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38 / MAY.JUNE.2021 USICERINKS.COM Basic Skills levels, instructors awarded them patches to sew onto their favorite skating jacket. With Snowplow Sam introduced as the program's "bear-y great" mascot, kids were excited to learn to skate and achieve their goals. The Basic Skills Program proved to be one of the most success- ful grassroots ice skating programs to date. Since its inception in 1985 and up until 2016, the program taught more than 2.5 million people how to skate. US Speedskating and USA Hockey even joined U.S. Figure Skating in endorsing the program as the best learn to skate curriculum to get started. Learn to Skate USA Launches On June 1, 2016, Learn to Skate USA launched as a rebrand of U.S. Figure Skating's Basic Skills Program with a mission to provide a fun and positive experience that will instill a lifelong love of skating. While the Basic Skills Program taught countless people to skate since 1968, Learn to Skate USA uses many of those fundamentals with a modern application. THEN NOW and 1989 , Ice skating schools gained popularity in the 1960s as skaters took to the ice for the pure enjoyment of it. 1967 , Developed in 1985, U.S. Figure Skating's Skate With U.S. program taught basic skills through a curriculum John Simon evolved from Ogilvie's original programming. , (Left) National Skating Month was a big hit in 2015. (Right) Learn to Skate USA celebrated its first birthday on June 1, 2017. BLAST FROM THE PAST