It's a day Stephanie McConnell will never forget. Her 3-year-old son John Michael was not where she thought he was.
"Everybody else thought that he was with the other person," McConnell said.
Her son had fallen into his grandparents' pool and nobody knew it.
"There's no pain like losing a child, and I don't want any parent to know that pain because of something that could have been prevented," she explained.
According to the Centers for Disease Control, an estimated one in every five drownings is a child under the age of 14. Eighty percent of drowning victims are boys. African-American children are particularly at risk. In fact, experts say they are three times more likely to drown than white children mainly because many live in urban areas and are not exposed to water as much.
Dr. Scott Batchelor, an emergency room pediatrician, said there are three ways to help prevent swimming-related accidents.
Batchelor said, "No. 1 is just supervision. You have to supervise your child really regardless of age. No. 2 would be personal flotation devices, especially for the younger kids. The other thing is CPR. All parents should learn CPR."
McConnell gets her strength of coping with John Michael's death through her mission to inform parents on the importance of educating their kids.
"I know that he would want me to do something positive in his memory and to help other children," McConnell said.
If her message saves one child, it's a message worth repeating.
Batchelor also wants parents to be aware that it's hard to recognize when younger kids are in distress in the water because they don't make a lot of splash and many times their call for distress is not loud enough to be heard.
Find a Red Cross CPR class near you.
Learn more about 3-year-old John Michael McConnell and his memorial website.