Photography by Amani Sodiq
For six years starting in the summer of 2012, five 6-year-old children spent every day of their summer helping others through with an organization called Community Connections, held by Lakehill Preparatory School.
Each day was different. Some days, they would help people take groceries to their car or clean up White Rock Lake, and other days they would donate food to Meals on Wheels.
The five friends, Max Jensen, Will Maya, Zach Strong, Cal Lewis and Zach Lewis loved every bit of it for a few reasons. They got to spend their summer break together, they were able to meet new people and make more friends, every day was different and they could help people around the neighborhood while having a good time.
When they turned 12, they aged out of the organization. And by high school, it was time to go their separate ways.
Strong and the Lewis twins went to Woodrow Wilson, Maya went to Bishop Lynch and Jensen attended Richardson High School.
Determined to maintain the closeness of their quintet, they brainstormed ways to stay connected while incorporating what originally brought them together: sports and community service.
They decided on was to start a nonprofit called Kickoff Sports Dallas, inspired by their experiences at Community Connections and their passion for playing sports together.
“We wanted to continue [community service] so we kind of went our own way with making our own charity with something we all love, which is sports,” Strong says. “We thought, ‘There’s not a lot of opportunities for underprivileged families to get [the] same equipment [and] the same camps we did.’”
Kickoff Sports Dallas aims to provide children with sports equipment, jerseys, shoes, connections and community support. The nonprofit also offers basketball lessons through camps and clinics.
Strong, a soccer player, serves as the treasure. Maya, who plays both football and baseball, is the communications coordinator. Jensen, basketball player and event coordinator, helps organize biweekly basketball camps and donation drives for KSD. Zach Lewis, baseball player and social media coordinator, handles their Facebook, Instagram and website. And Cal Lewis, who formerly played baseball and participates in theater, serves as president, coordinating outreach with potential partner organizations.
They brainstormed how to bridge the gap of disparities found in each sport like a lack of athletic equipment, less training and practice due to financial barriers.
“When we were coming out with the idea, we’d notice that when trying [out] for teams in middle school and high school there were students [who] weren’t as fortunate and didn’t have the experience on actual teams because it’s expensive,” Jensen says. “[We’re] just trying to level the playing field for students that are less fortunate.”
Knowing the sport was one thing, but understanding how to run a nonprofit was a new challenge, Strong says.
They started with the fundamentals, filing for nonprofit status and pitching their organization to potential investors — their parents — who each contributed $100 to help cover startup costs.
Once they received their nonprofit status, the teens began putting flyers around the neighborhood and spreading the word about their organization through Facebook and Instagram.
Children and their families slowly began to trickle in with interest, but they were determined to reach more people.
It started small, with a sports equipment drive in the neighborhood and giveaways at Northwest Community Center community outreach events.
In four years, the team had collaborated with over 20 nonprofit organizations for sponsorship, hosted 40 sports camps, donating more than 5,000 balls and raising thousands of dollars.
The organization was growing, and it was hard to keep up, Strong says.
“I did not think it would last this long, to be honest, because it was harder back then,” Jensen says. “I think it’s gotten easier with our connections but it was kind of hard getting started because we didn’t know what to do, we just collected everything and just had to reach out to a bunch of people,”
The group shares that they wouldn’t be where they are today without the help of Kiwanis Club for funding, Northwest Community Center for hosting their original basketball camp in 2023 and Owenwood for helping them finalize a location for basketball camps last summer. Mentorship from Megan Carlton, a teacher in Garland ISD, helped guide the group on how to run their nonprofit since 2021.
“I gained a lot of perspective on these kids’ lives,” Zach Lewis says. “It helps [to] shed light on what these kids are dealing with everyday.”
As the five high school seniors near graduation, the team prepares for their next challenge: keeping KSD alive while in college.
Zach Lewis is pursuing a business major at University of Arkansas. Cal Lewis is attending Rhodes College for environmental science. Maya is studying biology at Ole Miss, Jensen is attending Colorado School of Mines for engineering and Strong is pursuing biomedical engineering at Arizona State University.
They haven’t decided what’s next for KSD — whether it’s handing it off to another set of incoming freshmen or working on the nonprofit during holiday breaks.
One thing remains certain. KSD isn’t going anywhere.
