Venture Description: Team Ultimate is aimed towards preadolescence aged inner-city girls. We meet once a week for roughly 8 weeks (which makes up one "session"), to teach the sport of ultimate Frisbee and use it as a tool to touch upon other important life skills, such as teamwork, respect for others, and self confidence. Most recently, we worked with Girls Inc. in Worcester, MA. We also use journals and do team building activities to stress these skills. At the end of each session, each girl receives a Frisbee and the journal she had been writing in during the session.

Venture Origin: The members of our venture had a love for the game of ultimate Frisbee. In addition, we both have experience working with children and wanted to challenge ourselves by working with a population we weren't really familiar with (in this case inner-city, preadolescent girls). We felt confident in our target audience, however, because of our great aly

Innovation: Team Ultimate allows us to not only teach the girls a new, fun game, it also allows us to be mentors and role models for the girls. We lead by example, which is also very important. The girls then see us more as friends and confidants and less as more teachers telling them what to do. We think it's important to create relationships with each girl individually.

Impact

Impact: On 12/13/06 we completed our 1st session working with 14 girls consistently for 7 weeks at Girls Inc. in Worcester. At the end of the session we asked them to write what they liked and didn't like about the session. One girl wrote "I liked the way we showed respect to each other and I liked the way they were teaching lots of things we didn't know." We are using our venture to break down the barriers of different social classes.

Engagement with the community: We received a donation of 20 Frisbees from the Boston Ultimate Disc Association, which were we able to leave with the girls so they could continue playing. We are currently looking for 3 other youth volunteers to run sessions so we could run more than one at once and expand to other organizations (i.e. The Boys and Girls Club).

Impact and engagement progress since launch: We started with only two Venture members, but we are currently in the process of expanding. Also, we started our Venture with the idea of serving one organization, Girls Inc. in Worcester, and ended up giving a presentation to another group of girls in Roxbury.

Impact and engagement strategy: One of our strategies are to use the initial success of our first session to inspire people to start their own. Hopefully being able to see a Venture that, after a lot of hard work, got off the ground, will inspire them to start their own!

Awards: No awards....yet :)

Budget

Amount of Youth Venture seed grant: 648.00

Money raised: We have raised a little over $100 from a bake sale. The winter months is the time in which the bulk of our fund raising will happen. Sessions will resume in the spring.

Creative ways of raising resources: We have developed our own broacher and a website is in progress. We have continued to send donation request letters to local and national business for supplies needed (i.e. journals, pens, markers, Frisbees, paper, etc.)

Strategy

Expansion plan for next 6 months: 1. Expand current team from 2 people to 5. 2. Raise $300 (which will be used to buy more Frisbees). 3. Contact one more organization and set up a session.

Plans for sustaining the project: By adding to our crew now, by the time we both graduate, there will be experienced team members to fill our shoes and recruit more new members. Also, we have kept very detailed lesson plans and other information complied into a binder which will be passed on.

Vision for three years from now: Ideally, Team Ultimate will reach more than one organization and run multiple sessions at one time. It would be really great if we could enlist the help of other high schoolers and have them set up their own chapters of Team Ultimate. That way we could reach the masses and promote physical and emotional wellness to girls all over the place.

Project impact: Our venture has given these girls role models from a different area and way of life. By teaching younger girls, opposed to teenagers, we are able to show them that we're not much different than them and curb any stereotypes that may arise. We show them that one must give respect in order to receive it. We help them deal with problems, whether they be with friends, school, a family situation...we're another outlet for them to use; one that is completely disconnected from their home life. Also, we have acted as spokeswoman for Youth Venture, trying to get other youth involved. We recently visited the Dearborn Middle School in Roxbury, MA and gave a brief presentation on Youth Venture, our Venture, and how they could start their own. While the girls we were presenting to may not have been so impressed, the teacher who was with the girls, who was also a high school teacher, seemed very interested and almost inspired to start Youth Venture with some of his students.

Youth Venture movement - what it means and how you can contribute: Being a part of the Youth Venture movement is about kids helping other kids. I love the connection I feel with other venturers, because it seems like we're all working towards a common goal, which is to somehow better the community. As Gandhi said, we must be the change we wish to see in the world, and it certainly doesn't hurt that there are other youth that are striving for the same goal. I would love to help advertise and encourage other students to create a venture! Youth Venture is a great organization, but I fear that a lot of students either don't know about it or are afraid to put the effort into making a venture successful. We consider our venture to be successful and cannot wait to build upon our initial success with another session (or maybe two!)! Maybe we could inspire other teenagers with our success....let them know that it does take a lot of work, but it's so worth it in the end.

Author:
Kayla
United States