Tennis Without Borders 2022 Annual Fundraiser

Hi, we're Tennis Without Borders. We are a 501(c)3 non-profit organization that has a mission to help children develop life skills through the sport of tennis.

How you can help - With your generous support, we can continue to use tennis as a vehicle to impact young lives.

Your donation will go directly to helping with school fees and supplies, collecting tennis equipment, and travel expenses, so we can work directly with communities in need and provide meaningful mentorship, instruction, and spaces for creativity. We are building lifelong relationships and need your help to sustain them.

Below is a quick background on our organization and some of our work. You can find more information, pictures, and testimonials, on our website, tenniswithoutborders.net.

Cameroon:

In 2014, Cinda Holbach was introduced to Joseph Oyebog from Cameroon while he was in Connecticut. As a former professional tennis player and current teaching pro, she was asked to offer her teaching skills in Africa to assist their current teaching pros, help teach the children, and design lesson plans for their tennis development. Since then, she has traveled to Cameroon, Africa four times to work firsthand with the Oyebog Tennis Academy. On her Tennis Without Borders trips, she is able to utilize donated funds to support the programs and local community. Our mission is to provide these children the opportunity to rise above their life of severe poverty through tennis and education.

We are fortunate to be able to bring donated equipment, such as tennis shoes and rackets, and give them directly to the kids in Cameroon. We utilize donations to support baggage fees for equipment, trip expenses and the purchasing of other educational tools.

On our 2018 trip, we were able to purchase and donate eight laptops, three phones, three tablets, and additional educational equipment to enhance the childrens' learning opportunities.

New England:

Tennis Without Borders has deep roots in New England.

Many efforts across New England have been made to collect gently used tennis shoes, clothes and rackets for the children we work with in Africa, South America, and locally in the U.S..

We are honored to have many youth tennis players involved with fundraising in their own communities, such as setting up donation centers, refurbishing equipment, and volunteering at their local non-profits, which teaches them the importance of giving back.

We are frequently able to provide tennis equipment, such as junior rackets, grips, and string, to various rural and inner-city tennis programs in Massachusetts, Maine, Vermont, and Connecticut. In April 2019, we collaborated with the Sportsmen's Enrichment Center in Dorchester, MA to donate a new laptop, hundreds of grips, and tennis shoes and rackets. We have also donated to: Six-Love Tennis, in Stamford CT, The CLC YMCA in Damariscotta ME, Stamford Youth Tennis in Stamford CT, The Cobscook Community Learning Center in Northern Maine, and Norwalk Grassroots Tennis in Norwalk CT. We have also collaborated with Kids on the Ball in Burlington, VT.

Ethiopia:

In October 2020, Cinda, Georgia, and two other Tennis Without Borders volunteers traveled to Ethiopia, where they brought tennis for the first time to rural villages.

Generous donations allowed us to bring over tennis nets, rackets, balls, shoes, clothes, school and art supplies. All of these items were left with the schools and community centers of the areas we worked, so the children could continue to play tennis and use the school supplies to complete their studies.

Our team included a school teacher from Bristol, ME, who involved her entire elementary and middle schools to create art projects, which they shared with the children in Ethiopia. They created letters, artwork and bracelets depicting life in Maine, which were an amazing gift to share with the villages we worked in, and unite kids from across the globe and teach both areas about different cultures.

We were able to offer the children in Ethiopia days filled with tennis, art projects, jewelry making, and more. We also worked with the children to develop critical thinking and independent learning skills, as they often seemed to struggle in those areas. It was our mission of the trip to work with the children and teachers on developing those skills both on and off the court.

Additionally, thanks to donations from people like you, we were also able to sponsor two children for a year. These sponsorships will enable a child to go to a school for a year, eat daily, and provide his or her family with an animal which they will be able to farm on their land. We can see that the impact of our work in Ethiopia will continue to give back for years to come. We have recently developed suggestions for a curriculum for teachers in the villages we traveled to. We also hope to sponsor more children, and are excited to continue to connect with the children and teachers in Ethiopia, and continue the relationship between the school children in Maine and Ethiopia.

South America:

In February 2019, we traveled to the Raul Ordonez Tennis Foundation in Cali, Colombia, where we were able to donate tennis equipment, school and art supplies, and hygiene products, as well as provide tennis and art instruction to support the program. With the help of several junior tennis players from Maine and Massachusetts and a special education art teacher, Georgia Ahlers, we brought the community organization in Colombia a unique collaboration of tennis and the arts that emphasized unity. Today, we continue to support the Raul Ordonez Tennis Foundation with donated equipment.

Your support has meant that children have new shoes on their feet, essential school supplies, school fees paid for, and rackets in their hands. We have also had the opportunity to provide meals for families who need them, in Colombia, Ethiopia, and Cameroon.

We are excited to continue to share these experiences with you, and to grow our program so we can touch as many children’s lives as possible. Thank you for supporting our efforts.