Mission Statement
Mission Statement:
"Developing faith based social responsibility in at-risk youth."
Method Statement:
"Providing faith based mentoring and encouragement to underserved youth, while building enduring relationships and preparing tomorrow’s community leaders through baseball."
Vision Statement:
"Community leaders centered in Christ, mentoring social responsibility to the next generation of youth."
Description
WBO Objectives
Our mission at WBO is to assist and develop faith based social responsibility in our at-risk Tulsa youth. We have a curriculum that utilizes mentors to teach and inspire children to have hope and develop leadership skills that will prepare them for the future.
Our programs target low income minority youth who may have one or no parent present in their lives due to incarceration, death or absentee fathers. These youth are at risk for substance abuse, gang involvement & low academic achievement. Our goal is to mentor these youth in order to help them overcome the overwhelming statistical disadvantages that they are up against. Why use baseball or softball? Many of these children do not understand the concept of rules, consequences and order, both in sports and every other facet of their lives. Teaching the game of baseball with all of its intricacies provides children with important life lessons. For example, sacrifice is integral to baseball, everything from moving a runner up to hitting a sacrifice fly helps to demonstrate the importance of putting others before yourself for the greater good of the team.
The RBI program is based around 9 values for breaking barriers. They are courage, persistence, integrity, justice, teamwork, citizenship determination, commitment, and excellence. The growth of our RBI league from 150 boys and girls in 2011 to over 725 in 2012 has helped spark a new enthusiasm in our youth. In early June 2012, we selected 10 boys and 2 girls to represent Tulsa in the JR RBI All Star Classic held in Kansas City. We based our selections primarily on children with significant life challenges; not on playing ability alone.
