WEST HARTFORD — T-Bone stood on third base and glanced at the University of Hartford baseball players lined up on the foul line cheering for him. Then he tipped his cap to them.

Ryan Carter, a junior right-handed pitcher at Hartford, loves telling that story. He was one of the eight or so guys from the team who went to Thomas Hastings’ T-ball game in the spring. Thomas, aka T-Bone, is 7 years old. He loves the Red Sox. He loves baseball. He loves his friends from the Hartford baseball team. When he was a year old, he was diagnosed with muscular dystrophy, a disorder in which muscles get weaker with age and for which there is no cure.

Thomas, who lives in Windsor, was partnered with the Hartford baseball team through a Massachusetts-based program called Team IMPACT, which pairs children with life-threatening illnesses or life-altering chronic conditions with college athletic teams.

The Hartford men’s soccer team is also part of the program. Bryson Kelly, 10, of Rocky Hill, has mitochondrial disorder (in which food is not converted to energy for the body and the person affected is easily fatigued). He was paired up with the soccer team in August.

“His brother and sister go off to their different activities and he would say to me, ‘What’s my activity?'” said Bryson’s mom, Tyyne Kelly. “It breaks your heart. I’d tell him, ‘You’re going to the occupational therapist.'”

That’s definitely not as fun as going to hang out with soccer guys.

“It’s been an opportunity for him to be a part of the team,” Tyyne said.

Same with Thomas.

“When he first started playing T-ball, he was at the same skill level with the other kids,” said Thomas’ father, Brad. “As he’s gotten older, his friends have gone off to more competitive teams and he’s lost out on that opportunity.”

“Now [with Hartford], he’s integrated with a team. He gets that experience, physically and psychologically, to be part of the real team. He talks about the guys. He looks forward to seeing them. They are his teammates. It’s an experience he can’t get any other way.”

Thomas, who still can walk and run around on the baseball field but tires easily and uses a wheelchair to go longer distances, went to a number of Hartford baseball games last spring. He got his own locker in the Hartford locker room a few weeks ago. On Saturday, he went to the alumni game at Hartford and was able to decorate his locker.

“Most of the time, you don’t get to choose what team you get involved with,” Brad said. “My son’s a total baseball nut. I just put in a special request, if you could hook him up with a baseball team, that would be great.”

Bryson was going to see his locker Saturday for the first time and then going to the Binghamton-Hartford soccer game at night.

“The kindest thing I’ve ever seen was 11 guys coming to our house for his 10th birthday,” Tyyne said. “What college guys want to hang out with a 10-year-old on a Saturday afternoon? They were so sweet. It was the first time he wanted to have a friend at his birthday party to show his friend his teammates.”

“He has a hard time keeping up with other kids, so developing friendships is tricky for him.”

Hartford baseball coach Justin Blood already has his team involved in community service. They have worked with the RBI program in Hartford, trying to help revive baseball in the city; the Miracle League, a baseball league for children with disabilities; and they’ve volunteered at Jamie’s Run 5K every fall in Wethersfield.

Team IMPACT was more of a commitment. That was fine with Blood. He was all in.

“Thomas hasn’t officially been what they called ‘drafted’ into the program,” Blood said. “So we’re going to do a signing day [for him] in November around the national letter of intent signing day.”

This summer, Carter played for the Danbury Westerners of the New England Collegiate Baseball League. He thought it would be cool if Thomas could throw out the first pitch at a game. So he made it happen.

“Thomas got to throw out the first pitch, got a ball signed and got a T-shirt with his name on it,” Carter said. “The family had a good experience.”

Carter, who grew up in Proctor, Vt., has a deeper connection than most.

“I had a younger brother who passed away at an early age,” he said. “I definitely have a strong connection because of that. I definitely want to help anybody that’s facing any physical, mental, whatever kind of challenge they have. If you can make their life better for a day, or a year, I want to try to do that. Whether it be now or going forward.”

They are making a difference. Thomas, who also has scoliosis (an abnormal curvature of the spine), will have surgery for the 10th time on his back in November. The Hawks will be there for him.

Bryson, who tires easily and used to sit on a bench or a swing at recess at school, now kicks a soccer ball back and forth with a friend, his mom reports.

“Just the fact that he is willing to kick a ball back and forth…” Tyyne said. “Looking at Bryson and his level of confidence … it’s changed dramatically in the last couple months. It’s been an amazing experience so far.”

Source: Lori Riley @ http://articles.courant.com/2013-10-19/sports/hc-riley-column-1020-20131019_1_baseball-team-soccer-team-locker

Please join Team Up 4 Community this coming Friday October 25th as we join the ECC and there schools (Molloy, NYIT and Dowling) in a joint effort to give back in service to some local Long Island Communities.

