Background

We provide basketball programs for downtown youth on a year round basis. This year, we will have had almost 300 participants and over 20 adult volunteers in our program. Unfortunately, we cannot accommodate all the children that want to enroll. Core City Hoops is different from other organizations, in that we do classroom sessions with the kids and bring in outside agencies such as the Windsor Police Service and the Teen Health Centre to work with the kids in our program. We take on many of high-risk kids that are turned away from other programs.

The program founder, Pete Cusumano has been recognized both locally and provincially. Pete Cusumano received the provincial ‘Leadership in Sport’ award. Locally, he received the Teen Health Centre’s, Ken Jaggs ‘Youth Volunteer of the Year’ award for his work with Core City Hoops. In addition, the organization received the Queen’s 50th Jubilee Medallion from the federal government, for the contributions made to Windsor’s youth.

Core City Hoops mandate:

• Take on high-risk kids
• Take on kids from families with low parental involvement for the Ontario Basketball Association program.
• Make it affordable for kids to play, especially for kids from low-income areas
• Make it accessible geographically, our gyms are in the target area.
• Assist them with developing their social skills.
• Give them conflict resolution skills
• Provide them with educational tools to help them succeed in school.
• Emphasize discipline, behavior, sportsmanship and healthy attitudes.
• Provides nutritional component.
• Provide co-ed programmes in the summer camps and spring league.
• Provide nutritional component as many of the kids come hungry
• Provide mandatory in-classroom sessions on topics such as respect, conflict resolution, study skills (for older groups only), leadership, lateral thinking, communication skills and drug awareness, among other topics.
• Have strong ties with the outside community such as downtown elementary schools, Windsor Police Service and the Teen Health Centre.

Our experience has taught us that if we can get these kids involved at a young age, we could have a positive influence on their behavior. Early intervention is important, as we found it easier to influence the behavior of the younger players to conform to our expectations whereas some of the older kids were not as willing to conform. We have received positive feedback from the teachers and parents about the kids in this program, and how they noticed a considerable improvement in their behavior.

Program Objectives

Goal:

The goal of this organization is to give the downtown youth an opportunity to be coached by positive role models while playing basketball at a high level. Using sport, we want to teach them life long lessons regarding responsibility, commitment, and appreciation for community and respect for others.

Objectives:

• To teach good sportsmanship
• To appreciate cultural and ethnic diversity
• To give of self by learning the importance of being part of a team
• To understand the importance to strive for excellence
• To develop respect for others
• To develop leadership and resolve conflict in an acceptable manner
• To understand the importance of education and to be a good citizen at school
• To appreciate the importance of education
• To give these youth positive role models from which they can learn
• To give them an opportunity to develop their basketball skills
• To increase the number of adult volunteers. Especially, adults that work/live in the target area and reflect the ethnic diversity of the kids in our programmes.

Benefits:

• Provide recreation and structure.
• Provide leadership skills in high school counselors that work the camps (as well as a chance to earn some money)
• Provide easily accessible facilities to these downtown/west end youth
• Provide educational experiences they would not normally attend on topics such as leadership, conflict resolution, drug awareness, and importance of education. For the older kids, we can also teach learning and study strategies.
• Provide kids with an incentive to behave in school and the community so they can remain eligible for the programme.
• Provide recreation and healthy exercise to kids that have few outlets
• Provide healthy nutritional opportunities through the summer camps
• Provide an opportunity for the higher skilled player to play against other kids that have few outlets.
• Provide an opportunity for the higher skilled player to play against other kids in the province and Michigan.

Program Details

Travel Teams

This is for the higher skilled player from grades 4-12 and all teams are coached by two NCCP certified coaches and compete in the provincial championships. We are proud that TEN of the Core City Hoop teams have won gold medals at the provincial championships in the past five years.

Instructional House Leagues

This is a house league for kids from grades 1-8. All kids get instruction and a game weekly. For only $45 each participant receives a Core City Hoops t-shirt and a good quality outdoor basketball to keep. We have purchased lower rims and smaller basketballs for the younger participants

High Skills Camp

This includes participants from grades 2-8 from the downtown area. The kids attend all day Monday to Friday for that week.

The unique feature for these summer camps is the nutritional and educational component involved.

We provide a hot breakfast, hot lunch and an afternoon snack, as well as drinks for all campers.

In the educational component all participants must attend classroom sessions. We include guest speakers from the local Teen Health Centre, Windsor Police, Windsor Cancer Society, local teachers, local lawyers and University of Windsor strength and conditioning coach.

Topics include conflict resolution, importance of education, study skills, drug awareness, the law, conditioning and training, problem solving skills, leadership, protection to prevent skin cancer, public speaking and communication skills. Topics are adjusted to accommodate the various age levels.