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Alumni Giving Back - Chicagoland YMCA Fund
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Recently, I challenged myself to think about the times in my life I personally witnessed racial inequality. For me, one of the clearest examples of seeing these two Americas came from an unlikely place: Chicagoland High School football.
I played at Lincoln-Way East where the resources felt endless. The school was vastly white and was made up of students from Mokena and Frankfort, Illinois. My teammates and I would train in a top-notch weight room, run sprints in the a state-of-the-art field house, swim in the an Olympic-sized swimming pool, and eat catered team dinners in our sponsored team gear, excited for the upcoming game.
Game Day would arrive and we would face off against other public schools in cities like Joliet, Dolton, Harvey, or Chicago. Some schools in these communities did not get to play under the Friday Nights Lights like us – it was not allowed. They played on Saturday mornings. Their fields were often surrounded by a barbed-wire fence. Their schools were older and looked much different than ours. Their equipment was older and clunkier. While we had new jerseys about every two years, their jerseys seemed to be the same ones that had been being used for a decade. These teams almost always had fewer coaches and had little practice equipment to be found.
And, without fail, we would absolutely pummel them. Touchdowns, interceptions and sacks for us from the kickoff until the final whistle. The kids were often not in the game shape we were in. It was not rare to win by scores of 70–0. At times, it bordered on being dangerous for the opposing team.
During one particularly intense blowout, my coach checked me in to play defense when the game was practically over. I tackled the quarterback and felt something in his leg shift that felt unnatural. He had broken his leg and was screaming in pain. As the ambulance came onto the field to help him, my teammates congratulated me for the big hit I had made. I felt something inside me shift that day. I remember thinking, “What are we doing here? Why is this happening? What did I just do?” We got back onto the bus back never to return to these neighborhoods until the next year, when it was time for the newest blowout win.
If we can’t even make High School football appear competitive, what do you think was happening in our respective school funding? How do you think their science lab looked compared to ours? How do you think their Arts Department and Band resources stacked up? Do you think their Spanish classes took trips to foreign countries on spring break? What about class sizes? Funding per student? The differences in these schools, located mere miles apart, are equally staggering as they are heartbreaking.
The lopsided scores on those scoreboards represented so much more than a little High School football game. I was on the winning team simply by the divine grace of being born privileged. We celebrated a hollow victory, mostly thanks to a system that was rigged to ensure our own success.
If you participated in athletics in the Lincoln-Way School District, or others like it, you probably experienced things similar to what I described here. So, I’m calling on anyone from the Chicagoland area that can relate to make a difference today.
We have begun a GoFundMe and 100% of the proceeds will support kids in those neighborhoods that often go overlooked. The YMCA of Metropolitan Chicago has served our area for more than 150 years. The mission of the 'Y' in Metropolitan Chicago is to develop strong children, families, and communities across our city and suburbs through academic readiness, character development, violence prevention, and fitness. My hope is that kids can participate in sports and attend day camps with the same resources we took for granted.
I don’t claim to have the answers to what ails our nation, but this is something immediate and impactful that we can do.
With hope for better days ahead,
Tom Plunkett – BLM
I played at Lincoln-Way East where the resources felt endless. The school was vastly white and was made up of students from Mokena and Frankfort, Illinois. My teammates and I would train in a top-notch weight room, run sprints in the a state-of-the-art field house, swim in the an Olympic-sized swimming pool, and eat catered team dinners in our sponsored team gear, excited for the upcoming game.
Game Day would arrive and we would face off against other public schools in cities like Joliet, Dolton, Harvey, or Chicago. Some schools in these communities did not get to play under the Friday Nights Lights like us – it was not allowed. They played on Saturday mornings. Their fields were often surrounded by a barbed-wire fence. Their schools were older and looked much different than ours. Their equipment was older and clunkier. While we had new jerseys about every two years, their jerseys seemed to be the same ones that had been being used for a decade. These teams almost always had fewer coaches and had little practice equipment to be found.
And, without fail, we would absolutely pummel them. Touchdowns, interceptions and sacks for us from the kickoff until the final whistle. The kids were often not in the game shape we were in. It was not rare to win by scores of 70–0. At times, it bordered on being dangerous for the opposing team.
During one particularly intense blowout, my coach checked me in to play defense when the game was practically over. I tackled the quarterback and felt something in his leg shift that felt unnatural. He had broken his leg and was screaming in pain. As the ambulance came onto the field to help him, my teammates congratulated me for the big hit I had made. I felt something inside me shift that day. I remember thinking, “What are we doing here? Why is this happening? What did I just do?” We got back onto the bus back never to return to these neighborhoods until the next year, when it was time for the newest blowout win.
If we can’t even make High School football appear competitive, what do you think was happening in our respective school funding? How do you think their science lab looked compared to ours? How do you think their Arts Department and Band resources stacked up? Do you think their Spanish classes took trips to foreign countries on spring break? What about class sizes? Funding per student? The differences in these schools, located mere miles apart, are equally staggering as they are heartbreaking.
The lopsided scores on those scoreboards represented so much more than a little High School football game. I was on the winning team simply by the divine grace of being born privileged. We celebrated a hollow victory, mostly thanks to a system that was rigged to ensure our own success.
If you participated in athletics in the Lincoln-Way School District, or others like it, you probably experienced things similar to what I described here. So, I’m calling on anyone from the Chicagoland area that can relate to make a difference today.
We have begun a GoFundMe and 100% of the proceeds will support kids in those neighborhoods that often go overlooked. The YMCA of Metropolitan Chicago has served our area for more than 150 years. The mission of the 'Y' in Metropolitan Chicago is to develop strong children, families, and communities across our city and suburbs through academic readiness, character development, violence prevention, and fitness. My hope is that kids can participate in sports and attend day camps with the same resources we took for granted.
I don’t claim to have the answers to what ails our nation, but this is something immediate and impactful that we can do.
With hope for better days ahead,
Tom Plunkett – BLM
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Tom Plunkett
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Chicago, IL
The YMCA of Metropolitan Chicago (ATTN CONTROLLER)
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