As a kid, growing up in Western Springs, I was afforded every opportunity imaginable. New yoke of shoes? No Problem. You need some more mashed potatoes? Here, we take a 1/2 a pound of leftovers. You don't have supplies for school? Well, we better buy you some then. Don't make a site to use because the drive is being repaved? You could go to Springdale, Ridgewood, Wiola, Sedwick, or Pleasantdale Park if you need or you could likely get in the gym at LT.
I'm sure one of their ten gyms must be available.
What many people in the inner-city would call luxuries, I considered commonplace. It's not that I took it for granted, it was more that I just simply didn't acknowledge any better. I thought that is just how it was, regardless of where you lived. Flash-forward 10 days afterwards as I enter on my third year teaching and coaching in the Chicago Public Schools, and I see how naive I was.
I coach basketball at Kenwood Academy on the South Side of Chicago. During my first week of practice, I think getting on a kid for not acting with any energy. I went on and on about how he wouldn't be capable to work if he did not contend with a greater sense of urgency. He tested his best, but he did not match the stock that I demanded. After practice, I took him away and asked him what was wrong. A pair of proceedings of prying and he reluctantly responded,"Coach, I'm sorry. I make not eaten anything in two days, but I hope I will do better tomorrow." Silence_.
To think, I used to kick that we'd get to do in the upstairs gym sometimes at LT North, instead of in the gigantic field house. Looking backwards and seeing what I've seen these past couple of years, I am honestly embarrassed that I always used to kick about anything, as an athlete, as a student, and as a person. What troubled and disturbed me as a kid pails in comparison to not eating for a pair of days, or having to drop practice because your cousin got shot, or shot a poor percentage from the free-throw line because you don't receive a safe, non-gang and violence infested place to do over the summer.
With all the disadvantages that these kids are born with, it amazes me to see the bravery that they indicate every day by running hard and lacking to be coached. Basketball seems to be their outlet and it is has been a tremendous motivational tool that our coaching staff and fellow teachers have been capable to use to move them to amend in the schoolroom and off the court. The results have been great, but we even feeling that we could do much better.
Unfortunately, we have even lost some kids to the streets. Even though they had great potential as players, students, and people, the force of drugs and gangs was too often to overcome. Everyday, it saddens me to remember about what we could get done differently to maintain those kids on the correct path. Was is inevitable or did we spend the ball?
I can't definitively answer that question, but I think if we could get our athletic programs, specifically basketball, more attractive, we would make a much better ability to accomplish our goals of acquiring more kids to college and losing less kids to drugs and violence.
Here's where we ask you. We get really little funding. Our gym floor has dead spots all over. Many of the lights are out. Our bleachers are serious and our scoreboard is broke. We don't have enough uniforms for players and we no longer get support from the CPS for traveling to non-conference road games. We don't give a cabinet room, practice gear, or an athletic trainer. First-Aid Kit, no. Equipment, very little. I could keep going on and on, but it would likely be a little overkill and redundant.
Since I think that we can do better, myself and former members of our schools athletic fundraising committee are stressful to make out to people from the communities where we grew up and ask for financial funding for our kids. While we live it is a lot to ask, we trust that an enormous number of sound could get out of eve the smallest donation. If you'd wish to donate, you could go to the connection below and use the paypal link at the top right corner of the page. Trust me, it will be money well spent and much appreciated.
LINK TO DONATE: http://kenwoodhoops.blogspot.com
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