their work, Karalynne scooped most (not all) of the poop out, poured a large bottle of chlorine in practically on top of my son and then seemed annoyed when my mom took him out with 10 min to go in the session. When my mom pointed to some remaining floating poop, she scooped it out with her hands onto the deck. Per the CDC, there are specific guidelines for public pools to follow to help stop kids from getting sick from water passed illness — for diarrhea you have to evacuate for at least 24 hours, put a specific formula of chemicals and clean the filter. Then you test to make sure the chemical levels are safe before re-​entry. With over 100 kids in this pool each day I think this is a serious oversight and probably something that happens a lot.

Swimming Success is the best swim program out there! I saw some of my friends’ posts about this and signed up my son. He is now water safe and knows how to swim halfway across the pool, tread water and float on his back for 40 seconds!
His teacher, Kelly, was amazingly patient with my son, who has a tendency to act like a goof. She was able to motivate him and challenge him to try to new skills in the pool. He loved going to class and «walking the plank”/going off the diving board. We were so happy to see him excited about swimming.
Last year, we tried swim lessons at a different school, but he was a year younger and the classes were on the weekends. This daily format really helps to reinforce the skills learned the previous day and builds on those. I think the combination of the daily lessons and the year difference in maturity really went a long way to help him feel comfortable in and around water.
I wish this was a year round program, but we’ll definitely be back for more next summer!

Swimming Success is truly worth every penny! I have a 2 year old daughter and a 5 year old son. Both of my kids did not know how to swim prior to Swimming Success, however by the 3^rd day, my son (who had a near drowning incident & was fearful of the pool) could jump off the diving board and swim the full length of the pool on his own. My daughter was also jumping off the diving board and swimming to the side of the pool. AMAZING! The instructors are awesome — I can’t say enough about them! I plan to enroll my kids next summer to reinforce their skills and learn more difficult swimming techniques.

I was looking for a swim school to take my 2.5 year old daughter to be water safe and to learn how to swim. Then my friend told me she takes her son to swimming success so I decided to go check it out. By the end of her sons lesson, I was online and booking a spot for my daughter… My daughter hated taking showers, she would scream bloody murder when I poured water on top of her head. She’s also very careless in the water, she would just fight with us so we can let go of her but had no clue what she was doing, until we took her to swimming success!!! She screamed in the beginning, but her swim instructor Sam did an AMAZING job!!! He’s sooo patient with her, like all of the other instructors, Today is her last day of class and she came such a long way… She swims to the edge of the pool when he drops her in the water, and these past couple of days she’s been running to the shower cause she no longer is scared of the water in her face!!! I’m soooo happy I found this place… Can’t wait till next summer to sign her up again!!!

I was going to wait until my son was done with his 8 lessons to write a review but whats the point, I’ve already received far more than I expected for the money and time invested.
My son just turned four and seemed to like the water until he fell into a friends jacuzzi 6 months ago. We saw it happen and I rushed over to pull him out but there is no doubt in my mind he would have drowned had I not been nearby. Apparently there was no doubt in his mind that he was knocking on deaths door either because after that he wouldn’t even let us wash his hair. It really bothered me to see a fear of water settling onto my son so I was determined to get him lessons this summer.
I thought private one-​on-​one lessons were a bit pricey and overkill compared to what I had as a kid but I figured Swimming Success offered a guarantee so what the heck.
I have to be honest, if your kid is terrified of water, you better have a strong stomach. My wife came home crying after the first lesson so I took him for lesson two to see what was going on and after 25 minutes of listening to my son scream I was almost in tears as well. But something funny happened. My son screamed the whole lesson and had a terrified look in his eye but when the lesson was over, he hopped out and looked happy as a clam. I knew at that point he wasn’t hurt or haunted in anyway permanent so I took him home and we practiced swimming on the living room floor and most important, closing his mouth and holding his breath while under water. He seemed to have fun and I crossed my fingers for day three.
This is getting long so lets just say it went so well that we went to the Rose Bowl Aquatic center yesterday and I was actually getting nervous because he kept jumping in the pool and holding his head underwater. He’s not what I’d call a swimmer by any means but he has five lessons left and like I said, I’ve already got my moneys worth.
Thanks swimming success for giving me my water loving son back, along w/​some life saving skills to boot!

