THE ELENA BALTACHA FOUNDATION AND SHOES TO SHARE COLLABORATION
Posted 18th Nov
News and Stories by Nino Severino
We continue to relentlessly deliver our tennis road shows, delivering across London, introducing our wonderful game of tennis to more young pupils. It’s wonderful to be able to offer a dual package of objectives, combining tennis with the bonus of free footwear from the ‘Shoes to Share’ foundation, run by the Short family who are now based in America.
Our foundation has a very long relationship with the Short family, Eve Short, the mother of Ellis Short the V, is one of our very valued Ambassadors. Ellis V is committed to the benefit Shoes to Share can offer young children who may not be as fortunate and will struggle to purchase the sports shoes necessary. Not only for tennis, but for PE sessions as well.
Sports shoes can be extremely expensive, and out of the reach of some families who are struggling with the cost-of-living
issues. We aim to continue building this very special relationship with the short family and their foundation ‘Shoes to Share’,
this relationship and collaboration has a very focused objective, to extend support wherever it is needed. The shoes are
transported into the UK, our team pick the shoes up from the depot unit, all the shoes are beautifully presented in bags
arranged by the Shoes to Share staff. We then transport all the shoes to our storage unit and distribute as needed across
our network of schools.
It is truly wonderful to see how appreciative the children are when experiencing the tennis road show content, and the appreciation that all the teachers show our team of coaches.
Our trip to Turnham Academy in London, was once again outstanding. We continue to build on our very strong and very special relationship. The session, as always was full of games and laughter, with the very populate parachute game, which never fails to engage the children in so many ways, physically, mentally and emotionally.
We added the ‘Knock Off’ game, which proved very popular. In this game, all the children start with a racket and ball, working
in a marked-out area. The pupils balance the ball on their racket, with the objective to ensure they protect their ball
from being knocked off by the fellow pupils. The last child standing with the ball still placed on the racket is the
winner.
It’s wonderful to see all the children clapping the winners, showing outstanding sportsmanship and appreciation of performance and success.
As always, it’s wonderful to leave the school with a large stock of sports shoes, for any pupils who need them, and for siblings.
All at the Elena Baltacha Foundation will continue to deliver tennis to children across our network, especially focused on schools in areas of challenge. We would like to thank all the teaching, office and caretaking team at Turnham Academy, for their help, support and appreciation. We cannot wait to return again in 2025.
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