.@USTA SERVES AWARDS GRANTS TO D.C., VIRGINIA FOR QUICKSTART AND JUNIOR TENNIS PROGRAMS
WHITE PLAINS, N.Y. (Jan. 28, 2014) — USTA Serves, the national charitable foundation of the United States Tennis Association, today announced it has awarded Recreation Wish List Committee of Washington, D.C., a $15,000 grant and Quickstart Tennis Of Central Virginia Inc. in Ivy, Va., a $4,000 grant. The foundation concluded its 2013 grant funding cycle by awarding $450,000 in grants to 40 organizations that provide tennis and education to underserved youth and people with disabilities.
The Recreation Wish List Committee of Washington, D.C., and the Southeast Tennis and Learning Center (SETLC) serve approximately 400 youths each year. More than 90 percent of participants in the academic and tennis programs live in the most economically challenged communities within the District of Columbia. Students receive support and guidance to improve their grades, behavior, confidence and self-esteem. The USTA Serves funding will support SETLC’s Summer SETUP program, a six-week academic and tennis program for rising second through fifth graders taking place June 25 through Aug. 3, 2014, and the organization’s after-school academic, cultural enrichment and tennis programs. This is the eighth USTA Serves Grant awarded to the Recreation Wish List Committee of Washington, D.C., totaling $138,500.
Quickstart Tennis of Central Virginia, Inc., targets disadvantaged and at-risk youth in schools using tennis as a vehicle to teach about health and nutrition. The USTA Serves grant will go toward the organization’s QuickStart Pathway Builder, a program that combines tennis programming with nutritional education using tennis players as role models, hands-on gardening, organizing community volunteers and finding tennis-teaching resources for these underserved communities. This is the second USTA Serves grant awarded to Quickstart Tennis of Central Virginia, the first also for $4,000.\
“USTA Serves is proud to end the year by awarding and recognizing some of the country’s most phenomenal programs for their efforts toward impacting the lives of youth through tennis and education,” said Dan Faber, Executive Director, USTA Serves. “These programs have a solid foundation and exhibit tremendous dedication to serving children who deserve a life filled with education and physical activities. For this, we thank them for leading the way in designing a nurturing environment where students can thrive and succeed on and off the tennis court.”
The biannual grant process, a national initiative of USTA Serves, was established to award organizations that successfully combine tennis and education for underserved youth as well as people with disabilities to gain an opportunity to play tennis and improve their academic skills in a structured format. These programs also strive to help combat childhood obesity by promoting healthy lifestyles. To date, USTA Serves has awarded more than $17 million in grants and scholarships to standout players and programs throughout the country in order to provide at-risk and underserved youth with greater opportunities to achieve success.
—S. Pratt
Tennis Atlantic 