VCU news

By Mike Porter

Virginia Commonwealth University’s Lobs & Lessons program and the Center for Sport Leadership are being recognized for teaching children about character development and the importance of pursuing higher education as they also learn about the game of tennis.

The United States Tennis Association/Mid-Atlantic Section awarded its 2010 Community Program of the Year to Lobs & Lessons and the Center for Sport Leadership for hosting the Young Aces Open Tennis Tournament last April.    

The tournament attracted 160 fourth and fifth graders from Richmond public schools.

Tina Carter, director of the Mary and Frances Youth Center and Carrie LeCrom, Ph.D., assistant director of instruction and academic affairs at the Center for Sport Leadership, received the award during a Nov. 20 luncheon in Maryland. 

“This is a wonderful recognition of the work we do in teaching children about tennis and life skills,” Carter said. “They can use these skills in their classrooms and at home. There is a clear link between learning tennis and demonstrating good behavior on and off of the tennis court.”

Lobs & Lessons received another boost in August when the program was accepted as one of eight new provisional members of the National Junior Tennis & Learning’s First Serve Life Skills program.

“It was a natural fit for us to apply and we were ecstatic to get accepted,” Carter said. “By being accepted, we can now use the First Serve Life Skills Curriculum in our efforts to teach the students about tennis and about character.”

The curriculum will be incorporated into a yearlong program for middle school students. The National Junior Tennis & Learning’s First Serve Life Skills program will review the participants’ report cards and monthly progress reports and examine efforts to retain the students.  If at the end of the year, Lobs & Lessons remains a program in good standing, it will become a permanent chapter member.   

Lobs & Lessons is the only National Junior Tennis & Learning First Serve participant from Virginia. First Serve is the largest inner-city youth tennis and education program in the United States outside of the United States Tennis Association.

Lobs & Lessons began in the fall of 2004 with the mission of reaching out to underserved youth in the community by focusing on life skill lessons and the sport of tennis. 

With corporate support and a partnership with the Division of Community Engagement and the Center for Sport Leadership, Lobs & Lessons has reached hundreds of children by offering an after-school and summer enrichment program.