Since 1985, America has celebrated July as the nation's official Parks and Recreation Month. Up2Us Sports recognizes the importance of community parks and recreational areas and the role they play in building stronger communities. Each year, Up2Us Sports partners with parks and recreation departments around the country in a number of ways, including providing comprehensive training in positive youth development to their frontline staff and park leaders, to placing sports coaches in community centers to directly impact youth.
Read on to see how we are bringing Up2Us Sports training and coaches to parks all over the country.
Miami
The City of Miami Parks Department has been integral to our growth in Miami, particularly over the past three years. They have donated space at both Jose Marti Park (2015) and Gibson Park (2016, 2017, 2018) for us to host our local Coach Training Institutes. Over the past three years, we have invited park managers from the City of Miami Parks Department to attend the training and learn about sports-based youth development. To date, we have trained over 60 park managers and expect to have another 20 this August.
Philadelphia
Up2Us Sports partnered with Philadelphia Parks & Recreation in the fall of 2016 to provide two, three-day trainings for a total of 50 rec leaders who became certified in SBYD Levels 1 and 2. Since then, we have conducted a small leadership culture training with 10 staff members from their leadership team, and a two-hour workshop on relationship-building and culture with 25 rec leaders in early 2018. They have shown tremendous support by providing event space to host local Up2Us Sports coach trainings.
Seattle
In early 2018, Up2Us Sports, in partnership with Seattle Parks and Recreation, was awarded a King County Youth and Amateur Sports Grant to improve the quality of coaching in key neighborhoods in Seattle. In the coming year, Seattle Parks and Recreation and Up2Us Sports are partnering to place seven AmeriCorps service members as youth sports coaches in high impact community centers around the city. As part of the Up2Us Coach program, each service member will receive more than 32 hours of sports-based youth development training, trauma-sensitive coaching training, professional development, and ongoing support from both national and regional staff members.
