Quentin Prince: Elevating Equity Through Youth Sports

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Forty-year old Quentin Prince is executive director of the MKE Youth Sports Alliance (MYSA) formed in 2019. With the help of various organizations, MYSA was created to address the problem that many of the city’s young people were being left behind. Quentin is convinced that participating in sports diminishes social problems and offers kids a positive outlet. He has lived in Milwaukee all his life, has experienced family tragedies, and has devoted most of his time to making a positive impact on Black and brown youth. 

I met Quentin at the impressive Uihlein Soccer complex on West Good Hope. Dressed athletically in a blue backward baseball cap and a Brewers T shirt, he greeted me with a warm winning grin. At nearly six feet, trim and toned, he presents a strong presence. When we settled into a meeting room, he seemed eager to tell me his story.   

Share for me your early background, your parents, family, neighborhoods, and schools you attended. How you got to be you.

I was born and raised in Milwaukee on the north side, 23rd and Capitol. Growing up, I was part of the Chapter 220 Program that gave inner city students the opportunity to attend suburban schools. I went to elementary school in Fox Point, middle school in Bayside, and graduated from Nicolet High School in Glendale.

My dad worked at A.O. Smith in manufacturing, but he was also active with youth sports as a baseball coach in the Beckum Stapleton Little League on the north side. The league was founded in 1964 by former Negro League Player James Beckum. Playing baseball in that league was the highlight of my youth. I am still actively involved in Beckum Stapleton, as a coach and consultant to the board of directors. My mom works in healthcare as a OB/GYN in Women's Health and Obstetrics. She got her start as a Public Health Nurse with the City of Milwaukee and retired from the Milwaukee County Sheriff's Department in 2014.

After you graduated from Nicolet High School, what did you do?

I went to MATC, Milwaukee Area Technical College, and then to UWM with a focus on architecture. But I changed lanes, following my passion. Over 10 years ago, I went into the nonprofit and education fields. Right now, I continue to work for Journey House, a nonprofit organization that helps families move from generational poverty into productive lives. At Journey House, I am the director of youth leadership. I also facilitate college and career readiness programs. These are STEM programs (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics) that include financial literacy, character education, life skills, and readership development. I did not see myself as a traditional classroom teacher, but I wanted to make an impact on youth. For a few years, I taught at an MPS elementary school. I still work with a number of Milwaukee area schools, teaching core subjects.

The Milwaukee Youth Sports Alliance is only three years old. How did that come about?

The Greater Milwaukee Foundation had a series of discussions called On the Table. They brought together business and community leaders and education professionals who talked about how youth sports can be a tool for social change. The result was a report for the Wisconsin Policy Forum. The report was titled Above the Rim, and it detailed the landscape of youth sports in Milwaukee. This report was the beginning of MYSA, the MKE Youth Sports Alliance. (Youth is defined as grade school through college.)

My understanding is that one goal of MYSA is to give youth access to high-quality sports programs that support their physical and mental health. How does that process work in practical ways?

Several ways: Uniting the youth sports community to promote sports to help with social change. Advocating on behalf of youth sports for resources and awareness. Improving coordination between the stakeholders. Gathering best practices, sharing research, and evaluating programming. And offering training to youth sports providers so that young people and their families have the support they need.

And you also train coaches, from what I understand. Makes sense. Coaches can have a meaningful impact on motivating young people.

Right. We train coaches and youth sports providers. Our training focuses on social and emotional learning and trauma-informed care. For example, if you have a coach who doesn’t understand what kind of trauma inner city kids deal with, it can lead to a poor sports experience and discourage the kids from participating. We want to make sure coaches are equipped to effectively offer a positive experience for our young athletes.

The segregated inner city Black community has experienced social and criminal problems. For myriad reasons, Black youths have been mostly neglected. Around a quarter of children in Milwaukee grow up in poverty, which often results in low graduation rates, joblessness, violence and even crime. I understand that one goal of MYSA is to unite the youth sports community in order to promote sports as a tool for social change. 

Time and again, sports have been a great tool for creating positive social change. From providing livelihood to bridging the social gap, sports play a significant role. Millions of people watch sports tournaments. If you are a youth sports organization or an MPS interscholastic team, participation in sports is often the carrot to bring about positive results. Sports encourage national unity, bridges social identities, contributes to socio-economic progress, and tackles health disparities. Sports also teaches life lessons like team building, collaboration, leadership development, empathy, and enduring friendships. It also promotes gender equality. We are in the 50th year of celebrating Title IX, which prohibits discrimination against women athletes in education programs receiving federal financial assistance.

