As the board and staff of Philadelphia Youth Basketball are working diligently to assemble the pieces of a $25 million capital campaign to 
construct a world-class youth basketball and education center in North Philadelphia, we are ensuring that citizens of all ages and from every community from throughout the Philadelphia region have an opportunity to help make this center a reality.
We are indeed building “brick by brick” by assembling a wide and robust group of contributors who share our youth and community empowerment mission.
On Martin Luther King, Jr. weekend beginning Friday, January 20, PYB will be hosting a regional basketball tournament at the Germantown Friends School. The tournament is unique in several respects:
#1 – Of the 16 boys and girls middle school teams, each “flight” of four teams will have an independent school team, a Philadelphia public or charter school team, a suburban public school team, and a city or suburban Archdiocesan school team. The geographic and demographic diversity of participants will be extraordinary.
#2 – We will host a leadership dinner in early December for all of the team captains and coaches to explain the tournament, as well as the mission and future intentions of PYB for young people in Philadelphia and the surrounding counties. We will also rollout our PYB foul shot-a-thon at the dinner.
#3 – All players from each team (as well as other students from their respective schools if desired) will participate in a foul shot-a-thon in January which will be led by the co-captains of each team. This leadership development experience will have all players, in the weeks leading up to the actual foul shot-a-thon, gather “per shot pledges” for the number of foul shots out of 100 made at the actual shot-a-thon. The pledges will be tracked on a designated web page, and the proceeds will cover not only the costs of tournament participation, but more importantly will literally empower the young people to play a substantial role in the building of our center, “brick by brick.” To recognize their leadership, a commemorative brick with be placed in the walkway leading into our center once constructed. This “youth participation” fits squarely into our “all in” community mobilizing and fundraising approach to build a world-class youth basketball and education center with and for the our city and region.
If you know of a girls or boys middle school team who would like to participate in this tournament and fundraising activity, please click this link for registration materials. These young people will be helping to build a center which they and thousands of other student-athletes will be able come to in a few years for academic, athletic, and leadership development.
By Kenny Holdsman, President & CEO