Cicero, Sick., is a suburb that hugs the west facet of Chicago, and is residence to Hawthorne Race Course. It is also the headquarters of J. Sterling Morton Excessive College District 201, which serves roughly 8,000 college students from Cicero and surrounding communities.
Close to the highest of the Hawthorne stretch is a Golden Corral car parking zone. From this vantage level, you possibly can clearly see horses on the observe throughout coaching or racing. One morning whereas watching coaching from right here, coach Chris Block noticed a bunch of Morton Excessive College college students gathered by a fence observing the horses. An concept popped into his head: “We should always convey extra of these college students to the observe.”
Final week, the Illinois Backstretch Charitable Basis, the benevolent arm of the Illinois Thoroughbred Horsemen’s Affiliation, in collaboration with Amplify Horse Racing and the J. Sterling Morton Excessive College District 201, did simply that by internet hosting the inaugural Morton City Equine Program—and it was an incredible success. All I may take into consideration on my drive residence to Kentucky was the way it was some of the impactful outreach applications I’ve been concerned with for the reason that begin of Amplify.
Chris is president of the ITHA, led by government director David McCaffrey. David and IBCF program coordinator George Moreno reached out to me in February, searching for program improvement assist from Amplify, and we determined to deal with the venture collectively. The ITHA workforce introduced the idea of internet hosting college students at Hawthorne to the college district, who jumped on the alternative to attach their college students with horses and steered the creation of a four-day summer season enrichment program. From there, the ITHA and Amplify labored on a schedule and syllabus of subjects and actions, and the college district dealt with the registration of scholars.
We had anticipated a comparatively small group for our first yr, and the ultimate attendance resulted in 5 highschool junior and senior ladies and their science trainer, Kyle Boyd. The scholars’ minimal prior horse experiences spanned from by no means having touched a horse to occurring a leadline journey. All through the 4 days of the Morton City Equine Program, the scholars arrived on the ITHA workplace in a small bus and, for 3 hours, skilled the day by day exercise of a racetrack firsthand whereas studying trade practices, horsemanship, and utilized science. They’d the chance to groom a horse, feed copious quantities of peppermints to dozens of racehorses, journey across the observe in tractors, peer right into a scope at a horse’s respiratory tract, and even go on (what was for many of them) their first-ever horse journey. By day three, one pupil informed us she was having a lot enjoyable she wished this system had been longer.
Instrumental within the success of this program was the real dedication and enthusiasm from the ITHA workforce. David and George took energetic roles within the planning, and communication with the college district, in addition to the day-to-day educating. Horsemen’s liaison Mena Perez even shared her very particular lead pony, Bandit, as our mascot and educating assistant for the whole lot from grooming classes to a check barn demonstration and pony rides. Chris Block and his assistant Martin Martinez brazenly shared their barn as a educating area, amidst coaching and caring for round 35 head of horses. Chris served as an educator every day and invited the scholars to be a part of each step of coaching, from understanding the position of vitamin and the feed room to listening to the significance of hoof care whereas watching a horse get trimmed and reshod. His horses additionally acquired the overwhelming majority of the aforementioned peppermints.
To conclude day 4, we requested the scholars to finish a suggestions survey. Almost all of them conveyed that simply being within the presence of horses and getting to the touch them was essentially the most particular a part of all the expertise. In addition they mirrored strongly on how a lot they realized about racing, veterinary medication, and the nice care they noticed the horses receiving. 4 of the 5 college students expressed curiosity in changing into veterinarians, and one particularly requested how she may pursue a job on the racetrack within the close to future. Most telling of all was the handwritten thank-you card the scholars handed over earlier than climbing again on the bus to depart the observe one final time. One message learn, “Thanks all for taking good care of us and giving us all these fantastic classes. It was an incredible, enjoyable, unforgettable expertise that we cannot be forgetting any time quickly.”
There have been a number of moments from this program that can persist with me for a very long time: watching all 5 college students grooming Bandit and softly petting him as he munched grass; the laughter as they climbed into the beginning gate like assistant starters; the beaming smiles as they stepped down from the large John Deere tractors after driving across the observe; the even larger smiles as they sat tall on Bandit’s again.
The ITHA workforce and I went into the week understanding that this system was a trial run, and would function a studying expertise for all of us. We got here out of it figuring out that we had positively impacted the 5 teenage ladies who had attended. With out this program, these college students may by no means have had the prospect to actually be round horses. However on account of it, they skilled moments they may always remember. Racetracks have large potential to function facilities for studying inside the communities the place they reside. In lots of extremely city and inner-city areas, racetracks are the one locations for miles and miles the place individuals can go to see and presumably contact a horse. That is actually what Hawthorne is for Cicero.
At Amplify, our imaginative and prescient is to leverage the Thoroughbred trade to attach youth, households, college students, and educators with alternatives to study and interact with horses. However with the intention to make these connections, now we have to create the alternatives. The ITHA developed an unforgettable alternative by the Morton City Equine Program, and I am excited for the entire college students who will get to study horses and expertise the joy of racing as this system grows.