I found this quote from you regarding the success of the Milwaukee Bucks. You said, “The Bucks want to be seen not only as a basketball organization, but also as a force to create systemic change in Milwaukee.” What can sports do for systemic change in the social and cultural milieu?

The Bucks have a platform. They perform tremendously on the court but have the ability to do something with that platform for a greater impact. We all have that responsibility. But, if an organization like the Bucks advocates for a social cause, that can have a positive snowball effect that travels to other groups, eventually creating larger systemic change.

How can disadvantaged families get their kids into sports participation?

MYSA’s overall focus is to ensure young people have access to quality sports programs. We do this by partnering with youth sports providers for resources, tools and training. We are part of a national collective called the Movement for Sport Equity, which includes youth sports providers from across the country. If families are looking for sports opportunities, they can contact us and we’ll connect them to sports providers. For example, organizations like Every Kid Sports. Every kid deserves the opportunity to play sports. Cost is often a barrier that prevents kids from doing that. Every Kid Sports provides grants to cover registration fees for income-restricted families.

You once said, and I quote, “Everything in life is interwoven together. Sports and health, sports and education, sports and economic achievement all are interconnected. It could be the solution to so many problems.” How can sports help in being a solution, for instance, segregation and poverty?

If a young person has the opportunity to participate in a sport and be successful, that achievement can transfer to classroom performance. Sports can be the vehicle for youth to get into higher education, and this provides a greater career opportunity and finally a better socio-economic position. A sports facility can be a hub for a community or neighborhood. Right now, there is a proposed development in the works called The Opportunity Center. This development is an intentional reimagine of what a community center can be. The Opportunity Center would bring sports, education, mental health, and community engagement all into one space. This development is the vision of Frank Cumberbatch at Bader Philanthropies and Damian Buchman of The Ability Center.

In the city’s youth sports programs, there are silos, the various nonprofits working separately. For instance, the highly successful Running Rebels, Heal the Hood, and WestCare Foundation, to name a few proven programs. Does MYSA interact with other sports programs?  

MYSA is part a citywide collective effort. We partner with organizations like the Boys & Girls Clubs, the YMCA, the Running Rebels, MPS coaches, and so on. Our more recent collaboration was a “sports sampling” camp for MPS students at Wick Field. Inner city Black and brown kids are mainly focused on basketball, football or soccer. The sports sampling camp allowed them to participate in other sports and introduced them to golf, tennis, volleyball, cheerleading, track and field.

I read that you try to abide by a quote from Nelson Mandela: “Sport has the power to change the world. It has the power to inspire. It has the power to unite people in a way that little else does. It speaks to youth in a language they understand.” 

When you think of motivational speeches, a lot of memorable quotes come from the sports world. Sports has the power to unite. I can’t think of anything else where you get tens of thousands of people to come together with the same vision or focus as when fans get together for a big game. And businesses put on team building activities, which is a sports metaphor for winning or competing. Sport is all around us. It may take other forms but it’s always there.

Where does MYSA’s funding come from?

We get our primary funding from grant opportunities like all nonprofits. The Milwaukee Bucks, Bader Philanthropies, Herb Kohl Foundation, America SCORES and the Milwaukee Kickers have all contributed to the organization's growth in these first years.

Here is another quote from you: “Black and brown kids need to see more professionals that look like them. Kids can’t be what they can’t see.” Can you elaborate on this?

Through my work at Journey House, I facilitate college and career readiness programming. If a young person is never exposed to a particular career or an adult in that career, they may never aspire to be to go into that field. If you live your entire childhood in a bubble, your exposure to job opportunities is limited. For instance, many Black and brown kids are not exposed to opportunities in tech. I have the ability to educate kids and introduce them to individuals and companies where they could have a future career. I am also a financial advisor with Mass Mutual. This is another space where you rarely see people who look like me. Not only do I get to provide a service and build our community’s financial education, I get to show a young person that this is another career where you have the possibility of thriving.

Looking at you now, I like your hat, but that can’t be your only hat because you wear so many hats. Must be hard to keep track of them all. 

(Laughs)