MATTAPOISETT — Jack Stellato has sailed from Marion to Bermuda and New Bedford to Antigua. He’s done Buzzards Bay regattas and raced Beetle Cat sailboats.

A Mattapoisett resident since 1969, Stellato was announced Tuesday, March 19 as the new director of the Mattapoisett Community Sailing Association’s summer youth sailing program.

Stellato brings years of sailing experience to the program. 

When Stellato’s son Michael was a freshman at Old Rochester Regional Regional High School in 2008, the two started the sailing program at the school. What was first a club of less than 20 students has over time become a sailing team of nearly 40 people, according to Stellato.

Stellato’s ultimate goal with the youth sailing program at the Mattapoisett Community Sailing Association is to “get every kid to sail their own boat.”

“It's something they can do for the rest of their lives,” Stellato said.

Stellato enjoys “pretty much everything” about sailing, he said. It’s relaxing and rejuvenating, a sport where one can “just go out there and forget about everything else.”

“You can race,” Stellato said. “You can just cruise. You can just enjoy yourself.”

For attendees of the youth sailing program, sailing is “something they can do for themselves by themselves,” Stellato said.

“They go out there, and they make their own decisions, and I think it's really beneficial for a child to learn how to do that,” he said.

The youth sailing program will begin in July. To it, Stellato will bring knowledge and experience that in fact first began at Camp Massasoit in Mattapoisett when he was 10 years old.

“I want to make sure that the children are engaged, and they’re learning something and that they want to come back next year,” Stellato said.