Believers in the power of sports

The Play Ball Foundation invests in schools in high-need communities to provide high quality sports opportunities to empower middle school youth

Play Ball believes in the power of sports. We believe that all middle school students should have the opportunity to play team sports.

We believe that athletic competition introduced at an impressionable age can greatly improve school performance, community involvement and life skills of youth. We believe that Play Ball's commitment to our communities and our innovative and creative structure can be the catalyst for change and create opportunities where none existed before.

WHAT WE BELIEVE

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Play Ball partners with under-resourced communities in Massachusetts (Holyoke, Boston, Lawrence) to create and support school-based sports leagues for more than 3,200 middle school students.

By working with districts to create school-based sports leagues, Play Ball helps to make a difference in the lives of kids. We work with school districts because they have know and and work with the range of students in the city. Through the Play Ball leagues the relationships between students and teachers are strengthened, which helps students increase school engagement and healthy habits so they can be successful in school and beyond.

WHAT WE DO

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Quality after-school sports leagues are an important vehicle for school engagement and physical activity in middle schools,

and while these programs are widely available in suburban schools, they are critically lacking in most urban districts. We work to get more kids engaged in sports leagues because the benefits of being active are clear - active students have up to 40% higher test scores, and are 15% more likely to go to college, yet kids from lower-income homes are more than three times as likely to be physically inactive.