Boston CITs after a clinic at Camp Hale.

BTSNE completed its Boston Coaches in Training (CIT) program! Once again, it was a time filled with learning, growth, and development across various areas.

As our students get ready to head back to school here in Boston, we wanted to take some time to share with you all what our exceptional students experienced and accomplished over the last six weeks – both in the community and on the mat.

This summer, 14 wrestlers from seven different Boston-area schools participated in the BTSNE CIT program. The goals of this program include building leadership skills, fostering connections to local communities, building college, career, trade, and service skills, and developing leadership through coaching wrestling.

In a typical week, our Boston CITs would coach one to two youth wrestling events at community centers, engage in one or two days of training and personal development, and spend another day or two engaged in service activities with local community partners.

Here is a snapshot of what our summer looked like.

Boston CITs with the staff at the Travis Manion Foundation.

Russell Community Center
in West Cambridge

Our CITs led wrestling sessions for groups of about 15 to 20 kids aged seven to 13 and helped build a positive culture around wrestling. The CITs rotated responsibility as project leaders for our weekly sessions.

In each session, CITs took ownership of building the practice plan, communicating it to other CITs, assigning responsibilities, and ensuring the successful completion of tasks. The CITs built many positive relationships fellow students at the Russell Center.

Camp Hale

Camp Hale is a summer camp in the Lakes Region of New Hampshire run by United South End Settlements. Camp Hale graciously hosted our CITs for an overnight trip to New Hampshire to stay at Camp Hale for the sixth year in a row. The CITs ran a wrestling session in the afternoon and then facilitated a round-robin style wrestling tournament between the campers.

The CITs took advantage of the opportunity to further their leadership skills by observing and learning from the rituals and routines at camp.

Boston CIT Dante Shepherd coaching at the Russell Community Center.

Thornton Street Urban Farm and the Margaret Wright Community Garden

Our kids maintained two community gardens over the past several months at the Thornton Street Urban Farm and the Margaret Wright Community Garden. In doing so, CITs planted tomatoes, Buena Mulata peppers, Purple Kale, Dino Kale, and various herbs at these gardens. This summer’s often-rainy weather was very friendly to gardening, which led our CITs to have a solid harvest when all was said and done.

Also, on the gardening front, we continued our ongoing association with
Haley House
. Haley House runs summer training for teens called
Take Back the Kitchen (TBK)
, where they teach gardening and cooking skills through hands-on learning experiences. Our CITs participated in a TBK training where they harvested produce (from the Thornton Street community garden), then participated in a cooking class where they prepared lunch.

The CITs learned practical cooking skills and expanded their palette with healthy, sustainable cuisine.

Boston CIT Dante Shepherd at the Margaret Wright Community Garden.

This summer’s final gardening-related partnership experience was the CIT visit to
the Boston Children’s Museum
rooftop garden. Here, our CITs used the gardening skills and knowledge built throughout the summer to help teach younger children about harvesting and interacting with plants in this garden. The rooftop garden was harvesting carrots that day, and our CITs mentored the younger children, helping them select and pick produce.

The CITs also participated in
the Kindness Leaders exhibit
of the museum, which highlights young people who take the initiative to spread kindness in their communities.

While we at BTSNE are thankful for the continued support of our longest-standing community partners, all of whom we hope to work with again in the future, we are equally as excited to shed some light on some new partnerships built this summer, which include
Impact Boston
and the
South Boston Neighborhood House.

Our Boston CITs at the Boston Children’s Museum rooftop garden.

Impact Boston

Impact Boston led a unique class about self-defense and healthy relationships. Instructors from Impact Boston showed our CITs how real-world self-defense skills can be used in various dangerous and threatening situations.

As a group, we also engaged in reflective discussions to identify patterns of abuse, unhealthy attitudes toward relationships, and ways to support others who may be victims of abuse. Overall, it proved to be very educational and insightful.

Our students receive instruction and discuss proper self-defense techniques with leaders from Impact Boston.

South Boston Neighborhood House

Another new partner this summer was South Boston Neighborhood House, an organization that runs a variety of youth programming in South Boston.

We partnered with them for a one-day beach wrestling event at Carson Beach, where our CITs led a clinic and short tournament in beach wrestling.

A critical skill our CITs developed this summer was adapting to different wrestling styles and different programming contexts, so leading a day entirely focused on beach wrestling afforded many opportunities for creativity and clever planning.

Lynn Shore Showdown

Speaking of beach wrestling, we cannot forget the Eighth Annual Lynn Shore Showdown, our beach wrestling tournament hosted at Nahant Beach in Lynn, Massachusetts.

Boston CIT Navid Hodjat at the 2023 Lynn Shore Showdown earlier this month.

Our CITs took leadership in planning and executing the day’s activities, including registration, concessions, weigh-in, refereeing, and even wrestling in the tournament. The Lynn Shore Showdown is a great day of community building across BTSNE and our CITs helped deliver an upbeat day of wrestling on the beach. This year,

The Showdown had participants from across New England, including Massachusetts, Providence, and Connecticut.

To wrap things up for the summer, our Boston CITs supported our longtime community partner
HYCC Roxbury
at their Back-to-School Block Party! It was a wonderful community event with carnival games, ice cream, activities, and even an inflatable water slide!

The CITs helped by running the food tables, supervising games, and monitoring the water slide. We are grateful to our partners at Hawthorne Youth and Community Center (HYCC Roxbury) for continuing to support BTSNE and helping strengthen our students’ connections to the community.

BTSNE would like to give a special thank you to
Lucas Johnson
and
Tori Orender
, both of whom worked with our team at BTSNE while home from college for the summer. Lucas and Tori worked extensively with our CITs and supported all our kids over the last six weeks. Best of luck to Lucas (Williams College) and Tori (Western New England University) during their upcoming wrestling seasons.

BTSNE staff members Tori Orender and Lucas Johnson.

In the end, our Boston CITs felt overwhelmingly positive about their experiences this summer, and believe that they have sharpened a variety of skills relevant to their daily lives and future success.

Many have expressed interest in continuing with BTSNE as coaches as they grow older, graduate high school, and move on to other challenges.

We are excited to continue supporting the young people who have participated in our CIT program since its inception and look forward to seeing them continue to grow.

Because of your generous and continued support, BTSNE is proud to provide our athletes with unique competition and experiential opportunities on and off the mat. None of this would be possible without your help!

Thank you to all our community partners and our 14 Boston CITs!

Our CITs:
Luke Etheridge, Dante Shepherd, Michae Tavares, Yousef Hassan, Ezana Molla, Oscar Ali, Aydin Hodjat Navid Hodjat, Declan Bligh, Rafael Maya, Anthony Bitencourt, Anjue Liang, Samuel Flood, Quinn Bowles

Boston CITs Anthony Bitencourt, Declan Bligh, and Rafael Maya enjoying the HYCC Roxbury Block Party.

Thank you for an amazing summer!!!