I had heard about Swimming Success from a friend who took her son there last summer. I had not planned in advance to sign my son up, but by pure luck, they had a last minute cancellation and my son started lessons two days ago.
I have been taking my son every summer to the Rose Bowl Aquatic Center since he was 9 months old (he is almost 6 now). It was a great place to get him comfortable in the water and slowly, he was beginning to swim on his own.
During his first lesson at Swimming Success (two days ago), he was swimming across the width of the pool on his own. On the second day (yesterday), he was diving (not just jumping) off of the diving board and swimming across the length of the pool. Today’s day three and I can’t wait to watch him again!
I would highly recommend this place. I will be enrolling my 3 year old next year. Just be sure to sign up early in March when enrollment opens.

My 5 year old son did lessons when he was three in Glendale at Pacific Pool (almost the whole summer) and didn’t learn to swim and for some reason when he was 4 years old he became really scared of the pool. He didn’t even want to get in.
I was really worried how am I going to get him in the pool for lessons. Right from the beginning he was saying, I’m not going to do it. Doug was his instructor and the first thing my son asked is are you going to drown me. Doug said No and then my son started trusting him. My son loved Doug. First day was hard but by the end of the 2^nd day he was so proud of himself. He was swimming on his own the 3^rd day.
8 days latter he is swimming, my husband and I can’t believe it. My son asked aren’t you proud of me, I can swim now.
I only wished I would have signed up sooner so I could have done another sessions with Doug.
One tip, their website is slow when you sign up and click on the calendar it looks full but just give it a minute and then you will see the days not shaded out are openings. Click on one of those days.

8 days of Swim Success with any of the fantastic instructors is the only way to ensure your little one is water safe. The staff and technique are fantastic and will guarantee your child to be water safe in 8 days. The atmosphere is calm, the pool is clean and the staff is excited to work with your child. We look forward to a refresher this summer and hope to be back in the future for our second child.

I was really skeptical about the guarantee-​that by the end of the lessons my five-​year-​old daughter would be water-​safe and be able to jump off the diving board and swim to the edge of the pool by herself. My daughter has hated having water poured over her head (to rinse out shampoo) since she was a baby.
My daughter did lessons a couple of times at rose bowl aquatic center and I felt like she wasn’t advancing very quickly and was still fearful of the water. Granted these were group classes once a week. I think that what really sets swimming success apart is that the lessons are every day for eight days in a row, and each student gets a teacher of his/​her own. My daughter can’t wait to go back, and her best friend just signed up for classes.

My oldest daughter learned to swim with Swimming Success and we are getting ready to bring our two younger children there. My daughter loved her teacher and couldn’t wait to go to her lesson every day. We had tried months of group swim classes since she was a baby but it only took a few days at Swimming Success for it to «click.» She was swimming with such confidence by the end of the session.

I can’t say enough positive things about Swimming Success – I have an older daughter who had had two years of private swim lessons in our own pool, and STILL couldn’t swim. I was about to send her to summer camp and was nervous that she still was a poor swimmer. A friend recommended Swimming Success to me and my daughter was swimming by the 2^nd day! I was thrilled! It took them two days to accomplish what the other swim lessons couldn’t do in two years! She ended up taking swim here for three years.
My son is signed up for his fourth summer of taking the lessons, and I can’t say enough positive things about them. In my experience the teachers have been incredibly kind and caring (he has had the same wonderful teacher every year!), and while they do tell the children they need to do certain things, it is never in a mean or unkind way.
Both my children love to swim and spend all summer in the pool, so I am thrilled that they have gained such incredible skills at Swimming Success!

My 4 year old did swimming success in the Summer of 2013. I was warned in advance by parents that recommended it to me that it’s intense and there may be kicking and screaming, but walk away and let the instructors do their thing. Thankfully, my child did not do any of the kicking and screaming BUT she was very scared and there were a few tears.
Her instructor made her feel very comfortable and was super positive. I felt that she was very experienced and comfortable working with kids. This isn’t your 8 week 2 times per week 40 mins per class type of instruction. This is intense (about 25 min per class) BUT totally worth it. I did the traditional classes with my oldest child and although they were helpful, it took more time for him to learn. My youngest that did this class had never done traditional classes. I introduced her to swimming and got her comfortable in the water (blow bubbles, stick head in, etc) prior to swimming success but couldn’t teach her to swim myself.
Although the primary focus was safety (swim to a wall), my child was able to swim the length of the pool by the 6^th day. I was BLOWN AWAY! I would strongly recommend it. If you have a child that may be anxious or you yourself are anxious, just sit on the deck and watch from above. Your child FEELS your anxiety.
One small negative… it runs one class to the next. As soon as your child is coming out, another one is coming in. There is a bit of a «factory» like feeling which I wasn’t too thrilled about BUT I can’t take a star away for that small thing. MY CHILD LEARNED HOW TO SWIM IN 8 DAYS!
No more jumping into pools at play dates for this mom. :)