Volunteers

Michael Price: A History of Service

Michael's involvement with Youth Tennis Advantage (YTA) began in 1961, almost fifty years ago, when YTA was known as The Youth Tennis Foundation of Northern California (YTF).

Michael was born and raised in San Francisco and his passion for tennis and community involvement began at an early age.   By the time he was 16, Michael was not only playing on a championship varsity team at Lowell High School, he was also spending his summers teaching the basics of tennis to hundreds of youth in San Francisco.   To Michael, teaching tennis to kids “wasn’t work, it was my passion”, and to this day he still considers the years he spent on the tennis courts with “our kids” to be some of the most rewarding.

Michael’s zeal for tennis grew paralleling his tennis successes -- he played varsity tennis on three championship teams for Lowell High School and then played on equally successful varsity teams at San Jose State University (SJSU) where he was the team captain in 1967. In retrospect, Michael is appreciative of his tennis experience, one which has provided him with the necessary focus in school and a lifetime of friends and experiences. 

Upon graduating from SJSU Michael took a short break from YTF to work for the San Francisco Park and Recreation Department. While no longer an employee of YTF, he continued to support them in their annual fundraising activities. 

In 1972, Michael was invited to return to YTF to serve on the Board of Directors. Michael was Treasurer for many years and just recently took the lead as YTA’s new board President. According to Michael, his decision to accept the Presidency of YTA was an easy one. " We have a wonderful program of educational tutoring, and tennis instruction that is forever evolving and improving, plus a Board of Directors and Staff that is dedicated to, and united, in its desire to broaden the horizons and opportunities for our YTA children. It is an honor that I could not pass up." 

Michael resides in Napa, is retired, and the proud father of two adult sons.  He recently married Caroline Simmons, a past YTA board member and equally avid tennis player.

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Mark Springett, The Sports Psychologist

The game of snooker drew Mark Springett into the area of sport psychology. As a Pro-Am player of snooker, which is a sport similar to pool but with a larger table and narrowed pockets, he realized how a person’s behavior and their state can affect their performance. Finishing off his undergraduate degree in England, he began researching sport psychology programs. This research led him to John F. Kennedy University in 2007.

After several years, Mark graduated with a master in sport psychology and was looking towards gaining his accreditation. His love and interest for tennis led Mark to YTA after a former YTA intern introduced him to the organization. As a volunteer, Mark has worked with participants from the John McLaren Park and the Bear Trax site. He worked with students one-on-one for 10 weeks, concentrating on life skills such as goal setting and time management. Mark also worked on improving student performance on the court and in school.

The growth and development of these students over a short period of time was the highlight of Mark’s experience with YTA because he was able to see the students apply what they have learned on the courts.

After YTA, Mark plans on continuing his sport psychology path with a focus on tennis and golf. He hopes to work with professional players, college players, sport teams, and even individuals.

If anyone is interested, you can contact Mark Springett at mark_springett@hotmail.com.

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Sarah Steinbreder

  

Tennis and kids are the two things Sarah Steinbreder adores most in life; so it is no surprise that she serves on the Youth Tennis Advantage (YTA) Board of Directors.

Sarah’s remarkable service to YTA began with a tennis match at the annual Marin Doubles.  Taking place at eight different tennis centers across Marin, tennis players and enthusiasts from all over enjoyed a warm day of round robin doubles. The players later reconvened at the Harbor Point Tennis Club to participate in raffles, a silent auction, and even a fashion show which all benefitted YTA programs.

The tremendous amount of support displayed for YTA at the Marin Doubles left a lasting impression on Sarah. She took action and quickly signed on as Chair of the event for the succeeding four years. Her strong leadership and can-do personality would later earn her an election into YTA’s Board of Directors.  

Now in her fifth year with YTA serving as the board’s Secretary, Sarah admits that there is still a lot of work to be done. In these trying economic times where budgets are low and afterschool programs are being cut, Sarah realizes that kids need YTA more than ever. Her hopes for the future are to generate the financial support YTA needs to be able to run its quality programs and to expand on the organization’s public visibility. That way, kids can always count on YTA.

In addition to her role with YTA, Sarah works fulltime as a self-employed Mortgage Broker. She currently resides in San Francisco and plays 4.0 league tennis out of the San Francisco Tennis Club.

