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This teacher needs your help!

Mr. S. from Los Angeles, CA is requesting supplies through DonorsChoose, the most trusted classroom funding site for teachers.

See what Mr. S. is requesting

Support an athletic program for innercity scholars

My student athletes need game balls for boys and girls soccer and basketball.

  • $580 goal

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Hooray! This project is fully funded

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Dear Friend: Fifteen years ago, with neither money nor facilities, a bunch of enthusiastic inner city high school students started an athletic program at a school that was never supposed to have sports. In fact, Los Angeles Southwest Middle College HS was a last chance school for at-risk students, a drop-out prevention program. A bunch of those wayward students, rehabilitating gang members, found a social studies teacher to be their baseball coach and a field in a local park, they talked a math teacher and an English (me) teacher into starting a basketball program at our school. We found a league in which to play, an outdoor basketball court for practice, and a park gym for home games. Eventually our school added boys and girls tennis, boys and girls basketball, soccer, volleyball, and softball. Our athletes have accomplished great things -- not championships but the growth and maturity of learning sportsmanship, teamwork, how to win with class and how to lose with dignity. Some used sports as a means by which to escape the culture of gangs, crime and hopelessness in which they had been reared. Nearly all have graduated high school and many have gone on to college. And yet, our school is perpetually on the verge of having to shut down its athletic program due to the LA Unified School District’s refusal to fully fund sports programs in its schools. The school district provides transportation but not equipment, uniforms, or the cost of referees and umpires for home games. Such expenditures must come from “student body funds.” Larger high schools generate thousands of dollars from ticket sales for home football and basketball games and the vending machines and student stores on their campuses. We are a small school without space for vending machines or a student store or the ability to generate revenue by selling tickets to games (we have no football team or our own gymnasium for basketball games). Coaches have gone into their own pockets for thousands of dollars over the years in order to buy uniforms, equipment and basic operating expenses. We have tried a variety of fund raising schemes, but in an impoverished community, such efforts have had limited success and are a great distraction from academics, which our students can ill afford. We have considered requiring our athletes to subsidize the program by paying a fee of $25 to $50 each. This may seem a small amount of money but to a number of these young men and women it is unattainable. We are a tremendously successful school. Not only have we turned around the lives of many young people over the years. We are academically among the top high schools in the city. We have about 80 athletes. They deserve the experience of interscholastic sports. Our boys and girls soccer and basketball teams are gearing up for a new season but are without any officially approved balls in good enough condition to use in home games. We need a sufficient supply of NFHS-approved game balls for boys basketball, girls basketball, and soccer.

Mr. S. Middle College Senior High School Grades 9-12

Equity Focus

This project directly supports students at a historically underfunded school. Learn more about our Equity Focus.

This project will directly impact historically underfunded classrooms.

More about Mr. S.

Los Angeles, CA View local requests

Nearly all students from low‑income households Data about students' economic need comes from the National Center for Education Statistics, via our partners at MDR Education. Learn more

70 students impacted 5donors

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Where Your Donation Goes

Where your donation goes
Materials Cost Quantity Total
BRINE NCAA PHANTOM SOCCER BALL (SET OF 3) • Cannon Sports Inc $100.26 2 $200.52
CIF Approved Men's ZK Microfiber Composite Tan TF 1000 Spalding Basketball • Cannon Sports Inc $30.25 4 $121.00
SPALDING TF 1000 WOMEN'S OFFICIAL BASKETBALL OF CIF, ZK LEATHER COMPOSITE • Cannon Sports Inc $30.49 2 $60.98

Materials cost

$382.50

Vendor shipping charges

 $38.25

Sales tax

 $27.73

3rd party payment processing fee

$9.56

Fulfillment labor & materials

$17.00

Total project cost

$475.00

Suggested donation to help DonorsChoose reach more classrooms

$104.27

Total project goal

$579.27

How we calculate what's needed

Total project goal

 $579.27

3 Donors

-$508.75

Donations toward project cost

-$475.00

Donations to help DonorsChoose reach more classrooms

-$33.75

Excluded support for DonorsChoose

-$70.52

Still needed View calculationHide calculation

 $0.00

Our team works hard to negotiate the best pricing and selections available.

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