June 18, 2025  | Makenzie Kellar

Whether your district has an elaborate waterpark on the property or a particularly large pond, water safety should always be considered as a part of your risk management policy. According to the CDC, every year in the United States there are over 4,000 unintentional drowning deaths. For districts with particularly young visitors, it’s also worth noting that more children between ages one and four years old die from drowning than any other cause of death.[MK1] 

One way to keep your guests from becoming part of these grim statistics is to hire a lifeguard, but anyone who has ever worked for an aquatics department can tell you that the process is more complicated than bringing on your average employee. When lives are on the line, a hiring manager can’t afford to make mistakes.

While I don’t usually include author’s notes in these articles, this is a topic near and dear to my heart. My mother worked as both a lifeguard and aquatics director, and alongside the usual motherly advice, mine also threw in the aforementioned drowning statistics and continuously warned me about the risks of children swimming in puddle jumpers. Clearly her words had the intended effect since my siblings all became certified lifeguards, and before I wrote articles about safety and risk management, I worked as a lifeguard, too.

So, let’s dive into what you should know when hiring a lifeguard: when you need one, what you want to look for in your candidates, and how to keep them rescue ready.

Do You Need a Lifeguard?

This answer varies depending on what the body of water is and what resources your district has at its disposal. It’s not reasonable to expect a district to post lifeguards all along the coast of a natural lake, especially if there’s not a designated swimming spot established by the district. However, for designated swimming spots, pools, waterparks, or any place where you can expect to find visitors swimming, a lifeguard is the way to go.

A good rule of thumb is that the more attractions, special features, or hazards your swimming area has, the more you need a lifeguard. If you know that a pool or water feature draws in crowds, that may also be your cue to get a lifeguard; accidents are more likely (and easy to miss) when lots of people are in and around the water at the same time.

Unfortunately, bringing on a lifeguard is an expense that not every district can afford. For many others, keeping lifeguards on the payroll year-round just doesn’t make sense. After all, how many people really want to go for a swim in the middle of winter?

In these cases, a decent compromise is to hire a seasonal lifeguard and post signage making it clear to the public whether a lifeguard is on duty or not, what hours they are on duty, and to call 911 if an incident occurs while one is not present. This helps ensure that guests fully understand the risk assumed by swimming with no lifeguard and can make an educated choice whether to proceed.

You can also post signs encouraging groups of swimmers to designate a “water watcher,” which is basically the aquatics equivalent of a designated driver. Encourage your guests to choose someone in the group who is an adult, can recognize the signs of a swimmer in distress, and can dial 911; and who is not under the influence of drugs or alcohol or easily distracted by their phone or other conversations to watch over other swimmers.[MK2] 

To sum it up, lifeguards are recommended for spaces where you know people will be swimming, at least during busy seasons like spring and summer. If you don’t have a lifeguard, at the very least post signage to make sure people know that there is none present and to remain cautious.

Lifeguard Hiring Considerations and Certifications

If your district does find itself in need of a lifeguard, it’s onto the hiring process! The basics of hiring still apply when choosing a lifeguard; you will want someone who is responsible, shows up to work on time, gets along with the rest of the team, etc.

However, you will want to be sure that they are properly certified as a lifeguard. Several organizations offer basic lifeguard certifications such as the Red Cross or YMCA. The process of earning a lifeguard certification will typically include certifying trainees in CPR, First Aid, and AED use, though you should always double check with the candidate as to which skills were specifically included in their certification.

If you have a waterpark or particularly deep or shallow water, check if their certification has equipped them to handle rescues in those areas or if additional trainings or certifications are required. Remember, lifeguarding certifications usually expire after two years. When you bring a certified lifeguard onto the team, it goes without saying to make sure that their certification is up to date.

So, once you’ve found a certified lifeguard, you’re all set to hire them, right? Wrong!

