For many, learning how to swim is a rite of passage.

But a surprising number of American children can't swim.

Part of that comes down to access and restrictions rooted in racism that have kept generations of swimmers out of pools.

Isabella Jibilian of Rhode Island PBS explores the fight for swim safety.

RAY RICKMAN, Co-Founder, Stages of Freedom: One night phone call woman sobbing on the phone telling me that her child had drowned at five o'clock at Lincoln woods.

ISABELLA JIBILIAN: It was the early 90s and Ray Rickman was a Rhode Island State Representative.

It was that phone call from a grieving mother that sent Rickman on a new path, advocating for water safety.

RAY RICKMAN: She watched her son drown, she could not swim.

Can you imagine?

You can't imagine.

MARA GAY, New York Times Editorial Board: In the United States, an average of 11 people are drowning every day.

ISABELLA JIBILIAN: Mara Gay was an avid swimmer growing up.

Today, she's on the New York Times editorial board and has written about swim access and safety.

MARA GAY: So we're losing 4000 people a year to drowning.

It's the leading cause of death for children from one to four.

Drowning is something that affects Americans of all backgrounds.

However, it does disproportionately affect minorities.

ISABELLA JIBILIAN: According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Black children are 1.5 times more likely, and Native American children are two times more likely than white children to die of drowning.

Gay says for black Americans, that gap is rooted in slavery.

MARA GAY: So Black Americans, many people know we're not allowed to learn how to read during slavery.

Many times they also weren't allowed to learn how to swim.

And that's because it would have made it easier to escape to freedom.

Dogs couldn't track your scent in water, which was known among enslaved Americans.

During segregation you had public pools that were not open to black Americans.

ISABELLA JIBILIAN: Even after segregation ended, many black Americans were still unwelcome storyteller V Raffini grew up in Rhode Island.

V. RAFFINI, Rhode Island Black Storytellers: Pools weren't segregated but they were racist.

And when we got there, we dealt with the racism.

I can remember them calling us names like The Walking tool, or there's a Hershey bar in the in the pool.

And, you know, straight out coming out with the N word.

ISABELLA JIBILIAN: But intimidation wasn't the only way African Americans were driven out of pools.

MARA GAY: Many communities across the South but also elsewhere unfortunately, chose to fill in destroy or close their public pools rather than allow black Americans just swim in them, so white wealthier Americans who were able to start forming their own clubs, their own neighborhood associations that were of course segregated, and the rest of America was shut out.

ISABELLA JIBILIAN: Wayne Willis and his family are working to reverse that trend through their business Orca Aquatics.

His son Dylan coaches, the swim team, and his daughter Sydney and wife Joanna gives swim lessons.

Some of these students are able to learn for free thanks to former State Representative Ray Rickman.

RAY RICKMAN: Our number one goal is to teach now low income children to swim and to avoid drowning.

ISABELLA JIBILIAN: He started a program called Spoon Empowerment to sponsor swim lessons for black and low income youth.

2,600 children have learned to swim through the program so far.

MARA GAY: The reason so many Americans can't swim is because they don't have safe places to learn to do so.

Public pools are the critical piece of this puzzle.

So it would be the equivalent of calling for education for all Americans without having any schools.

ISABELLA JIBILIAN: In August, a chlorine explosion shut down the pool where orca aquatics holds its lessons until the damage is fixed.

They're teaching at a different pool, but have had to cut back swim lessons from seven days a week to three.

The shortage of pools in the area has inspired Ray Rickman to expand his mission.

RAY RICKMAN: A $20 million Olympic plus swimming pool for the people of Providence to come free to swim and we're going to get it done.

ISABELLA JIBILIAN: Rickman hopes that one day everyone in his community will have a place to swim.

For PBS News Weekend, I'm Isabella Jibilian in Providence Rhode Island.