The Newtown Athletic Club Kids Lives Matter is the brainchild of NAC owner Jim Worthington. The idea is to formulate a group that can organize and offer a clearing house of programming and services for the youth of the community to support them in the areas of mental health, education, sociability, recreation, sports and more.
According to the National Institute for Children’s Health Quality, COVID-19 has a detrimental impact in all these areas – social, mental, emotional, physical, educational, recreational and more. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released new data drawn from a survey done June 24-30. The data show a fourth of young adults in the U.S. said they “seriously considered suicide” in the month before they were surveyed.
According to the University of Oxford, “Parents/carers of children aged 4-10 years of age reported that over a one-month period in lockdown, they saw increases in their child’s emotional difficulties, such as feeling unhappy, worried, being clingy and experiencing physical symptoms associated with worry.”
After speaking with countless members of the community, as well as educators and experts from across the nation, Worthington was inspired to take action to make a difference for local youth. Kids Lives Matter is dedicated to the safety and health of kids of all ages, backgrounds and abilities.
“We cannot allow children to be marginalized during this time,” he said. “We must advocate for their wellbeing at every level of community, society and government.”
As a member of the President’s Council on Sports, Fitness and Nutrition, Worthington has been a part of launching the National Youth Sports Strategy introduced by the Department of Health and Human Services. This strategy provides a federal roadmap of actionable strategies to increase participation in youth sports – which has declined by over 5 percent in the last five years and continues to decline. This, according to Worthington, is only one way to improve the lives of youth.
Kids Lives Matter is forming a group of volunteers to offer and organize resources to help kids and parents navigate needed services ranging from mental health, education, social, sports and more. These volunteers will work under the umbrella of KLM as the group develops a strong foundation in the community.
Kids Lives Matter has already garnered attention from over a thousand people in the community who want to support and volunteer for the concept. Anyone who wishes to support and/or volunteer, visit facebook.com/klmtoday. You can like the page, share it with friends and colleagues, and volunteer by clicking on the “Jobs” button at the top of the page.
As the group develops, there will be a website to host all of the resources and programs that will be organized under the umbrella of Kids Lives Matter.
“Our hope is that the community will share this initiative with everyone so that we can make this organization a template to be shared across the region and the nation,” said Linda Mitchell, director of public and government relations at the NAC and head organizer for Kids Lives Matter.
Mitchell can be reached directly at [email protected] for further details.