While a certification is meant to show that someone has achieved the base level of proficiency needed for the job, this isn’t always the case. You might have a candidate who is certified on paper but hasn’t been swimming in a year and a half and is sorely out of practice. Or you might find someone who only has experience lifeguarding smaller pools and can’t perform rescues in your pool’s deep end.

Whatever the case, you’ll want your candidate to be able to give you a practical demonstration of their skills. This can include a swim test where you make sure they have the endurance to swim a few laps in your pool without rest, active/passive victim rescues, or scanning the pool for dangers and weak swimmers. Choose tests for your candidate that will prove to you both that they’re capable of doing the job and that they can handle the nuances of your particular pool.

Once you have a someone who is properly certified and has proven to be a strong enough swimmer for the job, you’re ready to hire a lifeguard!

You Have a Lifeguard! Now What?

Though it may seem like the work is finished when the hiring process is, that is far from the truth. Even the most qualified new employees need some on the job training, and a lifeguard is no exception. Help your new hire become familiar with your facility’s emergency action plan and start by having a more experienced guard shadow their shifts until they’re ready to work on their own.

You will also want to ensure that your lifeguards are regularly getting the chance to practice the skills they need to make rescues, which they don’t often get on an average day at work. Typically, aquatics facilities will hold a monthly in-service meeting for this purpose. Though the additional focus on rescue skills may make running an in-service seem like an intimidating process, it essentially runs like your average staff meeting. Take the chance to go over new and changing pool rules, ask for feedback, and throw in a few rescues to keep your lifeguards sharp. If there’s a need for it, you can also use an in-service to go over other topics that your lifeguards may face that are not necessarily related to water safety, like mandatory reporting responsibilities.

Remember, it’s wonderful if your in-services are fun and engaging, but they should always be something your lifeguards take seriously. Remind them that each in-service is meant to give them the training they need to save lives, so staying focused in each meeting is incredibly important.

Even once the initial training and in-services are taken care of, you’ll want to keep tabs on your lifeguard as they go about their day-to-day work. During busy summer seasons, a lifeguard can easily become overstimulated, dehydrated, or develop a heat-related illness. Any one of these will impede a lifeguard’s ability to watch the water, so have your lifeguard take a break or put another guard in their place if you notice them struggling.

Other Water Safety Considerations

That just about covers the basics of bringing on a lifeguard, but having a lifeguard alone does not guarantee that visitors will stay safe in and around the water.

First, accidents in aquatics facilities don’t start and stop at the water. Slips, trips, and falls are a top cause of loss for many districts, and this risk is exacerbated greatly when you have a wet concrete pool deck and young swimmers insist on getting a running start for their cannonball. Make sure that both you and your lifeguards are paying attention visitor behavior in all parts of the facility and have rules in place to reduce risk.

Second, there’s very little a lifeguard can do if they do not have the proper equipment. Make sure that you have rescue tubes and well-stocked first aid kits that lifeguards can easily access in the event of an emergency. Also, having safety equipment such as lifejackets available will allow your guests to take precautions to keep themselves safe. Just be sure to do your research before purchasing equipment you’re unsure about (for instance, you don’t have to look far to find reasons not to buy puddle jumpers for your pool.[MK3]  Stick with the life jackets). If funding is an issue for your district, purchases like these may be eligible for our Safety Grant Program.

Finally, this is by no means an exhaustive list of everything involved in bringing on a lifeguard. Check your local, state, and federal guidelines as well as resources like the CDC’s Model Aquatic Health Code.[MK4] 

If all this information feels overwhelming, be sure to reach out to others for help. From personal experience, I can tell you that those who work in aquatics are some of the most passionate water safety advocates you’ll ever find. If you look for the right connections, you can build not just a safety culture, but a safety community.

 [MK1]Drowning Data | Drowning Prevention | CDC

 [MK2]Designate a Water Watcher, Supervision Could Save a Life - NDPA

 [MK3]"Ditch the Floaties": the Dangers of the Popular "Puddle Jumper"

 [MK4]2024 Annex to the Model Aquatic Health Code (5th edition)