Utah Youth Sports Giving Day to help nonprofits remove barriers to youth sports

PROVO — The sounds are almost constant.

Skateboards rolling across the floor.

Wheels scraping ramps.

Encouragement when someone falls.

It happens over and over again.

Inside the Carry On Foundation's indoor skate park in Provo, though, those falls aren't seen as failures.

Here, they're all part of learning.

"What we're teaching them is they're building that confidence through trying and making a little bit of progress," Cole Parkinson said.

Parkinson, who is the executive director of the Carry On Foundation, used his master's degree in sports psychology to start the nonprofit about two and a half years ago with a different idea of what youth sports could teach.

"Our goal is to teach mental health skills through the art and discipline of skateboarding," he said.

Instead of just helping children learn tricks, Parkinson combines classroom instruction with time on the ramps, using each success and each setback as an opportunity to build confidence.

"We're trying to give all of these kids skills that will build resilience now in their life, so that when they're having a hard conversation at school or taking an important test or playing baseball, whatever it is, they can remember 'Carry On,'" he said.

Parkinson said the goal reaches far beyond skateboarding.

"It's not to make them all Olympians. That's not the mission," he said. "It's really giving them the skills they need to help them live a healthy life."

That mission is one reason the Carry On Foundation is among nearly 80 youth sports nonprofits that have already signed up to participate in Utah Youth Sports Giving Day, a new statewide fundraising campaign led by Miller Sports + Entertainment.

The campaign is designed to help nonprofit organizations that introduce children to sports while removing some of the financial barriers that prevent many families from participating.

"There's such a need to help kids get active and to be able to try sport and there are a lot of barriers to entry to participate with the cost of registration fees," said Jenny Teemsma, vice president of communications and community relations for Miller Sports + Entertainment. "There's also equipment, and there are also barriers of transportation for families that have two parents working full time. It's really hard to figure out the logistics of getting your kid to and from different activities."

Nonprofits can register to participate through Sept. 1, and organizers hope to have 100 organizations involved.

The public fundraising campaign officially begins Sept. 12, when Utahns will be able to visit the Utah Youth Sports Giving Day website, learn about participating nonprofits, and donate directly to the organizations they want to support.

"We will match their donation. The goal is to raise $3 million for youth sports nonprofits across the state, and we have a matching pool of $1.5 million that we've already secured," said Teemsma. "Every dollar matters and it can go a long way. A lot of these nonprofits really stretch the dollar, so even if you think like $5 won't make a difference, I promise it truly will."

For Parkinson, the campaign is about making sure more children have access to programs that teach much more than athletic skills.

"What kind of started our nonprofit is we are seeing the numbers of these kids, these young kids here in Utah, and really all over the world, that are really struggling with mental health skills," he said.

He believes sports can become a place where children learn confidence, resilience and perseverance — the kinds of lessons that stay with them long after they leave the skate park.

"We're seeing the impact," said Parkinson. "We have what's called the lecture and the lab. The lecture happens when we're teaching sports psychology techniques in our mental health classroom here in the park, and the lab is when they come, and they're on the board, and they're trying, and they're failing and they're practicing."

The Carry On Foundation recently opened a second skatepark in South Jordan.

About 500 kids, including some adults, have signed up to be part of the foundation's programs.

"The reason I love skateboarding is because it's an independent sport," said Parkinson. "These kids are accountable for their own success. They can't say the coach didn't put me in the game, or the quarterback didn't throw me the ball. This is up to them to decide if they're willing to move forward with that friction. That's a really important piece of action sports that I love."

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