John Boruk: [00:00:00] All right. Welcome into the podcast that focuses on the $15 billion industry of youth sports and how you can mold a champion physically, socially, mentally, and educationally for life. My guest. On this show, someone who does all of that President and CEO, the Ed Snyder Youth Hockey and Education, a position that he has held for 15 years.

Prior to that, he served as the executive Director of the Arthur Ash Youth Tennis and Education Program. Scott Tharp. Welcome to the show, Scott. You and I have known each other for a while, but what you guys do with the Ed Snyder Youth and Hockey Education is something that is phenomenal.

And in fact, there's other hockey programs across the country that have been trying to emulate what you guys do. We're gonna get into all of that. But first tell me how you got started with the youth hockey and education and what drew you into that?  

Scott Tharp: [00:01:00] First of all, let me say it's good to see you and thanks for having me, John, but I, I guess I took a fairly circuitous route. Hockey was a sport that I played and loved growing up, but my primary sport was tennis. I was fortunate enough to earn a college scholarship playing tennis, and then got played on the professional tour for a quick cup of coffee before I got into coaching on the professional tour.

Which led me to my position at Arthur Ash, Youth Tennis and Education. And it was there that I happened to meet Ed Snyder, who was one of my supporters, one of my patrons. He as you might know, he was an avid tennis player himself. And one day I got a call out of the blue from Ed asking if. [00:02:00] Come hit some balls with me over at the Arthur Ash Youth Tennis and Education Center, and I couldn't refuse him.

So we hit some balls and he probably, between shots, he probably asked me a thousand questions and mostly about the type of programming we were doing, how we blended education and life skills into the tennis program. And when he left, I said to my wife, I think that was a job interview. And about an hour later I got a second call from him asking if he would asking me if I would consider coming to work for him.

And at I turned him down because I was really immersed in what we were doing at Arthur Ash at the time. But if you knew Ed, you knew how persistent he could be and. He doesn't take no for an answer. Yeah he was relentless. And [00:03:00] he had a couple of his executives, Peter Luukko and Fred Shabel come calling on me.

And he eventually wore me down. And the reason that, that he convinced me was I thought, Man, it would be a very cool thing to be able to do what we were. At Ash and bring it to another sport because we firmly believe that sport has a power can empower youth like no other. It can be such a motivator.

We call it a hook hockey's the hook, which brings our kids into our organization. And allows us to immerse them into much. Life lessons. Yeah. Ed Snider.  

John Boruk: Obviously the Philadelphia Flyers was his number one passion in life as the founder in 1966 and served in that capacity for nearly 50 years.

One of the longest [00:04:00] serving sole owners of any professional franchise. And then I would, you have to think that by starting the Ed Snider, what was then the youth hockey found? He said was going to be his legacy. So this, the foundation at the time was his second passion in life and really when you take a look at hockey as a youth sport and compare that to all the other youth sports, no sport demands more financially in terms of a financial commitment more than hockey.

You're looking at on an average of $3,400 annually, and that's, equipment traveling, everything that he built, wanted to give that back to the community of Philadelphia for free. And that, at its core is the essence of what Ed Snyder Youth Hockey and Education does.  

Scott Tharp: It was in the beginning. You're absolutely right. When Ed first came to me [00:05:00] and we talked about what our next steps would be. Our core objective at that time was to be able to provide an opportunity for kids to play what he thought was the greatest sport ever invented. And PR with a particular focus on kids who otherwise would never have such an opportunity.

So we really focused on bringing the sport to the inner city. And as you. For inner city kids, ice hockey is non-traditional. 

John Boruk: What I find really fascinating is that those who go through the program and stick with the program usually come back in some capacity. As an instructor, a teacher from the educational, maybe as a tutor.

But once they get hooked into the program that they wanna stay for a long. 

Scott Tharp: In the recent years, I [00:06:00] I'll go back maybe three or four years, probably 80% of our hires. And we have about 180 employees right now. And probably 80% of our recent and hirees are kids that have come through our program.

And to me that's really significant. It goes back. I remember an old tennis coach of mine, his name was Chuck Creasey, was the coach at Clemson University, and he once told me, he said, Scott, things that are hard to pick up are hard to put down and ice hockey's hard to pick up.

But, before you can play hockey, you've gotta learn to skate. And it's not an easy sport, but it's a sport that engenders hard work and honest effort. The fact that we have so many of our kids coming back and staying with us after graduation from college [00:07:00] or secondary schools attest to the fact that it is so hard to put down.

John Boruk: What I think is really great is yeah, you supply all of this, the equipment, everything free of. For those who live in the inner city. But when you break down the program, the components of the program, especially as you get into the educational side, the discipline side and everything associated it, it's really a program that you could apply anywhere.

I think it and it just happens that you're doing in the inner city, but talk about really the core components of the program and how you could take that and apply it to any, junior hockey program. 

Scott Tharp: Oh I think that's absolutely true. What sets us apart is that we are applying it to an audience that, that otherwise would never set foot on ice.

