Project Play Summit 2024

July 2024 newsletter

Featured highlights:

  • Watch philanthropist and new Baltimore Orioles owner David Rubenstein interview our Tom Farrey on how the country can lift youth sport participation rates to 63% by the end of the decade

  • Read about the NCAA league that could save the Olympic sport pipeline

  • Dive into insights about how school coaches prepare for and experience their roles, from our recently published National Coaching Survey

  • and more…

June 2024 newsletter

Featured highlights:

  • Read the 63x30 press release and learn about our national roundtable’s plan to raise youth sport participation to 63% by 2030

  • Watch the 63x30 Project Play Summit session where our panel explored the value of organizations mobilizing at all three levels — national, state and local

  • Embrace the Ripken Way as Cal Jr. and son Ryan offer guidance on how to be a sports parent

  • and more…

Project Play Summit 2024 Recap: State of Play featuring Maryland Gov. Wes Moore

The Project Play Summit closed with an inspiring perspective on how one state is leading the charge of organizing and supporting the growth of youth sports. 

Maryland Gov. Wes Moore discussed the value of sports in his life and for children, along with the role of government to help provide access. Joined by moderator Greg Olsen, Moore said his passion to use his platform to benefit youth sports came from being impacted as a child through playing sports.

Project Play Summit 2024 Recap: Service Learning Through Sports, featuring Josie Portell and Rishan Patel

Inspired by the School Sports Equity Toolkit, the Aspen Institute’s Service Learning through Sports is a one-year program that provides micro-grants and mentorship programming to select U.S. high school students who lead, or aim to lead, a project or initiative addressing an issue of sports access. At the Project Play Summit, two high school students explained how they are making a difference for their communities and teammates.

Project Play Summit 2024 Recap: Catch Her If You Can, featuring Diana Flores

Like the trajectory of women’s sports in the U.S. today, Diana Flores seems to be faster and more elusive than anybody who can keep up with her.

The captain and quarterback of Mexico’s national flag football team joined USA Today’s Christine Brennan at the Project Play Summit for insights into ways to engage girls from Hispanic families. Hispanic girls are often the most elusive, and underserved, populations of youth in sports.

Project Play Summit 2024 Recap: The Key to 63, featuring Christina Hixson, Kim Hegardt & Kevin Martinez

Just 54% of youth in the U.S. played on a sports team or took sports lessons in 2022. At the Project Play Summit, the Aspen Institute challenged its Project Play network to embrace a goal of 63% by 2030 – an outcome that research shows would unlock at least $80 billion in societal benefits.

Project Play Summit 2024 Student Recap: Health Equity in Youth Sports, featuring Mike Locksley, Marci Goolsby & Mayrena Hernandez

Providing qualified athletic trainers to secondary schools, reducing potentially career-ending knee injuries through neuromuscular training, and paying attention to the mental health of athletes were discussed during a Project Play Summit panel on health equity in youth sports.

Project Play Summit 2024 Recap: Baltimore as Beacon with Kevin Plank

Baltimore may not be his hometown, but Under Armour Founder and CEO Kevin Plank is committed to the city. With an ambitious project to raise high school graduation rates in Baltimore public schools and a new company headquarters opening in the fall, Plank is using the brand he built to energize a city he loves.

At the Project Play Summit on May 15, Plank discussed Project Rampart, an initiative Under Armour started in 2017 that has renovated Baltimore school gyms and outfitted every varsity athlete and coach in the city with uniforms.

Project Play Summit 2024 Recap: Children’s rights, youth sports policy take center stage

BALTIMORE, Maryland – Maryland became the first state to sign the Children’s Bill of Rights in Sports after Governor Wes Moore endorsed a framework that all youth should have the opportunity to develop as people through sports.

“Some of my earliest memories are on a basketball court in the Bronx, where it was a place of escape,” Moore said May 15 at the Project Play Summit, the Aspen Institute’s annual youth sports conference. “It was a place where you felt safe. It was a place where you met some of your lifelong friends. It was a place where you learned all the beautiful things you can learn from team sports – how to win properly, how to lose properly, the importance of being able to trust the people to your left and right and make sure you’re practicing so they can trust you back.”

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Maryland pioneers model that brings soccer into high-poverty schools

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TAKOMA PARK, Maryland – It’s 3:40 pm on a fall afternoon, and as classes let out, about 40 children flood into the outdoor patio at Rolling Terrace Elementary School. They come for snacks and soccer and receive life lessons along the way.

On this day, many are antsy to play soccer, tying their free cleats and chatting loudly with friends rather than listening to their mentors discuss what optimism and persistence mean. Lukas Barbieri, a high school student who is the youngest of Rolling Terrace’s soccer mentors, eventually quiets the kids down.

“Does anyone remember what optimism means?” Barbieri asks.

“Helping your friends,” says one child. “Being thoughtful,” adds another.

“Sort of,” Barbieri replies. “Optimism means you have to believe in yourself.”

In a sense, this scene represents what optimism for youth sports looks like.