University of Minnesota Athletics
Golden Gopher Tennis Gives Back
1/13/2003 12:00:00 AM | Men's Tennis
While that sounds like a pretty good use for the facility, the tennis lessons are intended for a much more important purpose. The tennis is being used in conjunction with a tutoring program, which targets improvement in students' academic and athletic achievement.
The Brooklyn Center Junior/Senior High School (BCJHS) Tennis and Tutoring Program is the brainchild of Jill Watson, a teacher of English Language Learners and her husband, Marty Johnson, a USPTA tennis pro.
The school system is faced with the same difficult issues as other metro area schools, but Brooklyn Center Junior and Senior High Schools have been identified as having a challenged or at-risk student population in several areas including special needs, language background, academic and athletic achievement and racial segregation. In addition, as much as 30 percent of the student body comes from refugee and immigrant backgrounds.
Just over two months old, the BCJHS Tennis and Tutoring Program was created to help deal with those issues. The program has reached its maximum level of participants of 30 with 20 of those students being immigrants or refugees.
"We wanted to create (this program) to get students into a sport that we love," Watson explains. "One of the biggest benefits that I have seen already is so many refugees are interacting with mainstream students. You'll have an honors student sitting down with a refugee student and reading with them or helping them recognize the alphabet."
The program doesn't just bring Brooklyn Center students into closer contact with each other, but also with University of Minnesota students, in this case, Golden Gopher men's and women's tennis players. Members of both teams take part in the Monday sessions, giving up some of their valuable time to give back to the sport they love so much.
One of the regulars is junior Aleksey Zharinov, a junior from Novosibirsk, Russia. Zharinov is currently ranked 58th in the nation and is one of the leaders of a talented Golden Gopher men's tennis team.
"This is a lot of fun," Zharinov said. "It is great to help out these kids. Not being from here, I can understand what some of them are going through."
How the University of Minnesota got involved with BCJHS requires a trip back in time. Golden Gopher Men's Tennis Head Coach David Geatz and Watson's husband, Marty Johnson, have been friends for nearly their entire lives.
"I've known Marty my entire life," Geatz said. "I grew up in North Dakota and he was raised in Brookings, S.D. We grew up playing tennis together and he's a good friend of mine. When he approached me about this, I didn't hesitate. We hoped that some of their kids would relate to some of our players. We might have the most culturally diverse team on campus."
Ironically, Geatz isn't just helping out Johnson. In some ways, he is paying back his old friend. In the fall of 2000 while Johnson was on staff at Northwest Athletic Club, he was asked to take a look at a player who was at the facility. Impressed by what he saw, he decided to hit with the player and found out he was just visiting from Russia. Johnson called Geatz and told him he should come over and look at the player. A year and a half later, that young man, Aleksey Zharinov, enrolled at Minnesota and is currently one of the Golden Gophers' top players and one of the athletes most involved with the Brooklyn Center Tennis and Tutoring Program.
The University of Minnesota didn't just have top-flight tennis players like Zharinov from places such as Russia, Switzerland and Colombia, it also had a brand-new, state-of-the-art facility.
The Baseline Tennis Center opened its doors in October. Before the facility was constructed, the men's and women's tennis programs at Minnesota commuted to Bloomington every day for their practices and meets.
"We started out by trying to find a facility close to us and it simply was not possible," Watson said. "Without the Baseline Tennis Center, it would be very difficult to hold our program. We're very thankful for the staff there. I don't know if we could've gotten it done without it. We would have needed a miracle."
"For this program to be held somewhere else, I think it would've been too hard for players to participate," Geatz commented. "Most of them do not have a car."
But with the facility and the partnership between Brooklyn Center and the U, both sides are optimistic of the program's prospects. Watson and Johnson established a similar program while living in Sioux Falls, S.D. This past year, it was named National Junior Tennis League Chapter of the Year in the USTA Northern Section. One of its students received a scholarship to work out at Monica Seles' private training facility in Florida.
But it's no secret that the future success and potential expansion of the Tennis and Tutoring Program at Brooklyn Center will depend on the generosity of others. It costs nearly 300 dollars for every Monday trip to the Baseline Tennis Center. The program is free to students, thanks in large part to several cash grants.
"With money and volunteers, you can certainly envision expansion," Watson says. "Marty and I really love doing this because you see how the kids love it. You see how it changes their confidence. We've had one inquiry from another school already. I can see it happening, but it just takes the magic ingredients of money and volunteers"
Any discussion with the program's current volunteers and the future is bright for not only the current group of students, but for many more, down the road.
"In some ways, our players are getting just as much out of this as the kids," Geatz said. "They're putting something back in the game that's been so good to them. A lot of them are on scholarship, get to travel, get great equipment and play in the top facilities. It feels good to help others out and some of the kids really look up to them."
"The kids see a girl student of color teaching them and our students of color look at that and say `I can do this'," Watson added. "For those of us involved in the program, it's not hard to stay committed when you can already see the positives that have come out of it so far. We hope we can one day get more students involved."
For now, the group of 30 students in the BCJHS Tennis and Tutoring Program play on. The tennis lessons are scheduled to run every Monday through the middle of March and the group hopes it can make a field trip to watch their Golden Gopher men and women counterparts when their dual meet seasons start in late January.
Individuals, companies or associations interested in supporting the program by volunteering, in-kind donations (racquets, shoes, balls, etc.), or financial assistance are asked to contact Jill Watson at: jwatson@brookcntr.k12.mn.us, or by phone: 763-561-2120, ext. 421. When the brand-new Baseline Tennis Center was built on the University of Minnesota campus, its benefits for the Golden Gopher men's and women's tennis programs were obvious. It would also serve as a great resource for the University community as well. But certainly one of its greatest contributions can be witnessed late Monday afternoons as a group of students from Brooklyn Center Junior and Senior High School make the trek from their northern suburb to campus for an hour and a half block of tennis lessons.
