IN THE CLASSROOM:Kids run the show at this club

Kids with zinc oxide-covered noses, beach towels and sabots crowded the sand at the end of Turquoise Avenue in Newport Beach. It was just another day at the office for Evan Fullerton, a commodore at Balboa Island Yacht Club.

The first day of the work week found Fullerton, 16, and the approximately 180 kids in the BIYC summer program busy indeed, practicing swan dives and chasing one another across the beach. Not to mention racing each other on paddleboards between Cooper’s Dock and Beek Pier.

At this yacht club, kids run the whole show. It is the kids themselves, boys and girls ages 4 through 16, who plan activities and events and govern the summer program’s day-to-day tasks, such as competitions for sailing, paddling, swimming and rowing.

“It’s a club run by kids for kids,” Fullerton said. “Parent involvement is kept to a minimum.”

By the looks of the many happy, energetic youngsters and the handful of parents relaxing in beach chairs, the kids’ program of self-government benefits everyone.

“It teaches us responsibility for when we get older,” said program participant Karsten Sigband, 12, of Newport Beach. “Everyone gets to be in charge of something. You learn how to deal with people … even complaining parents.”

Not that parents have many complaints. Fullerton said parental involvement is mostly limited to a pool party at the San Diego home of one yacht club family and such events as a parent party, end-of-the-year banquet and Parent Participation Day.

Although they let their kids take the helm within the program, many parents play a pivotal role: they help introduce their kids to the local tradition that is sailing.

“Their friends do it, their parents did it, and a lot of their grandparents did it,” Fullerton said of the children in the summer program. “Some families have been doing this for 60 years.”

Fullerton is aware that some kids’ lengthy family histories of sailing can put unwanted pressure on them to excel as sailors. He says the summer program is very accommodating.

Jimmy Donovan, 13, of San Clemente, no longer lives on Balboa Island, but he finds the yacht club’s summer program to be a very low-key place to hang out. He sails in the Bay Fleet and is one of the summer program’s best sailors.

“I definitely look forward to doing this program in the summer. I love coming back and seeing friends and sailing,” Donovan said.

“The beauty of this program is that it’s a lot more laid back,” said Fullerton, who lived on a boat in Mexico with his parents for three years. He has a relaxed attitude with the kids and the program in general. “We don’t push people if they don’t want to do things, and we try to include everybody.”