Paul Kamin, board chair for Sail Orcas, is proud of the sailing program for youth.

“When I think of the accomplishments of the kids who have gone on to join the high school sailing team, it really makes my day,” Kamin said.

The program is structured so that a child is able to receive instruction in sailing from the age of seven to 18 with the programs offered by Sail Orcas. The summer youth sailing instruction covers seven to 14-year-olds. Sailors who are 13 to 14 years old are taught via the Explorers program.

“Then there’s the high school sailing team, which the kids can participate in throughout their freshman-senior period,” Kamin said.

The summer youth sailing program is run in conjunction with Orcas Rec.

“We think that this has been a fabulous partnership,” Kamin said.

Orcas Rec takes care of the registrations and promotions for the sailing program, and Sail Orcas does the hiring and training of the staff. Sail Orcas owns all of the equipment as well.

“This year we had well over 100 different children who took multiple lessons,” Kamin said.

The program ran all of July and August, with beginning classes held in the morning and the more experienced sailors taking their lessons in the afternoon. Classes are limited to 12 to 16 children per class. Sail Orcas uses only certified U.S. sailing instructors for all of the classes.

“This year, both instructors were local kids who grew up through the program, and who were on the high school sailing team,” Kamin said.

Barrett North and Tate Westerfelt of Orcas Island were the student instructors.

“Tate is sailing collegiately now in Boston. He came back for the summer, finished up the lessons, and now he’s back in Boston,” Kamin said.

Kamin says the parents of high school sailors contribute funding to the program.

“We also do fund raising, and we use proceeds from our summer youth program and the adult program,” he said. “We also have corporate sponsors for the boats we have, and we scratch out our fundraising efforts like everyone here. It’s a community-supported program and the parents are very involved as well.”

For example, when the high school team won the district event this year, they had a couple of weeks to plan for the trip to go to Florida.

“It was a mad scramble,” Kamin said. “Families had to pitch in to buy the tickets, but the kids went out and had the single most successful carwash I’ve ever seen on this island. They put sailing kids on every block in town and they literally herded cars in the direction of the carwash.”

The high school sailing team is not part of the high school curriculum.

“It’s not in their athletic department, and not funded through the public school system,” Kamin said. “But we do have a high school age team, just not affiliated with the school system. Burke Thomas heads up that program and it’s been very successful. One of their members just took a silver medal at the Junior Olympics.”

A stepping stone to the high school team, called the Explorers, takes middle school children on Wednesday afternoons in the spring and fall. They have a chance to go out for two to three hours a week and learn more about the high school program.

“They work on competence and confidence in the boats, so that when they get to high school and start racing and being more competitive, they are more comfortable with racing techniques and their boats,” Kamin said.