Welcome to the KCARE Newsletter! We are excited to provide quarterly updates on events, discussions, and fundraising efforts in our goal to promote racial equity. We are honored to have your attention. The KCARE website officially launched in April and we received some exciting donations! Thank you very much to our donors.
TRAVELING WITH KCARE
Providing Experiences Outside of Louisville, KY
KCARE’s annual Michigan trip is coming up in June. From June 13-17th, the varsity basketball teams for Waggener and Atherton will travel north to Glen Arbor, MI to play in a summer tournament and explore the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Park. Glen Lake High School will host the tournament that will include teams from Detroit and Northern Michigan. We are looking to build on the success from last year’s trip and have added a few teams to join in the experience. In addition to playing basketball and spending time with athletes from different communities, the kids will get to kayak, climb dunes, swim in the lake, and enjoy nature in “The Most Beautiful Place in America.”
KCARE is also planning a trip in the Fall to take kids on a visit to an HBCU campus. We are hoping to include a football game between two HBCU schools as part of the experience. We think this will be a fun way to reward kids that are doing well in the classroom and on the playing field.
PARTNERSHIPS IN TEACHING
Encouraging Black athletes into the education field
Last week the KCARE team met with leadership within the Louisville Jefferson County Public Schools (JCPS) to discuss recruiting Black male athletes into the education field. Per the National Center for Education Statistics, just 2% of teachers in the US are Black men. A 2017 study by the Institute of Labor Economics found that low-income Black students who have a Black teacher–man or woman–for at least one year in elementary school are less likely to drop out of high school and more likely to consider college. As coaches in Louisville, we have direct access to Black male athletes that would like to stay involved in high school athletics. We want to encourage them toward the education field to become teachers and administrators. We are looking forward to working with JCPS on their recruiting initiatives to see if we can help improve these important statistics.
