Bengal Club 2010
If you care about sports and education, read this ESPN article about an inspiring girls JV softball game this spring in Indianapolis – a game that ended after 1 and 1/2 innings when the winning team (!) offered to forfeit. Roncalli High School, a well-to-do perennial softball powerhouse, was in the process of trouncing Marshall, an inner-city school which had just started its softball team and had nothing in the way of experience, coaching and equipment. The Roncalli girls, who hadn’t lost in over 2 years, were willing to forfeit because they wanted “to spend the two hours teaching the Marshall girls how to get better, not how to get humiliated.” Marshall desperately wanted to finish their first game, but ultimately decided that they would forfeit, deciding that “this one time — losing was actually winning.” After that, the real magic started. Players from both teams broke into groups, teaching/learning how to hit, throw and run. Kids from very different places and very different situations, instantly came together over their love of learning how to play the game. Even the umps hung around. Please read the whole thing.
The study of sport is at the very heart of Burke. It extends far beyond the finish line, the final buzzer or the last out. It’s a study of what lies within the heart of each of the players and the team. Every year, every season and every game, players, coaches and fans explore what it really means to “try out,” to compete, to coach and be coached. Players learn what to take away from a loss and from a win – on their own and and with their team.
Last night, the Burke community came together at the Sports Banquet to
"I Believe That We...!"
celebrate the year in sports. Listening to the words of Coach McQ, the other coaches, and the athletes (Maya and Will, The Machine), watching their faces, the high-fives, the cheers and the hugs – you could see that over the year, on and off the field, the athletes studied and gradually had begun to fill in their own definitions of “winning.” At the end of the event, photos of the past athletic year played on the huge screen in the atrium. With each picture, the crowd erupted with a boom of tremendous whoops, laughter and tears, which you could feel as much as hear. With each slide you literally felt that the definition of ‘winning’ includes the caring, giving, excelling, supporting, celebrating and learning that is involved with insuring that everyone can play.
Click here to see more photos at Burkepix.
