Play Ball! Featured on Only a Game

NPR’s Only a Game (Saturday, May 18, 2013)
“Budgets and Box Scores: Funding Sports in Boston Public Schools” The NPR story is the grand finale of a week-long series by Doug Tribou and Karen Given of 90.9 WBUR, Boston’s NPR News Station. Here’s the week’s stories:
 

Boston School Sports ‘Turning The Tide,’ Superintendent Says (May 17, 2013)
Being part of the solution, Play Ball! athletes arrive in high school ready to play.

Grades-To-Play Motivation Propels Some Boston Student-Athletes  (May 16, 2013)
(May 16, 2013)  Making the grade in the classroom and on the field builds fan base with parents. 

Charities Try To Keep Boston Student-Athletes In The Academic ‘Zone’ Too (May 15, 2013)
Success on the field and in the classroom. Play Ball! football team at the Rogers Middle School studies and plays together.

The 2 Private Organizations That Have Changed Boston Public Schools (May 14, 2013)  Today’s story highlights Play Ball!s successful funding and partnership model for expanding Boston Public middle school sports programs.

How Boston Public School Sports Have Improved in 4 Years (May 13, 2013)
 Features our teamwork with the Boston Public Schools to expand youth sport opportunities for middle school students.
                                                                            

Our Story

In Fall of 2009, Boston Public Schools (BPS) offered basketball and track to middle school students.  That September, Play Ball! stepped in and provided funding for the first middle school football league in the City of Boston. Today Play Ball! has 40 teams offering 4 different sports to middle school students.  The Play Ball! student athletes are having having fun, building friendships and character through the lessons of sports – teamwork, communication and discipline. 

Inspired by our student athletes and their interests, Play Ball! now funds baseball, double dutch, girls volleyball and football.

The Play Ball! leagues provide access to competitive sports for over 1000 middle school students.  Many have never played an organized sport before and more than 80% live below the poverty line.  

Help us get more feet on the field and more sneakers in the gym.  Become part of Boston’s newest sports tradition.  Join the Play Ball! team and give today.  It’s your ticket for the best teams in town!

 

The story of a middle school football team (Boston.com, Sept 16, 2012)

For Rogers Middle School, introducing football a game-changer  (Boston.com, April 4,2013)

 

By Nick Ironside
Special to Boston.com / April 4, 2013

The mother of eighth grade special teams player Freddy Mercado, Jajaira Mercado, has sent some of her older children to the Rogers and has seen wholesale changes at the school since football was implemented.

“I’ve seen a lot of kids with anger issues, issues at home … things like that,” she said. “And [football]is the one thing that they have. I don’t know, it would just bring a smile to their face and they could feel good about themselves. “It’s just so good for them. I talked to a lot of the kids, but I didn’t even have to talk to them to see it.”

Emphasizing academics
Science teacher and assistant coach Grady McClinton’s classroom has two vertical rows of desks facing each other. The seating arrangement accommodates about 30 students.  Posters around the room display the periodic table of elements, different stages of evolution and charts with equations on them. At the back of the room next to the windows, two disco balls hang down from the ceiling.

Sam Roman, an eighth grader and linebacker, gets out of his chair. It screeches a little bit, but the students in the fairly quiet room aren’t disturbed by it. Neither is McClinton.  He walks over to the disco ball nearest his seat in the back, touches it, and looks up at the array of white circles of light cluttering the classroom’s tall ceiling.  He surveys the entire ceiling – his eyes dancing around from side to side– and then Roman spins the disco ball, trying to make the white circles in the dim classroom move quicker.

“If you do it slower it’ll work better,” interjects McClinton in a casual tone but strong voice. He goes on to talk about prisms and the changes in light. Roman doesn’t seem too bothered, his eyes still peaking up at the ceiling. He spins it again, this time at a slower pace, and the white circles slowly bounce around the walls and ceiling.  McClinton smiles and focuses back on the grading he was doing. Roman’s peers are getting more distracted by the second, and now they – like Roman – are staring around the room, their eyes darting from wall to wall.
This is one of two classrooms with a study hall at the Rogers. The team won its game over Mildred Ave. Middle School a day earlier.

Double Dutch & Play Ball! — Ten Teams, Ten Weeks — 150 Champions

The gym is silent as judges count jumps per minute in the first event — the Speed trial. A team from the Mildred Ave school lights it up with 240 jumps in a two minute period. Next up is the Compulsory competition featuring basic moves such as jumping in a complete circle on one foot, then the other, then crossing feet and getting knees high.  Tricks must be executed with, first, one girl in the ropes and then two.  Both areas of competition require, not only the total concentration of both rope turners and jumpers, but also sheer athleticism.  Parents, spectators and teams erupt in applause as each group finishes!

The tournament ends with the Freestyle competition where push-ups, cartwheels and other advanced tricks are performed by two girls in the ropes performing at the same time.  It’s an awesome showcase for our advanced jumpers and similar to what you’d catch on ESPN during national and international competitions – in fact, some of the girls from our league are headed South for the National Tournament later this year!

BASEBALL AND VOLLEYBALL SEASON COMING SOON

Will the Fredericks’ team continue to dominate girl’s volleyball?  Will the Edwards face off with the Curley again? Only time will tell.  These two programs bring students who have never played an organized sport onto the field and into the gym.  The competition is intense and fun to watch.  All across the city, teams are getting ready for what is sure to be our most exciting season yet!

 

« Older Posts
© 2010 The Play Ball! Foundation