While that sounds like a pretty good use for the facility, the tennis lessons are intended for a much more important purpose. The tennis is being used in conjunction with a tutoring program, which targets improvement in students' academic and athletic achievement.
The Brooklyn Center Junior/Senior High School (BCJHS) Tennis and Tutoring Program is the brainchild of Jill Watson, a teacher of English Language Learners and her husband, Marty Johnson, a USPTA tennis pro.
The school system is faced with the same difficult issues as other metro area schools, but Brooklyn Center Junior and Senior High Schools have been identified as having a challenged or at-risk student population in several areas including special needs, language background, academic and athletic achievement and racial segregation. In addition, as much as 30 percent of the student body comes from refugee and immigrant backgrounds.
Just over two months old, the BCJHS Tennis and Tutoring Program was created to help deal with those issues. The program has reached its maximum level of participants of 30 with 20 of those students being immigrants or refugees.
"We wanted to create (this program) to get students into a sport that we love," Watson explains. "One of the biggest benefits that I have seen already is so many refugees are interacting with mainstream students. You'll have an honors student sitting down with a refugee student and reading with them or helping them recognize the alphabet."
The program doesn't just bring Brooklyn Center students into closer contact with each other, but also with University of Minnesota students, in this case, Golden Gopher men's and women's tennis players. Members of both teams take part in the Monday sessions, giving up some of their valuable time to give back to the sport they love so much.
One of the regulars is junior Aleksey Zharinov, a junior from Novosibirsk, Russia. Zharinov is currently ranked 58th in the nation and is one of the leaders of a talented Golden Gopher men's tennis team.
"This is a lot of fun," Zharinov said. "It is great to help out these kids. Not being from here, I can understand what some of them are going through."
How the University of Minnesota got involved with BCJHS requires a trip back in time. Golden Gopher Men's Tennis Head Coach David Geatz and Watson's husband, Marty Johnson, have been friends for nearly their entire lives.
"I've known Marty my entire life," Geatz said. "I grew up in North Dakota and he was raised in Brookings, S.D. We grew up playing tennis together and he's a good friend of mine. When he approached me about this, I didn't hesitate. We hoped that some of their kids would relate to some of our players. We might have the most culturally diverse team on campus."
Ironically, Geatz isn't just helping out Johnson. In some ways, he is paying back his old friend. In the fall of 2000 while Johnson was on staff at Northwest Athletic Club, he was asked to take a look at a player who was at the facility. Impressed by what he saw, he decided to hit with the player and found out he was just visiting from Russia. Johnson called Geatz and told him he should come over and look at the player. A year and a half later, that young man, Aleksey Zharinov, enrolled at Minnesota and is currently one of the Golden Gophers' top players and one of the athletes most involved with the Brooklyn Center Tennis and Tutoring Program.
The University of Minnesota didn't just have top-flight tennis players like Zharinov from places such as Russia, Switzerland and Colombia, it also had a brand-new, state-of-the-art facility.
The Baseline Tennis Center opened its doors in October. Before the facility was constructed, the men's and women's tennis programs at Minnesota commuted to Bloomington every day for their practices and meets.
"We started out by trying to find a facility close to us and it simply was not possible," Watson said. "Without the Baseline Tennis Center, it would be very difficult to hold our program. We're very thankful for the staff there. I don't know if we could've gotten it done without it. We would have needed a miracle."
"For this program to be held somewhere else, I think it would've been too hard for players to participate," Geatz commented. "Most of them do not have a car."
But with the facility and the partnership between Brooklyn Center and the U, both sides are optimistic of the program's prospects. Watson and Johnson established a similar program while living in Sioux Falls, S.D. This past year, it was named National Junior Tennis League Chapter of the Year in the USTA Northern Section. One of its students received a scholarship to work out at Monica Seles' private training facility in Florida.
But it's no secret that the future success and potential expansion of the Tennis and Tutoring Program at Brooklyn Center will depend on the generosity of others. It costs nearly 300 dollars for every Monday trip to the Baseline Tennis Center. The program is free to students, thanks in large part to several cash grants.
"With money and volunteers, you can certainly envision expansion," Watson says. "Marty and I really love doing this because you see how the kids love it. You see how it changes their confidence. We've had one inquiry from another school already. I can see it happening, but it just takes the magic ingredients of money and volunteers"
Any discussion with the program's current volunteers and the future is bright for not only the current group of students, but for many more, down the road.
"In some ways, our players are getting just as much out of this as the kids," Geatz said. "They're putting something back in the game that's been so good to them. A lot of them are on scholarship, get to travel, get great equipment and play in the top facilities. It feels good to help others out and some of the kids really look up to them."
"The kids see a girl student of color teaching them and our students of color look at that and say `I can do this'," Watson added. "For those of us involved in the program, it's not hard to stay committed when you can already see the positives that have come out of it so far. We hope we can one day get more students involved."
For now, the group of 30 students in the BCJHS Tennis and Tutoring Program play on. The tennis lessons are scheduled to run every Monday through the middle of March and the group hopes it can make a field trip to watch their Golden Gopher men and women counterparts when their dual meet seasons start in late January.
Individuals, companies or associations interested in supporting the program by volunteering, in-kind donations (racquets, shoes, balls, etc.), or financial assistance are asked to contact Jill Watson at: jwatson@brookcntr.k12.mn.us, or by phone: 763-561-2120, ext. 421.
