Through Up2Us Sports’ national coaching program, 300 AmeriCorps members will be trained to coach and mentor low-income youth to make better decisions, stay healthy, and reach their potential, through the power of sports. The $2.6 million in grants from the Corporation for National and Community Service (CNCS) will support AmeriCorps members nationally with added support from CaliforniaVolunteers, Serve Illinois, Volunteer Louisiana, PennServe and Serve Washington.

“The support that AmeriCorps has provided to Up2Us Sports since our inception nearly a decade ago has been essential to our continued success and efforts to build a workforce of highly-trained coaches nationwide” said Paul Caccamo, founder and CEO of Up2Us Sports. "We are grateful that the Corporation for National and Community Service continues to see the value that their members serving with Up2Us Sports can and will offer to kids and communities across the country.” CNCS will also provide over $1 million in education scholarships for the AmeriCorps members funded by these grants to help pay for college, vocational training, or pay back student loans.

AmeriCorps operates as a public private partnership that leverages significant amounts of outside resources to stretch the federal dollar and increase community impact. This grant will generate an additional $3 million in national and local matching support and other outside resources from businesses, foundations, and other organization.

Beginning this fall, AmeriCorps members serving through Up2Us Sports will join the more than 75,000 AmeriCorps members serving across the country in 21,000 locations. These members help communities tackle pressing problems while mobilizing millions of volunteers for the organizations they serve.

Since the program’s inception in 1994, more than 1 million men and women have served in AmeriCorps, providing more than 1.4 billion hours of service and have earned more than $3.3 billion in education scholarships to pay for college or pay back student loans, more than $1 billion of which has been used to pay back student loan debt.

For more information about getting involved with our AmeriCorps-funded national coaching program in your market, contact info@up2ussports.org.