Pradyut Voleti was trained by USA’s leading skill development trainer, Ganon Baker, as part of the Shadow Coaching Program at Elev8 Sports Institute in Florida and was personally trained by Cody Toppert, a Cornell Legend, who has played 9 years in Europe and the NBA D League.
He started Dribble Academy with 2 bamboo sticks and a ring and 5 children. Most children living in the slums of India don’t have access to clean water, food or clothes. Education, self-worth, sports and the belief that they have a future, all remain a distant dream. Today, the academy has over 150 kids enrolled in the program.
He started Dribble Academy with a 3 point focus
- Provide free Basketball training to children to help their development
- Encourage the parents to allow their children to play instead of sending them to work
- Imparting life-skills training to the children
Dribble Academy started as an endeavor to channel the energy of these children and teach them, valuable life-skills through basketball. They focus on teamwork and discipline, and an effort towards imparting not only basketball skills but also dance, music and English language classes. This would give all-round development for the children and bring about positive change in the community
He’s reaching out to us as a fellow basketball lovers and supporters to help him spread his story to our friends. The good folks at Footletic have made a video called Dribble With A Cause and helped him launch a crowdfunding campaign to support the academy. They’ve received some traction on Facebook and YouTube though not nearly as much as they need. Please spare 2 minutes to watch the video below to know and experience the joy basketball has brought to these 150 children.
Help by sharing this story with your friends and donate if you can to help them meet their goal of providing these children with the basic needs of shoes, nutrition and clothes to keep the Dribble Academy going. Every penny would help.
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