Source: http://www.eccsports.org/information/general-news/2013-14/101613_teamupcleanup

Central Islip, N.Y. – Friday October 25 will be, “Team Up to Clean Up,” day for three East Coast Conference member institutions. Dowling College, Molloy College and New York Institute of Technology have all arranged to provide clean up efforts in their local communities as part of a one day community service initiative that the ECC hopes will become an annual event throughout the conference.

“We are very proud of the success our institutions show in academics, athletics and in service to their communities,” stated ECC Commisioner, Dr. Robert Dranoff. “This new initiative is aimed at creating clean, beautiful public places, reducing waste, and generating a positive impact on the local communities our schools are based in.”

Student-athletes, coaches, and administrators from various teams at each institution will be putting in time with various assignments.

Molloy College will be working with the Village of Hempstead, NYIT will clean up around the town of North Hempstead, and Dowling College will continue their efforts with the Town of Islip as part of the Keep Islip Clean campaign. This will be the eighth straight year Dowling has provided clean up services around their community.

Henry Schein, Inc., of Melville, N.Y., distributor of health care products and services, has graciously donated supplies to all three schools for their work including protective gloves, garbage bags and wipes. Justin Hickam, Regional Sales Manager for Sports Medicine at Henry Schein, has worked closely with the ECC to arrange for this donation.

“This event is another example of the important place our schools and conference hold in their neighborhoods,” noted Dranoff. “Our student-athletes and athletic departments are role models, I believe, in their efforts to help others. We are all proud of the work they do and the impact they make in building relationships and partnerships with their communities.”

Marissa Cloutier, ’14, is majoring in biology and minoring in chemistry, with a concentration in the Gerald R. Ford Institute for Leadership in Public Policy and Service. She is a member of the Prentiss M. Brown Honors Program and an all-league women’s tennis team member. She is the daughter of William and Brenda Cloutier of Grosse Ile, Mich., and a graduate of Grosse Ile High School.

For Marissa Cloutier, ’14, a beautiful new community kitchen in a rural African village underscored a lesson of how not to do aid work. “The kitchen, which was built several years ago by an aid organization, has never been used because the community believes it is unsafe to cook in an enclosed structure,” said Cloutier. “They were cooking on clay stoves outside and the new building remains unused.”

Cloutier spent much of last summer in Ghana interning with Global Medical Brigades (GB), a nonprofit sustainable development organization that provides health care and development assistance to poor communities in Central America and Africa. During her internship, Cloutier traveled to seven communities in Ghana gathering cultural information that would help GB develop programs suited to each community’s specific needs and customs.

Along with formal interviews with community leaders and clinic patients, Cloutier also had the opportunity to go door-to-door, talking with a wide variety of people with the help of a translator. “We spent a great deal of time in the communities learning about their lifestyles, culture and health concerns,” Cloutier said. “It was very rewarding to work with the community people to improve GB’s programs, even though it was challenging to do so in only one month.”

The Importance of Knowing the Culture

Cloutier was also able to make a distinct contribution. “A woman I interviewed told me she had never been to school, but years ago, a visiting nurse held a health and hygiene workshop with her family at their home,” Cloutier recalled. “I asked other people in the community about their experience with these family workshops and others seemed to also recall a great deal of what they had learned.”

Cloutier wrote a short report about this education model and presented it to the GB Ghana staff. “Global Brigades is now looking into using this new model to teach hygiene and nutrition,” Cloutier said. “It was really rewarding to make a contribution that could help improve Global Brigade’s programs.”

The Ghana trip was Cloutier’s second experience with GB; as a member of Albion College’s GB student group, she assisted in a traveling clinic in Honduras in 2011. “Some issues that exist in Honduras were also clearly present in Ghana. For example, malaria and parasites that result from a lack of clean drinking water are common in both places,” Cloutier said. “But the people in Honduras have a lot of problems with tooth decay because of their diets, which are high in sugar. The oral health of the Ghanaians I saw was much better.

“Being able to visit both places made me realize the importance of knowing the culture I am serving,” Coutier noted. “Programs that are desperately needed in some places simply will not work in others because peoples’ needs, culture and beliefs differ greatly around the world.”

Tying It Together

The two experiences, Cloutier noted, “have helped me develop a better understanding of global health and given me the opportunity to work with physicians and leaders in public health on a daily basis. This internship tied together my academic concentrations in public policy and service and pre-medical studies and has even given me the opportunity to learn more about biology, which is my major, “she said.

“I am confident that this internship will help me as I write my thesis this year and as I pursue a career in the healthcare field,” Cloutier said. “It has been great to learn so much outside the classroom while also making use of the knowledge that I have acquired as a student at Albion.”

