Baltimore Youth Sports Collaborative

February 2025

In 2017, Project Play chose Baltimore for its first State of Play report.  The report attracted a few national sports-based youth development (SBYD) programs to start offering their programs in Baltimore for youth in underserved communities. However, unlike some State of Play cities, no local organization formed to organize these youth sports nonprofits to work together.

In late 2022, Ivan Leshinsky, Co-founder of the Southwest Sports and Fitness Alliance in Baltimore and Rob Smith, Founding Executive Director of the Youth Sports Collaborative Network, agreed to work together to bring Baltimore youth sports organizations together. It eventually became known as the Baltimore Youth Sports Collaborative (BYwhich Rob and Ivan have been co-managing.

Currently, there are 17 youth sports organizations making up the Youth Sports Collaborative Network. Welcome more to join. These organizations fall into 3 categories:

Youth Sports Program Provider: 10:12 Sports, Baltimore Community Rowing, Baltimore SquashWise, Beat the Streets Baltimore, Girls on the Run of the Greater Chesapeake, First Tee – Greater Baltimore, Harlem Lacrosse – Baltimore, Leader Breeders Inc, Lee Lee Kiddz, Peace Players International, Soccer Without Borders, The Loop, Volo Kids Foundation.

 Coach Training: Positive Coaching Alliance, Up2Us.

 Supporting Community Youth Sports: Leveling the Playing Field, Southwest Sports and Fitness Alliance

Collaborative’s Focus: The focus of the Collaborative has been to identify ways to obtain more financial resources for Baltimore sports programs to increase the number of youth participants in their programs.  This first first opportunity was to make sure they were aware of one-time grant from state funds being managed through the Play Sports Coalition. As a result, 8 out of the 13 youth sports program providers in the Collaborative received grants between $10,000 - $20,000.

In September 2023, Rob along with executive directors of two Collaborative sports programs, Abby Markoe of Baltimore SquashWise and Anthony Hudgins of Southwest Sports and Fitness Alliance, met with Lieutenant Governor Aruna Miller to inform her of the various youth sports programs in the greater Baltimore region serving underserved communities and to explore possible options for funding from the state.

Starting October 2023, the Collaborative focused on supporting their youth sports programs to receive funding from Baltimore City Schools. After several meetings and email communications, City Schools made available federal funding in February 2024 for youth sports nonprofits to offer their programs for Middle School students during the 2024 spring session. Seven Collaborative participating organizations, out of a total of 13, received contracts with City Schools to offer their programs.

In October 2024, the Baltimore Mayor's office and Baltimore City Schools announced that building on the 2024 "spring's successful pilot," they wanted to partner with local youth sports vendors again in at least 10 different sports. As of February 2025, City Schools is still finalizing agreements with these vendors to start offering programs in March.

For the latest Directory of the Baltimore Youth Sports Collaborative Organizations, click on Directory of Baltimore Youth Sports Collaborative Organizations Feb 2025.pdf.

For more information contact [email protected].