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New American Red Cross Course is a Life Saver

American Red Cross and Allen Pool Resources to Create Web-based Water Safety Training

SALT LAKE CITY (September 20, 2010) — Most business training courses are implemented to save money or to save time. A new training course is being implemented to save something more valuable – people’s lives. The American Red Cross has teamed up with Allen Communication Learning Services to produce custom training courses that takes a proactive approach in reducing the number of water related deaths.

Each year in the United States, more than 3,500 people die from accidental drowning and water related accidents. This is an average of about ten deaths per day. Sadly, many of these deaths could have been prevented had there been enough certified rescue responders available. To try to reverse the trend, the American Red Cross and Allen collaborated to produce an online version of the Red Cross’ highly successful Basic Water Rescue and Small Craft Safety (BWRSCS) courses.

“Allen is pleased to work with The American Red Cross, an internationally recognized and respected emergency response and rescue organization,” said Ron Zamir, CEO of Allen. “The Red Cross deals with life and death situations, which leaves no room for error in their certification training. We’re appreciative that Allen’s long record of effective adult learning solutions has earned their confidence.”

The BWRSCS has been one of the Red Cross’ most popular training programs, especially among youth camps and activity programs. “The American Red Cross Small Craft Safety Course is one of the most comprehensive safety courses for teaching supervision and emergency response for a watercraft program,” said —Rhonda Mickelson, Director of Standards for the American Camp Association. “This course can help prepare your staff in the planning and implementation of safe watercraft programs—from equipment selection and appropriate instruction to responding to emergency situations.”

Unfortunately, the traditional classroom course format severely limited the courses availability and restricted the number of people that could attend and complete their certification. Recognizing the dire impact of these limitations, the Red Cross investigated online options that could reach more potential learners.

Allen worked closely with the Red Cross to design an engaging, learner-friendly online version of the BWRSCS course that effectively teaches the skills necessary to complete the certification process. The online courses utilizes custom illustrations, coupled with short video clips, to deliver clear and informative content while ensuring a clean, welcoming environment for learners who may be new to online courses.

Since the new Red Cross training courses are available to anyone with a computer, it is accessible to more people and is far more convenient than the classroom version. More learners mean more certified lifeguards and rescue workers in or around the water. The Red Cross hopes this will translate into fewer water related accidents and deaths.

Contact your local chapter of the Red Cross for more information or to register for training.


About the American Red Cross

The American Red Cross shelters, feeds and provides emotional support to victims of disasters; supplies nearly half of the nation’s blood; teaches lifesaving skills; provides international humanitarian aid; and supports military members and their families. The Red Cross is a charitable organization — not a government agency — and depends on volunteers and the generosity of the American public to perform its mission. For more information, please visit www.redcross.org or join our blog at http://blog.redcross.org.

About AllenComm

For three decades, the learning and development experts at Allen Communication Learning Services () have helped many of the world’s largest companies sharpen their organizational performance. Allen expands their client’s capabilities by using progressive approaches in custom training, e-learning, and blended learning development, as well as learning portal development and technologies. This bold approach results in highly-customized organizational training solutions that help departments scale and achieve more, while improving ROI.