But yeah you're absolutely true. In fact, the model that we use is largely the model [00:08:00] that we used at Arthur Ash Youth Tennis and Education, 

John Boruk: which is, you guys do preach education and sometimes I think you get so caught up. Especially if your child is good at hockey, that it's hockey, and oh yeah, let's get our homework done.

You, you guys almost prioritize it the right way, right? Hockey's the vehicle, but it's the vehicle to being as the essence of this podcast being a champion in life. And that starts by being so educationally sound, and I'm sure a lot of these kids have gotten an education to.

They probably wouldn't be thriving if it wasn't for the program 

Scott Tharp: That's absolutely true. I think one of the keys to our retention rates in our program and we found that if we can keep a young man or young lady in our program for up to 10 ICE touches [00:09:00] that they usually stick with us.

I really think that the carrot that's out there for them is the fact that we're able to tell our kids and, we start as early as age five. But the, where we really like to set the hook in I is as they approach middle school and we're able to tell our kids that if you stay with us you can earn.

A full scholarship to a high performing private or parochial school. And if you stay with us through graduation, we have eight actually it's nine now, partner universities. And if you gain admission to any one of those nine universities, we're gonna give you a full college scholarship, including room and board.

And I don't know of any other organization out there that can make that claim. And I think that's what keeps our kids in the program that. [00:10:00] Incentive that if they stay with us, they can get a fully paid for education. 

John Boruk: Yeah, I, that is absolutely fabulous in the sense that it's combining schoolwork, education, athletics, all in one and sticking with something that, Really keeps 'em off the streets, who knows what they would be doing?

I'm sure you have success stories. I bet you some of the kids who've come through the program would probably share and have shared with you, Scott, Mr. Tharp, this is what would happen to me if it wasn't for Ed Snyder's Hockey and Education 

Scott Tharp: Program. I, yeah I think the program is absolutely life changing and I could give you a plethora of those stories.

And that's what's the most fulfilling part of my job. I think it's the thing that Ed was most proud of. [00:11:00] I recall one time I was sitting next to Ed and he was doing an interview for some TV show, I can't remember which one. And the host asked him, Wouldn't it be great if someday one of your kids could actually come through this program and become an NHL player. And Ed's eyes narrowed as they used to a lot of times, and he said, Yeah, that would be okay. But that's not our purpose. My purpose is for the thousands tens of thousands of kids to come that come through our program and learn the importance of staying in school, staying out of trouble with the law learning the importance of giving back to their community and becoming productive citizens.

That's what will change our program. And that's what you've done. That's what we try to do. 

John Boruk:. How [00:12:00] much of this is recruitment on your end to, to get the word out there, to tell them? Because I'm sure a lot of these kids have been like, hockey, I don't watch hockey. We've got basketball courts or this, So how much of it's recruitment and then how many of the kids that do come through the program wanna embrace the sport?

Scott Tharp: In the beginning, we never thought we would be successful, as successful as we, we are and have been. And we put a lot of effort into making appearances and having town hall meetings. It's community centers, churches, the places in the neighborhoods we wanted to be, which are all inner city neighborhoods in Philadelphia.

And convincing the parents and stakeholders that this would be a good idea, good [00:13:00] place to place their kids. Once we got a few in it really we didn't have to do much recruiting anymore. It was peer to peer. People saw what a great program that that this was. And the parents beat down our doors to get their kids involved because as you just said, we were putting them in, we were taking them off the streets.

They were coming to what was a safe. They were getting supplemental education services that were augmented into what they were learning in school. But the third pillar besides education and hockey of our program is life skills. And so they were able to learn things that they weren't learning in school.

They were learning how to introduce themselves, how to look people in the eye, how to shake hands, [00:14:00] how to write resumes, how to how to sell themselves, how to market themselves. 

John Boruk: All of those elements that you need and that are required in the business world being taught. And that's something that I think as we got into the digital age of social media and everything, the eye to eye, the communication it's becoming a lost start.

I, I, that's one thing that I know that employers talk about now is they lack the social skills. So to me, that's very important.

Scott Tharp: Yeah, to with as far as we're concerned hockey is always gonna be the biggest part of what we do because that's our hook. Education you absolutely need, but if you don't have the life skills to go with it you're not gonna be, you're not gonna complete yourself.

John Boruk: You always want to showcase some of the people who have come through the [00:15:00] program and where they are now. And that's one of the great things is I look at your 2021 year in review. You've got one alumnus who is playing up in Maine in the NA, the NAHL, which is tier two, the second highest level of junior hockey in the United States.

You've got a Snyder Hockey alum. John Carlo Valentine, right? Is I pronounce that right? Yeah. Yeah. That is part of the Baylor Football program. And we talk about that a lot, how you can play. I think it's great because I think it. Hockey is probably the most skilled sport because it requires really two skills in one, you gotta master the skating, then you have to master everything else.

But it's, we talk about being multifaceted and being, get out there and play as many sports, because in a lot of ways they're all interchangeable. So it's so good that I know that you see this, that they're, they've taken all of those. [00:16:00] And have gone on to really great things.

