Vandalia Recreation Center — Local services in Vandalia

i have somewhat of a mixed review, but due to the most recent incident that we experienced in their swim classes, i had to give a low review. my daughter did swim lessons here for 3 sessions which are 6 weeks each. the first two sessions anna was her instructor and we loved anna and my daughter did as well. but if we had a sub, they didn’t seem to be trained very well and the class ended up feeling like a waste because of that. the real problems started when she started level 2 classes and her instructor was josh. it was pretty clear that he was new because you could tell that he didn’t know what to do. the very first level 2 class, my daughter was right next to him in the pool along with four other children and she was drowning and he didn’t realize it. i was across the pool and saw it and i got up to run over there and then he realized it and got her out of the water. my daughter is 3. she’s barely over 3 ft tall. i don’t think he took the height of the children in consideration when deciding where in the pool to do the class and clearly she couldn’t touch the bottom of the pool. i went to console my daughter who was rightfully traumatized. the manager amaya sat with her after it happened but surprisingly i didn’t get even a hello from her or josh. not an apology. this put us in a tough situation because i didn’t want her to forever be afraid of the water (the whole reason she was in classes) but i also didn’t want her to be there where she didn’t feel comfortable and honestly we didn’t either. so we went to two more classes after where we wasted our time watching our daughter sit on the edge of the pool, scared to get in. we decided to contact swim safe and got refunded for the classes. i also wanted to make sure that they knew about the situation so this doesn’t happen to another child and possibly have a worse outcome. there were also multiple times were we weren’t communicated with well and were told to contact swim safe for anything related to the swim classes. no one, even the instructors could give info on makeup classes, etc. to go there and swim with your child for a day, sure it’s fun. but to have swim lessons there, be weary and keep your eyes on your child. we’ve started classes somewhere else and my daughter has done...

If I could leave no stars I would. The staff is VERY unprofessional and clearly isn’t trained the same way. Called and gave the ages of ALL the kids I was bringing. Staff told us the prices so we came down. We get here, again staff member asked the ages of the kids.. we told and the lady said that my 3 (almost 4 year old) WOULD be permitted to go into the playground area. We came to swim then my son wanted to go play. We go to pay for it and the same staff member explained because he isn’t four he isn’t allowed to go in. I explained that not even 1 hour ago this SAME staff member JUST told us he could go in, she then says to me “well go in the playground room and ask the staff member in there if she will allow it since there is only ONE child in there. Just as I am talking to that playground staff member the staff member from the front desk, who just told me to do this called and they chatted on the phone and it ended up in the result of no. I made a comment on how I knew she and the other staff member were talking to each other and she tried telling me the phone call was from someone else when clearly you seen the truth. (might I remind you, this playground set is no bigger then what you find at McDonald’s) THEN (as if the staff here already wasn’t getting a poor review) I had another staff member stop me before entering the locker room who then questioned me on how old my son and stated that if he was 4 he was to go to the men’s locker room in order to enter the pool!!!!!?????!!!!??? Well first off, clearly my son is 3 which is why we couldn’t be in the small playground area but also I would NEVER allow my son to go into a grown mans locker room without someone being able to go in with him that I trusted !? The staff inside the pool area is extremely rude to kids, yelling at them for BEING KIDS. Overall for the price I paid to get in here I could have stayed the night at a hotel with a pool and had more fun then being interrogated by the rude staff here at the...

Staff is very rude. They do not understand children especially the life guarding staff. They asked my one year old to leave because she was having a melt down and we stepped away from the class to calm her down. We were told that either she participates in the class or we had to get out of the pool. It took 5 calls to get to a voicemail to discuss this situation. The first 2 calls I was immediately put on hold and hung up after 10 minutes. The third call I spoke with their manager, John, who told me the front desk will take care of it. After another 10 minutes on hold I hung up. Then I called a fourth time and again and I immediately got put on hold for 5 minutes till I hung up. The fifth call Jaime answered. I explain my displeasure with our treatment and she said she would put me through to Denise's voicemail. I tried to explain that John said the front desk could take care of it and she said "If you were here you would see how busy it is and right now I should be transferring you to voicemail, but I am still talking to you when I should be helping someone else." We have been coming here for years. My kids have enjoyed the pool so we thought we would give swim lessons a try. We will not be back and are pulling our kids from their swim lessons. We are going somewhere else where courteous customer service is top priority as swimming is not the only lesson I want my...