 

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Dr. Grant: A Profound Advocate for Education, Inclusion, & Tennis

For some, subtlety can be a force to be reckoned with, a gentle quality that miraculously brings profoundly wonderful changes despite the odds. These qualities are what one thinks of when recalling Dr. Ron Grant’s dedication to community tennis where underserved youth are concerned. Dr. Grant’s understated and modest nature, has never diminished his unrelenting concern for kids living in some of our communities’ poorest neighborhoods. Couple this with his passion for the things that mattered most to tennis legend Arthur Ashe, and you’ll find in Dr. Grant, an outstanding life force for kids’ academic pursuits and their love for tennis.

As Youth Tennis Advantage’s (YTA) very first African American President, Dr. Grant hired YTA’s first female executive director, lead a team of dedicated staff of life skills and tennis coaches, and mentors who are based all across the San Francisco-Bay Area to ensure that African American kids and other children of color are engaged in the rich array of programs YTA offers.  Under Dr. Grant’s leadership, the program’s flagship program, Bear Trax, collaboration between UC Berkeley and YTA was established, as well as, other ongoing YTA programs which are have enduring successfully.  In fact, it is daunting recalling the various ways in which YTA has grown and evolved during his leadership, whether it is his role in successfully maintaining key corporate sponsors in Bank of the West and Esurance Tennis Classic, or his nurturing significant relationships with annual tournaments which earmark funds specifically for YTA. When you add them all together you find that each of these partnerships have played a significant part in the lives of the children YTA programs are intended.

Even prior to Dr. Grant’s YTA presidency, his vision of and commitment to inner-city youth was clearly established and present with his establishing the Warren Brown Tennis Program in Oakland which was later renamed the Piper Jaffray Inner City Youth Tennis Program, to fund excellence-level coaching and provide a bridge between entry-level players and players who go on to attain sectional rankings, play college tennis and even move on to the pros. 

Now that Dr. Grant’s YTA presidency has been successfully completed, and his retirement in full gear from his medical practice, chances are good that we’ll likely find him traveling abroad from time to time. However, we can also bet that he will remain an ardent tennis enthusiast committed to furthering opportunities for kids who need help most and speaking to the very objective Arthur Ashe had in for them where education and tennis is concerned.

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L.Jay Tenenbaum: 30 Years and Counting

L. Jay Tenenbaum knows a thing or two about Youth Tennis Advantage, a lot of it dating back to the mid 1960s, and considering his 30 years of enduring service as a member of YTA’s board of directors, there’s no surprise why.

L. Jay Tenenbaum’s dedication to YTA came about from his relationship with the Youth Tennis Foundation, an organization that eventually became YTA.

“Originally before Youth Tennis Foundation, it was known as the East Palo Alto Tennis and Touring club,” recalls Tenenbaum. “Then in 1988, the YTA was created when the Youth Tennis Foundation merged with the National Junior Tennis League (NJTL). Though admittedly, it was from an initial specific intention of allowing my good friend Ed Osgood use of my tennis court that brought us together to discuss Osgood’s collaboration with NJTL and mine with the Youth Tennis Foundation, “according to Tenenbaum who describes long time friend Osgood as an extraordinary person who has been invaluable and committed to YTA through the years.

“However, each of us soon realized that the tournaments I had been involved with to help raise funds for the Youth Tennis Foundation dating as far back as the 1960s, and Osgood’s relationship with the NJTL had been operating concurrently and for very , very similar purpose. “Essentially our respective objective was rooted in helping poor children experience tennis, and from there we merged to form YTA and immediately combined site locations to spawn 10 different sites across the Bay Area.

Tenenbaum story underscores an important factor in the evolution on YTA, which is that neither the Youth Tennis Foundation nor the NJTL was interested in competing against each other. Both opted instead to join its two boards for the purpose of providing more tennis opportunities to larger numbers of youth in many more cities than either of them could have achieved on its own.

With YTAs formation, Tenenbaum believes that the Bank of the West Classic fundraiser for the organization was made possible. “Unlike the ballet, opera, or the symphony which each has a natural pool of resources to seek funds from, YTAs kids are from poor neighborhoods,” he explained. “Since there really isn’t any fundamental support for lessons and equipment, no constituency to call back on for support, corporate donors and fundraisers like Bank of the West and have been crucial to YTAs longevity and the children we’ve been able to reach.”

With numerous active years under his belt, and more than 30 of those dedicated to tennis and YTA, Tenenbaum looks forward to continue working with board members and the executive director of the YTA , he said he believes that fundraiser’s can work effectively with organization’s such as YTA.

“I think our new executive director is a real go getter, she seems to understand how big fundraising can lead to needed funds for grants; I will be delighted to see the organization grow and evolve so even more kids and teens enjoy tennis,” Tenenbaum added.