The Algonquin Studios team is honored by our recent selection as a 2010 InfoTech Niagara BETA finalist in the "Excellence in Giving" category for our dedicated approach to the development of youth sports programs in the City of Buffalo through Algonquin Sports for Kids and the Buffalo Soccer Club. In the five years since Algonquin Studios co-hosted the first soccer clinics at the Johnny B. Wiley sports complex on Best Street, the Buffalo Soccer Club has grown from 150 child participants at 8 weekly summer clinics to the 500 children we now have as players on our House Leagues, Travel Teams, and Wrap Around Clinics.

The staff and volunteers who make all of Algonquin Sports for Kids' programs and activities possible truly believe that after school programs like the Buffalo Soccer Club have the power to keep children safe, alleviate childcare worries for working parents, and inspire success among youth and that the investment of time and resources into community-based programs like ours are powerful weapons in the fight against juvenile delinquency, childhood obesity, and our country's persistent high school drop-out crisis.

Algonquin Sports for Kids is particularly focused on an educational model of coaching and training. We encourage our teams to have a fun-loving, sportsman-like attitude about their sport and, rather than over-emphasize competiveness and an "all-or-nothing" approach to winning, our players are coached that, as in their daily lives, they should do the right things on the field, not just the things that will yield the best short-term results. We also dedicate a great deal of time and effort to parent education, trusting that parents who understand and espouse the goals of Algonquin Sports for Kids will make better decisions for their children both inside and outside of the BSC arena.

Algonquin Sports for Kids is in the midst of an exciting expansion effort and we are thrilled to be on the verge of offering Football, Basketball, and Wrestling clubs to interested children in the City of Buffalo. We expect the addition of these clubs to raise our overall program participation numbers to close to 2,000 children! For more information about contributing to the growth and development of our clubs, or if you're interested in having a clinic developed for your organization, please contact our Executive Director, Tom Garigen, at 716-842-1439 or garigen@algonquinsports.com.