San Diego's Arden Pala named "SportsKid of the Year"
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Sports4Kids' sports clinic at Perkins Elementary in Barrio Logan. Photo: Courtesy Sports4Kids
San Diego is home to Sports Illustrated's 2024 SportsKid of the year.
Why it matters: Arden Pala, a 15-year-old sophomore at Francis Parker School, turned the spark of an idea four years ago into a nonprofit that provides free sports clinics to low-income schools.
How it happened: Pala was volunteering to read to kids at Perkins Elementary when the principal mentioned the Barrio Logan school no longer had a full-time athletics coach.
- Driving back to Rancho Bernardo, he told his mom his idea, and a few weeks later he started offering a weekly after-school basketball clinic for interested students.
- "At the end of year, kids started asking if I was coming back next year," Pala said. "They loved the sports clinic we hosted, and the kids I coached had become a close-knit group of friends."
The big picture: That clinic has grown into Sports4Kids, a nonprofit that has raised over $300,000 to introduce kids to sports.
- Quickly, Pala recognized the size of the void: He contacted 12 other schools with a majority of low-income students, and none of them had after-school athletics either.
- "That's when I realized this could be something," Pala said. "But we had no money and no nonprofit setup."
- He got started with a $1,000 microgrant from Youth Service America, which he used to jump start the program, hiring an adult coach to run practices with him.
What's next: He's now focusing on increasing his budget enough to hire one more coach, enough to offer clinics in eight schools.
- Sports4Kids is also launching a "gear up initiative," collecting sports equipment and donating it to schools and YMCAs.
- After he graduates in two years, Pala plans to go to college on the East Coast — NYU is his dream school — and managing the coaches and clinics, plus the team of volunteers he's built, from there doesn't seem realistic. He's looking for a successor to keep running the nonprofit.
Fun fact: One of the kids who attended the second season of Pala's lessons this year made his varsity basketball team as a freshman.
- In May, Pala received the Presidential Lifetime Achievement Award for his volunteerism.
- San Diego has also proclaimed Feb. 23 "Arden Pala Day."
- Talk about good company: Sports Illustrated's 2020 SportsKid of the Year was Juju Watkins, now a superstar for USC women's basketball.