When Fruitridge Manor resident Katie Silva casually mentioned to a coworker that her son Erik liked to play basketball , her colleague passed on information about a community basketball program called the Kings and Queens Rise Co-Ed Youth Sports and Mentoring League . Led by the Sacramento Kings , Build . Black . and the Black Child Legacy Campaign , the summer basketball league has dual goals of preventing youth violence and creating positive connections and experiences for local youth . Katie quickly signed up her 14-year-old son . Oak Park resident Andrea Jorden did the same for her fifth grade daughter Meiah Tyes . Both mothers like how the program boosts confidence in their kids , teaches them team-building skills and good sportsmanship , and gives them something positive to do during the summer .
The Sacramento Kings is one of several area sports organizations that have launched community programs that are harnessing the power of sports to impact local youth for good . Programs that promote literacy , STEM education and art are offered alongside those that teach positive life skills through the games of basketball , baseball , golf and soccer .
Following an increase in the number of gun violence incidents involving Sacramento youth in 2018 , Sierra Health Foundation launched a series of interventions to address the issue , including partnering with the Sacramento Kings to create the Kings and Queen Rise program , a public , community basketball league for fourth through 10th graders from eight predominantly underserved communities . The program just wrapped up its fifth season and averages 300 players each year , with nearly 100 percent full-season participation .
“ This is more than just sports ,” says Chet Hewitt , president and CEO of Sierra Health Foundation and The Center , which manages Kings and Queens Rise , Build . Black and the Black Child Legacy Campaign . “ The young men and women who participate also get trained and learn how to deescalate situations that could lead to violence , how to show up as a peer mentor and support for their friends and how to win and lose graciously .”
Erik Silva , a Hiram W . Johnson High School freshman , likes how the league involves the community . “ Other teams like AAU ( Amateur Athletic Union ) are private and expensive . This is more of a public and community-type of basketball league . And I ’ m meeting people from all over Sacramento ,” he says .
Each of the eight communities has the opportunity to host a weekend of basketball . “ The players get to see both the vitality and the wonder of these environments and also begin to learn that there are common challenges that they all share as young people . We know that crossing boundaries and building healthy relationships with kids of other communities makes it less likely for those kids to be engaged in violence that sometimes has community orientations to it ,” says Hewitt .
PS7 Elementary School student Meiah Tyes says she really connected with her coaches Isaac and Daisy . “ They bring confidence and teach us how to play basketball .” She was also excited to meet rapper 50 Cent at the Golden 1 Center , which opened the world ’ s first full-service music
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