What Makes a Community? Reflections on 2022-23

It’s easy for me to talk about wrestling.  I live it. I breathe it.  I know it works. I know it changes lives. So why is it so hard for me to describe what exactly we do at Beat the Streets? As we end the 2022-23 year, I find myself struggling for the right words, even while I know it has been a phenomenal year.

Too often, we flip-flop between sports vocabulary (matches, tournaments, practices and state qualifiers) and nonprofit vocabulary (programs, impact, social-emotional learning, theory of change). But neither feels right for us. We are neither a typical sports club doing nonprofit work nor a normal charity-funded youth program doing sports. We are more.

We are a community.

We are a community united by wrestling and reinforced by year-round opportunities to engage and build lasting relationships.  Like any strong community, we look out for each other, ensuring that all wrestlers can access the resources they need to become Life Champions.  Our community is a place to belong for all Chicagoans who share our values and culture.

Strong communities provide a sense of belonging.

Strong communities meet their members’ oft-changing needs.

Strong communities’ members support each other.

Strong communities save lives.

Wrestling is the entry point into our community.  And, we believe wrestling by itself is powerful - the best vehicle for self-improvement, in fact. But beyond wrestling, some of our community members need more. Not everyone needs the same type of support or the same amount of support.  We’re here for our wrestlers, whatever they might need. I suppose we can call these extra support systems programs, but they really are opportunities, created to meet needs, open to all, accessed by many and critical to some.

Some organizations focus on one or two aspects: sports plus tutoring or sports plus mentoring or enrichment in a safe community space. We believe we are alone in the local nonprofit sector offering a combination of all five: sports, academic support, enrichment, mentoring and community.  Yes, we have a programmatic approach to each, but more importantly we customize the experiences we deliver to the needs of each of our community members individually.

How does that play out for us?

Last year, we served 3,000 unique wrestlers who in total registered 4,500 times for our programs, events and activities.  1,700 wrestlers were guest participants at our events.  1,300 we’d call our “Beat the Streets” team.

52% of our team of 1,300 came mostly for the wrestling.  With world-class clinicians and the top coaching staff in Chicago, we’re here for that!  These 675 sports-focused wrestlers received not only phenomenal wrestling instruction available to our whole community, but also the powerful message of our values-based coaching style.

Almost half, or 625 “Impact Wrestlers“ on our Beat the Streets team, accessed additional opportunities and events within our community throughout the year. This is the group for whom we start talking about delivering impact both on and off the mat.

Intensity deepens with engagement. Over 25% of the Impact Wrestlers group, or 160 “High Impact” wrestlers, not only wrestled with us throughout the year, they also took part in a variety of enrichment activities, including academic support, travel, and life skills workshops.

Sometimes, even that isn’t enough. 50% of our 160 High Impact Wrestlers need even more support to become Life Champions.  We do whatever it takes for our 80 “Three-Sixty Wrestlers” which could mean helping them resolve homelessness, work with their families, secure scholarships, access city and state resources, get a ride to practice or simply feel seen.  Whatever they need as individuals.

It’s much easier for me to talk about our community of wrestlers and how deeply they engage with us.  Their stories compel us, their needs drive what we do. Nevertheless, we have to organize ourselves as a business, to ensure that we are offering the highest quality services to anyone in our community who might need them.  I’m delighted to say that we’ve spent a good part of this past year tweaking our organizational structure and putting a strong leadership team in place to do just that.

Wrestling - headed by former World Team Member Patrick Martinez, Coach Martinez focuses on bringing the highest quality wrestling experience to our entire community, from tots to high school, through seasonal programs, clinics and tournaments.  With six primary wrestling sites and the SCORE partnership at twenty Chicago Public Schools, Martinez is able to bring the power of wrestling to youth throughout the City and beyond.  He is joined by Head Men’s Coach Mike Boyd and Head Women’s Coach Sammie Barrientos and a roster of over 200 paid and volunteer coaches.

Enrichment - headed by teacher and wrestler Leila Cleofe, Coach Leila manages our vast menu of enrichment activities, including our flagship Life Champions Academy, camps, college visits, scholarships, and cultural excursions.  Coach Leila’s team also includes the “Three-Sixty Wrestlers” program, which coordinates the myriad of services required to support our community members most in need of additional resources. 

Academic Support - also managed by Coach Leila is our Academic Support Services.  This includes our organized programs such as the After School Tutoring Center and our program that matches individual tutors to wrestlers needing assistance in specific subjects.  It also includes meeting wrestlers’ requests for help on one-off projects, such as a college essay guidance, homework help, assistance with research projects and help enrolling in school or signing up for FAFSA.

Mentoring - our formal mentoring program relies on our Young Professionals, our alumni and our connections within the Chicago wrestling community.  We deliver mentoring both through our Life Champions Academy and one:one matching of mentors and coaches to wrestlers as part of our “Three-Sixty” program.  Informally, our coaches develop meaningful mentor relationships with individual wrestlers organically throughout the seasons.

Community - the hardest to codify but the most important to changing lives is the sense of community we build at Beat the Streets Chicago.  Our staff, our wrestlers, our families, our donors, our coaches and our supporters all come together in a supportive, affirming place for all of us to belong and celebrate each other.  From formal activities and events to online platforms to impromptu birthday parties to friendships to ensuring that every youth has a positive adult relationship: we are a year-round culture-first community doing everything we can to match resources to the needs of our youth wrestlers so that they may go on to become Life Champions.

It takes structure and resources to manage our community. In addition to coaches Patrick, Leila, Mike and Sammie, we’re thrilled to have on our team Ian Rose as Director of Facilities and Events, Cathy Yen as Director of Strategy and Finance, Hannah Weigel as Development Coordinator, Justin Hames as Marketing Coordinator, Alex Madrigal as Assistant Enrichment Coordinator, Chris Helm as Facilities and Program Associate and Ryan Cone as our Administrative Assistant. We’re shortly going to announce our newest hire who will manage our tutoring center and Three-Sixty Program as well as announce the dozen incoming Up2Us coaches for the 2023-24 year.  These are the people who hold our community together.

So, let’s try this again:

What is Beat the Streets Chicago?

We are a vibrant community accessed through wrestling and organized to help our community members get what they need to become Life Champions.

What do we do?

Whatever we can; whatever it takes; whatever our members are looking to us to provide.

How do we know it is working?

3,000 wrestlers participated in our community last year.

1,300 of these wrestlers call themselves “Beat the Streets” wrestlers.

625 of our Beat the Streets wrestlers are here for more than just wrestling.

160 of our wrestlers seeking additional resources are deeply engaged year-round in both wrestling AND enrichment activities.

80 of these wrestlers need three hundred and sixty degrees of support, which we do our best to provide.

We must be doing something right.

Thank you to each and every member of the Beat the Streets Chicago community.  You are Beat the Streets and we are here for you.