Our Background
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Core City Hoops is based in Windsor (Ontario, Canada) and began in 1988, when Pete Cusumano and his friend, Arvin White, created a basketball club that would gave kids from the Core City of Windsor an affordable opportunity to play ball within a club, with Rep teams, as well as run a house leagues program and offer summer camps in their neighborhood and community school. Once Pete and Arvin retired, Paul Levac, longtime Core City resident, took over the program and continued what Pete and Arvin started, focusing on mentoring and leadership skill, character development through sport, community outreach and job opportunities for youth.
We are a club that relies heavily on fundraising and grants to run the fixed costs of our program. Participants are charged a nominal fee to cover tournament and out of town registration fees. Subsidies are available for qualifying participants. The financial structure ensures access and affordability for everyone, giving each player excellent coaching and mentoring from our valuable volunteer staff of teachers, community advocates of youth and sport. With on-going support from the school, and community partners, our goal is to continue to provide the skills, experiences and relationships through sport to support the positive development of youth. Our travel teams keep costs minimal by only participating in select out-of-town tournaments, and by arranging for local tournaments or games. We register for round-robin tournaments within a day's drive (i.e. Sarnia, Chatham, Stratford, London, or Michigan) to allow our kids the opportunity to play first-class basketball but without spending maximum dollars. This provides basketball programs for downtown youth on a year round basis. This year, we will have had almost 150 participants and over 10 adult volunteers in our program. Core City Hoops is different from other organizations, we take on many of children that are turned away from other programs. |
Core City Hoops Mandate:
Our experience has taught us and research from reports such as the 2008 Review of Roots of Youth Violence that if we can get kids involved at a young age, we can have a positive influence on their prosocial, interpersonal, academics and future outcomes. Early introduction to this sport and character development program is critical to building foundational trust and relationship that positions our youth for success. We have received positive feedback from the teachers and parents about the kids in this program, and considerable improvement in attendance, attitude, wellbeing, self-esteem, peer -relationship and behavior.
Target Areas:
Target Areas:
- Students in risk - academic, violence, systemic racism, discrimination, newcomer, mental health and addiction, in-care, criminal justice system involvement, lack of safety and access to resource
- Take on kids from families with low parental involvement for the Ontario Basketball Association program.
- Make it affordable, accessible space for kids to play, especially for kids from low-income areas
- Assist them with developing their social skills.
- Provide conflict resolution skills
- Provide them with educational tools to help them succeed in school.
- Emphasize discipline, behavior, sportsmanship and healthy attitudes.
- Provides nutritional components.
- 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 Unemployed Help Center.
- Refer to student social emotional well -being supports
- Violence prevention and personal safety
- Promote student engagement and leadership for disengaged students
- Family and Community Engagement
Program Objectives:
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 teach lifelong lessons regarding responsibility, commitment, respect, and appreciation for community.
- 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 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 programs.
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