Nearly 5 years after Hurricane Katrina decimated the city of New Orleans, the city is getting a boost of hope from a project started by a teacher at George Washington Carver High School.
Fresh out of college, the now 24 year-old Brian Bordainick joined Teach for America to help make a difference for kids growing up in the inner-city. When he showed up for his first day at G.W. Carver High School, he didn’t see a school – just eight trailers in the parking lot of an abandoned school.
Shortly after starting at G.W. Carver, Bordainick was asked to step in as the school’s athletic director – and become the youngest athletic director in Louisiana history. Hoping to help reshape a program that was once great (the football program won multiple district championships and has an alumni roster including NFL-great Marshall Faulk), Bordainick faced many challenges as the school did not have resources to support the program.
But as Bordainick began to piece together the program, he learned of an NFL grant program for $200,000 in matching grants to rebuild football facilities and decided to pursue the grant to build a state of the art football field and track for the 9th ward community – called “The 9th Ward Field of Dreams”. Throughout this process, Bordainick eventually found an architecture firm to provide a budget a rendering of the project, which proved to be slightly more than he had anticipated – $1.85 million dollars.
Although told by many that this was an impossible dream – Bordainick pushed forward with the 9th ward project and over the last year has raised over $1 million dollars, has garnered support from Nike, and even scored a feature for The 9th Ward Field of Dreams on ESPN. With just a little more help, The 9th Ward Field of Dreams will be built.
“Together we can prove that against formidable odds, a few people crazy enough to believe in their own power to create change can overcome a seemingly impossible challenge.” – www.9thwardfieldofdreams.com
Learn more about the 9th Ward story in the videos below, or text “DREAM” to 50555 to make a donation and help The 9th Ward Field of Dreams reach its goal of $1.85 million and bring hope to the city of New Orleans.
Anything is Possible from The Canary Collective on Vimeo.
Brian Bordainick Talk @ The Feast from Chris Schultz on Vimeo.
Tags: 9th Ward Field of Dreams, Brian Bordainick, Causes, ESPN, Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans, Nike, Teach for America
