AUSTIN WILDCATS Basketball, Inc.
4th Annual Toy Drive
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ABOUT THE TOY DRIVE
Over the past six years we have taken numerous Wildcat and Lady Wildcat teams to Southeast Austin to play in basketball leagues outside of our program. I did this for many reasons, but primarily to allow the kids to see the bigger picture of basketball and, more importantly, the bigger picture of life. For the past six years the Dove Springs Recreation Center has become part of the extended Wildcat community. Every year, the recreation center holds a Winter Carnival for those in that community who might not otherwise celebrate the holidays, but they had never been able to give away toys. I decided three of years ago to host a toy drive with a “Saturday Midnight Madness” event and donate all of the toys collected to the Dove Springs Recreation Center. With the help of parents,!
players and coaches we collected over 450 toys for last years Winter Carnival. My ultimate hope, besides giving holiday toys to children who might not otherwise receive them, is to teach the kids in the Wildcat Program that giving is not just writing a check, but seeing a need in your own community and doing what needs to be done to fulfill that need.
THIS YEAR
My plan for our fourth year is to change the format and combine our Annual Shoot-a-thon and Toy Drive with our Fall Midnight Madness Event. Over the years the Shoot-a-thon has been used as a great fundraiser that helped provide money for equipment, scholarships and other program needs. However, our program is on a solid financial foundation and we would prefer to use the Shoot-a-thon format to raise money to purchase toys for our Annual Toy Drive. This way the kids are raising the money themselves by collecting pledges and making baskets. It is important to us that our kids feel like they were responsible for providing toys to these less fortunate kids from our extended community. With your help, we could meet or even SURPASS our goal of raising $4,000.00 that would allow us to purchase 300 toys, and further tailor the donations to specific age groups or even requested toys to better meet the needs of the Dove Sp!
rings community.
MIDNIGHT MADNESS
On Saturday, November 11th we are having our annual Fall Midnight Madness in conjunction with our First ever Shoot-a-thon/Toy Drive. Please print out the Austin Wildcat pledge form that you and your kids can get pledges on. Your child will need to get pledges from family members and friends. The pledges will be for how many shots he or she can make from the free-throw line (the younger kids will be allowed to shoot a little closer) in minute. In the past pledges have ranged from .25 cents per shot made to much more. I believe our best shooter will make around 25 shots in a minute and the average will be 12 to 14 shots made. We plan to have medals for the top finishers in each age group.
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The schedule for the Shoot-a-thon/Toy Drive will be as follows:
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Saturday, November 11, 2006
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Junior Wildcats (4th, 5th, and 6th grades)
· Shoot-a-Thon 6:00 to 6:30
· Pickup Games 6:30 to 8:00
· Pizza and Drinks 8:00 to 8:30
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Senior Wildcats (7th to 12th grades)
· Shoot-a-Thon 8:00 to 8:30
· Pickup Games 8:30 to 11:00
· Pizza and Drinks 11:00 to Midnight
*ALL YOU NEED TO DO IS START GETTING PLEDGES!
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Shoot-a-thon Pledge Form
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Sample Shoot-a-thon Pledge Form
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DONATIONS
If you do not have time to take part in the Shoot-a-thon, a simple donation is just as helpful. Last year due to the large amount of financial donations we were able to work out a great deal with Toys-R-Us.
I would like to encourage those of you with businesses to make a financial donation to our toy drive and we will put your company’s logo on our web site.
VOLUNTEERING
If you would like to help with Midnight Madness or the Shoot-a-thon/Toy Drive please email me. Unlike previous years, the Wildcat Program will be providing the pizza and drinks, so I will not need donations for these items. However, we will need donations of gift cards or other “cool” items for the participant raffle. I could also use help with the actual Shoot-a-thon, coordinating the food and drinks, monitoring the courts and most importantly cleaning up the gyms afterwards. I hope to have a wrapping party for the toys on Saturday, December 2nd and will need help with this along with handing out the toys at the Winter Carnival.
If you have any questions about the Austin Wildcats Basketball program or the Wildcat Toy Drive, please feel free to email me If you have questions about the Dove Springs Recreation Center or their Winter Carnival, please feel free to email Billy James
Sincerely,
Darrel Smith
President
Austin Wildcats Basketball Inc. |