O
livia Koch of Montgomery, N.J., has a passion for lacrosse. Her zeal is so strong that she applied for a US Lacrosse Soft Stick Grant to introduce the sport to students at a school she had never seen. Each grant provides 30 gender-neutral plastic sticks and soft balls, along with a curriculum guide to help teach the sport. Koch reached out to the administration at Christina Seix Academy, an independent school for underserved kids in Trenton, to ask if she could teach lacrosse to the students. Now, thanks to Koch's efforts, fi rst-, second- and third-grade students receive lacrosse instruction twice a week for an hour each. Ninety-eight percent of students are black or Latino. By the way, Koch is just 14 years old and in eighth grade. “You’d expect to see someone that young for a couple of weeks and then they would disappear,” said Rob Connor, head of school. “She has become part of our school community, and the kids love her to death.”
Connor previously considered adding lacrosse to the curriculum. He just wasn’t sure about the next step. “We didn’t have the expertise in-house, so Olivia’s timing was great,” Connor said. “She impressed us right away.”
Koch worked with her parents, Michael and Michele, to complete the US Lacrosse
grant application in 2015. After receiving the equipment, she set up drills for students and faculty at CSA to introduce lacrosse. “The structure that she created was really developmentally appropriate for our kids,” Connor said.
Having played lacrosse since age 8, Koch said her motivation simply was to give back and fi nd a way to expose others to the sport she loves. She was inspired to action after reading Condoleezza Rice’s book, "Extraordinary, Ordinary People: A Memoir of Family."
“The kids bring so much energy, it’s really fun to teach them,” said Koch, who plays on her middle school and club teams. “This has been a life-changing experience for me.”
laxmagazine.com
June 2016 » LACROSSE MAGAZINE
49
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