Source: http://www.gobrits.com/features/Cloutier

Washington, D.C. – Head lacrosse coaches Scott Urick and Melynda Brown as well as several members of the University of the District of Columbia men’s and women’s lacrosse programs hosted a group from The Washington Inner City Lacrosse Foundation (WINNERS) Lacrosse organization for an instructional clinic at UDC Field on Saturday afternoon.

Urick, Brown and several men’s and women’s lacrosse student-athletes ran a clinic that featured drills stressing fundamentals such as stick-handling, passing and catching and shooting. The approximately 20 boys and girls of various lacrosse experience benefitted from the instruction of the seasoned coaches and the student-athletes.

“I feel this is as good of a way as any for the UDC lacrosse programs to give back to the Washington, DC community,” men’s lacrosse head coach and former nine-year Major League Lacrosse veteran Scott Urick said. “By doing this, in conjunction with WINNERS’ ongoing efforts, we’re helping make the sport of lacrosse accessible to boys and girls in the DC metro area who otherwise may not have the opportunity. These boys and girls were eager to play, and more importantly, eager to learn…and just a lot of fun to work with.”

WINNERS is a nonprofit organization that was started in October 2000 to provide Washington, DC boys and girls from historically underserved neighborhoods the opportunity to learn the game of lacrosse and the life skills associated with playing a team sport. It uses the sport as a vehicle to instill values, education and life-sustaining skills that will ultimately give young boys and girls the tools to be successful on and off the field. Since its inception, it has introduced the game of lacrosse to over 5,500 inner city DC youth.

Brown, who had a stellar high school career at Council Rock South in Pennsylvania and college career at UMass, said she is encouraged by the sport’s growth throughout the District of Columbia.

“I think WINNERS is a tremendous organization,” Brown said. “These boys and girls are getting a fantastic opportunity, and we’re thrilled to be a part of the continued growth of this great sport in the nation’s capital.”

Provided by the District of Columbia Sports Information Department.

Source: http://www.eccsports.org/sports/mlax/2013-14/releases/100813_udclax_winners

Posted: Monday, October 14, 2013 2:42 pm
Jon Buzby
Source: http://www.newarkpostonline.com/

Next Saturday, October 26 is a rare off day for all but one of the Glasgow High School fall sports teams. But instead of sleeping in, hanging out with family and friends, or heading to part-time jobs, the majority of the school’s athletes and coaches are participating in the school’s inaugural Glasgow Care Walk before they head to Delcastle to watch the Dragons face the Cougars on the gridiron.

The walk begins at 10 a.m. in the stadium. As of this week, there are nearly 100 students registered and the general public can sign up during school hours at the school or starting at 9:30 a.m. the morning of the event. Of the $10 registration fee, $7 is being donated to the local Red Cross and $3 goes toward the school’s athletic department.
“At the end of last year, we decided that we wanted our athletes and school in general to be more involved in the community,” athletic director Jeremy Jeanne explained. “We want our student-athletes to understand that being an athlete is a privilege and because we want our athletes to understand that privilege, we want them to understand the importance of giving back. Our kids are very excited about this event.”

A simple idea that started out as one relatively small walking event involving only student-athletes has since expanded to include any interested member of the student body, their family and friends, and the general public. The overwhelming positive response was one reason Jeanne decided to expand the Glasgow Care concept beyond the athletic department.
“The original goal of the Glasgow Care campaign was for Glasgow High School student-athletes to give back to their community,” Jeanne said. “I remember the first time I met our new principal, Mr. Ivory, and shared this new initiative. He right away fell in love with the idea. Thanks to his support, we have expanded this new initiative to not just our student-athletes, but to the entire school. We are using ‘Glasgow Care’ to offer our students community services hours that are applied toward the 60 hours required for graduation.”
A dozen or so students participating in Saturday’s morning walk are doing double-duty, spending the afternoon at the Veterans Hospital in Elsmere to visit with the veterans and make blankets for them.

“I was very excited about volunteering for this because I believe it’s an honor to be able to meet some of the veterans who had a hand in keeping liberty in America,” junior tennis player Jackie Cornejo said. “I’m looking forward to hearing about how life changes after being part of something as big as serving the country.”
Saturday’s community outreach is just another example of a year-long effort by the Glasgow athletes to give back to the community. Other initiatives include visiting different elementary schools in the district to read and donate books during the winter months, and hosting an egg hunt in the spring for kids with disabilities or who are in a shelter.
“Our mission as educators is to produce responsible and productive citizens that give back to their communities,” Glasgow principal Dean Ivory said. “I am so proud of our student-athletes for leading by example.”

That example has now expanded beyond just the athletic department, and although that was not the original intent, Jeanne couldn’t be happier that it is the end result.
“Glasgow students truly care about the community,” Jeanne beamed. “I just love it!”