On March 9th, on the East side of Austin, 6 professional and Olympic athletes took time out of their busy schedules to visit Brooke Elementary, to encourage kids to exercise and stay active. Brooke Elementary is a neighborhood school where 96% of the student body qualifies for free or reduced lunch. It is also a community of kids and administrators who are trying new and innovative ideas to keep kids engaged and learning. With this in mind, we connected former WNT soccer star and Olympian Kristine Lilly, former NFL player Octavious Bishop, Olympic Decathlete Trey Hardee and Olympians Sanya Richards Ross, Kendra Chambers and Fiona Asigbee with the kids. First, the athletes stood up and shared a little about themselves. Octavious shared his struggle in academics as a child and how he was able to turn it around and earn his PHD. Trey Hardee talked about being cut from his basketball team, only to become a gold medal winning Olympian. Their inspirational stories were followed up with fun physical activities with the athletes. We truly enjoyed facilitating this athlete visit – the largest visit of this type we have ever coordinated. Hats off to Brooke Elementary students and administrators for making us feel so welcome.
