where scheduled activities and events take place. All of these opportunities add up and help youth achieve the recommended amounts of daily physical activity.
and volunteer coaches with practice plans for all ages and skill levels to ensure that every experience includes wellorganized, progressive skill building.
Additionally, Clubs provide youth with access to sport leagues and organized sports programs. These programs ensure that all youth, regardless of gender, income or skill level, can experience high-quality youth sports. Partnerships with uniform and equipment suppliers provide free or discounted uniforms and gear required for practices and games. These offerings help decrease financial barriers that may prohibit families from participating in sports.
The U.S. Soccer Foundation recently adapted its soccer curriculum for Clubs. The program introduces youth to the sport in a supportive environment by focusing on individual skill progression and social-emotional development. Each session teaches youth fundamental soccer skills while blending in nutrition education and social-emotional skills like decision making, impulse control and perseverance. These skills are integrated in program sessions through group agreements, emotional check-ins, youth-led pickup games, warm-ups and reflections. The health and nutrition information is integrated seamlessly during practice, with youth learning about healthy foods that will give them more energy without interrupting the physical activity.
Clubs also intentionally address gender and age-related disparities. In the Takeover Thursday initiative, for example, Thursdays are dedicated to physical activity and sports for girls. Offerings include female-only open gym time, league games, or having a female athlete host a fitness class. Staff consult young people to design activities that meet their interests, such as escape rooms and step contests. Clubs are placing more emphasis on lifelong physical activities, such as yoga, dance and canoeing or hiking, to help youth find their favorite way to stay active beyond their years as a Club member. PHYSICAL ACTIVITY SUPPORTS SOCIAL-EMOTIONAL SKILL BUILDING Physical activity also enables youth to practice and build social-emotional skills such as perseverance, decision making and stress management.89 Club members learn perseverance when they repeatedly practice a new or challenging skill, like jumping rope, and how to cope and keep on going if they lose a game. They also practice decision-making during games when they think about how to get around a defender or make a good pass to a teammate. Partnerships between BGCA and sports organizations like Jr. National Basketball Association and National Football League Flag Football provide Club staff
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202O NATI O NA L O U TC O M ES RE P O RT
BOYS & G IRL S CLUB S OF A M ERICA
