A DECADE OF SUPPORTING TEACHERS
The College Football Playoff Foundation Has Left an Indelible Impact on Education and the Teaching Profession Over the Last 10 Years
BY DAVID LEEYou can’t watch college football today without seeing that green apple with a football imprint on it at some point. The Extra Yard for Teachers logo is synonymous with empowering teachers and supporting students across the country.
Extra Yard for Teachers is the College Football Playoff (CFP) Foundation’s community outreach arm. It’s entering its 10th year and has become the largest sports entity dedicated to supporting teachers. Whether it’s equipping teachers with critical resources, advancing STEM programs, fueling national recognition platforms, or helping revolutionize the
classroom experience, the true lasting positive impact is immeasurable. But a few key metrics can help quantify what’s been accomplished so far.
Since its inception, the CFP Foundation and its partners have invested $70 million toward advancing education, supported more than 500,000 teachers, reached 10 million students, and has benefited 55,000 schools. The growth has been exponential, but its humble origin, coinciding with the launch of the College Football Playoff for the 2014 season, was an ambitious experiment
to elevate the teaching profession through resources, recognition, professional development and recruitment and retention.
The growth has been exponential
“When we were considering whether to try this experiment — using a big platform like the College Football Playoff to solve social challenges and needs like education — we weren’t absolutely sure at the time,” said CFP Foundation Executive Director Britton Banowsky. “Education got identified because the College Football Playoff is an extension of higher education. We realized that teachers in particular needed support, and they still need support there. They are generally underrecognized, and the prestige in the profession is not where it should be. Narrowly focusing on educators and education has helped us drive impact in a way that we know we’re making a difference.”
EXPONENTIAL IMPACT THROUGH PARTNERSHIPS
Education is a cornerstone for strong communities. It’s the basis of self-empowerment, economies, employment opportunities and civic engagement. As the CFP Foundation’s impact started to take off,
locking arms with partners throughout college football, media and other various philanthropy organizations helped expand the reach exponentially.
“As we evolved, we got into providing a significant amount of resources for teachers in the classrooms,” Banowsky said. “We developed a lot of programming to support the mission. The last five to seven years have been about scaling the work through our partners.”
The CFP Foundation began leveraging the larger platform of college football, and today partners with
every FBS conference and their member institutions and every bowl game, plus ESPN, conference networks and corporate partners such as Dr Pepper, Eckrich, and Cheez-It. Thanks to its partnership with the DonorsChoose platform that allows teachers to submit requests for specific classroom needs, the CFP Foundation can better ensure that funding does directly to the teachers that need it and for what they need the most to support their students.
“Without that kind of support, we couldn’t get it done,” Banowsky said of the partners. “The conferences plus Notre Dame have been unbelievably generous and supportive of this work over the years.”
ACCUMULATED IMPACT
$70M IN SUPPORT 500K TEACHERS SUPPORTED
10M STUDENTS REACHED
55K SCHOOLS BENEFITED
As we evolved, we got into providing a significant amount of resources for teachers in the classrooms.
BRITTON BANOWSKY
Early on, Extra Yard for Teachers Week was created to honor teachers in local communities at the beginning of the school year. Teacher Appreciation Week is in May, but Banowsky thought it would be nice to honor and encourage teachers as they were getting back into the classroom. Universities and conferences quickly joined in to support it, while ESPN and conference networks started to highlight teachers and broadcast special donations. Organizations across the country outside of football have also participated.
Three years ago, the Big Day for Teachers was added during Extra Yard for Teachers Week as a singleday concerted effort of community impact across the extended college football family. Millions of dollars in investments are announced that day, and thousands of people support teachers in multifaceted ways. Grants are announced, finalists for the National Teachers Hall of Fame are highlighted, and student-athletes and coaches surprise teachers and tell stories of the impact those educators have made.
LASTING CHANGE
The CFP Foundation’s work aims to impact communities long term. Whenever the next College Football Playoff National Championship location is announced, the work immediately begins by identifying specific needs in local schools. Through the mission, complete technology centers have been created, gardens have been built and teacher retention and recruitment campaigns to fill classroom vacancies have been greatly improved. Looking back over the last decade, Banowsky said that providing classroom resources stands out as the most impactful, filling the gap between what educators have in the classroom and what they need to be successful.
“We pride ourselves in the way we approach the legacy work in these communities, because we go in really early, engage, and try to be really good listeners about the needs of the community,” Banowsky said. “We’ve had some amazing stories, whether it’s college readiness in Tampa or literacy in Atlanta or the recruitment and retention of teachers in New Orleans. It’s hard to make change in the education space in a couple months. It takes years to get the outcomes you’re looking for. That’s why we go in early and stay late.”
The College Football Playoff Foundation and ESPN have teamed up for 10 years to recognize great teachers. This December, we will be doing even more to support schools through a new initiative — Touchdown for Teachers. For every touchdown scored during a college football bowl game, teachers will earn $1,000 toward classroom resources for their students.
For the 2021 national championship game in Miami, the CFP Foundation began work years prior when the South Florida location was announced as a host. Nearly 50 middle schools in Miami-Dade County and surrounding areas were identified for turning outdated libraries into technology centers. Despite navigating the COVID-19 pandemic in the 2020 season, by the time the national championship game was played, half of the library makeovers were completed.
“They’re used year after year after year to the next generation of students,” said Orange Bowl CEO Eric Poms, who grew up in the Miami area attending public schools. “So, we estimate there’s approximately 30,000 students and teachers between Miami-Dade County, Broward County and Palm Beach County that would be impacted by these facility upgrades. We couldn’t do this without the CFP Foundation.
I have an incredible sense of gratitude to Britton [Banowsky], the CFP Foundation, Bill Hancock and the CFP, the board of managers, and the management committee for giving us this capacity.”
This season’s title game comes to Houston, and it’s one of the largest undertakings in the CFP Foundation’s history. The Houston Loves Teachers initiative was created to envelope the work happening there. It has involved more than 15,000 educators in the area so far.
EXPANSION AHEAD
As the College Football Playoff enters its 10th season of a four-team tournament, it will evolve into a 12-team bracket next year. The playoff expansion presents new opportunities, more fan and media attention, increased revenue, and a larger impact for the CFP Foundation.
Poms said a 12-team playoff will bring a CFP game to the South Florida community every year through the semifinal and quarterfinal rotation, which offers more opportunities to partner with the Extra Yard for Teachers program.
“If you have 12 teams, obviously there’s going to be a whole lot more opportunity to raise awareness and funding,” Banowsky said. “So, we see growth in revenue, but we also see growth in our potential to make an impact during the early rounds of the Playoff by investing in the communities that are hosting and expanding our overall postseason footprint.”
Historian Henry Adams once wrote that “a teacher affects eternity: he can never tell where his influence stops.” If that’s true, then the impact of the CFP Foundation will never cease, either. What it’s planting—along with its many partners—in communities across the country will ripple through generations.
Houston