You've got girls who are playing major university ice hockey. So they are, it's not like they're playing sports. They're taking everything that you've taught them and maybe some of the skill set from playing hockey, and they're applying that now at the collegiate level and beyond.

Scott Tharp: One, one of the girls that, that actually the very first college graduate that we had come through our program was a young lady by the name of Berlin Reyes. And I'll never forget one day I got a call from Ed Snyder. His office was right above mine at the Wells Fargo Center, and he said, Come up to my office.

I need to show you. And I'm thinking, Oh, I don't know if this is good or bad. I went up there and he was actually blotting tears from his face and he shoved a letter across [00:17:00] his desk and said, Read that, and it was a letter she wrote when she was 13 years old. She had just come into our program at age 11, and so she, she'd been in about a year and the letter started out, Dear Mr. Snyder before Ed Snyder, Youth Hockey in education, I had no hope in life. And it went on to say that she'll be forever grateful for what we've been able to provide to her. As it turns out, she became a very first college graduate, went to Westchester University on a full scholarship.

Graduated Cum Lada was captain of their women's hockey team, Division two hockey team that won the national championship. And now she's a young entrepreneur. She [00:18:00] she has her own art and tattoo studio in Roxboro and she gives back to the program to the tune of $5,000. . That shows it was beyond my expectations.

One day when I got an envelope from her and opened it up and the $5,000 check in it and there's an example of someone that learned the importance of giving back and paying forward for the next generation. 

John Boruk: When I look at the, this generation of kids, I can tell you the tattoo industry's going pretty strong, right?

Scott Tharp: Yeah. She made a good choice. . 

John Boruk: Yeah. She made a pretty good choice, and I'm sure she's the go-to tattoo artist. They're in Roxboro. Talk about some of the funding, how much where that comes from, how hard it is because this is a nonprofit organization and you're always looking for [00:19:00] fundraisers ways for people to contribute. And really how that all comes together. 

Scott Tharp: Yeah. Obviously you can do an awful lot if you have the money to do it with. . And not gonna lie, Ed left us in a pretty good situation. However we like to joke he left us in a situation that is such where he still controls us from his grave.

He took great pride while he was alive in matching every dollar that we raised with two of his own. And, they're not too many people that are gonna make that type of commitment. And shortly before he. He called me in one day and he said, I think I figured out a way to make my match perpetual.

And I said, Really? How's that? He said I'm gonna leave you a nine figure endowment, [00:20:00] but the only way you can draw down from it is by continuing to raise money. And that way I can make my two to one match which is unbelievable. To have that type of support and that type of commitment from someone is incredible.

Our annual operating budget is about $7 million a year. So that means that our development people are tasked with raising about two and a half to 3 million a year. And with Ed's match, not only we meet our budget, but we can put more money aside that will sustain us for perpetuity. 

John Boruk: Is there an element to at Snyder, the youth and hockey program, that when you started this, you probably didn't say to yourself when you got involved said, [00:21:00] I didn't foresee that, that this program was going.

Turn out kids that did the a or thought this way or was there something unforeseen in this program that really is a byproduct of what its intentions were when you set out? 

Scott Tharp: Yeah. Our mission is to create opportunities for young people to prosper in. And that's pretty much been our mission statement from the beginning.

But if you'll notice under our logo, we have put in a tagline called Building Lives and Uniting Communities. And the whole idea of uniting communities while we build these young lives was an ancillary result. It's exact, it's something we never first saw in the very. [00:22:00] formative years we used to and we still do.

We, we have not only are we the largest youth hockey provider in the Atlantic District, and we have 20 some teams in the DVHL, which is mainstream recreational hockey, but we start our kids in our own in-house recreation league. We're at five City Rinks. One's in West Philly, one's in Kensington, one's in North Philly one's at Franklin Circle and one's in South Philly.

And so we started in-House League where on Saturdays we would take kids from West Philadelphia up to Kensington and they would play and almost an in-house intramural. . And as Philadelphia's a city of neighborhoods and there are lines, certain [00:23:00] lines that certain people of certain demographics don't cross.

We were crossing those lines was we were taking a group of kids from our rink in West Philadelphia, the Lars Sim skate house, which is predominantly African American up Kensington to the Scanlon rink, which it has a very large Hispanic population. And it's in, back then it was largely Hispanic and real blue collar Polish American.

And the very first. Saturday that we had the Snyder Hockey League, I got Ed out of bed and I drove him up to Kensington to watch the match and or watch the game. And as we walked in the door there were people from [00:24:00] Laura Sims that had come up to watch their kids intermingling with the folks from the Kensington neighborhood.

Folks cheering in Spanish, and Ed turned and looked at me. He said, I've been in hockey for 40 plus years. It's the first time I ever heard Spanish spoken in a hockey rink. And before long you could see these two groups melding together in support of their kids. And there was no divisiveness.

They were all trying to learn the game to gather and support what we were. And that's when we decided, you know what we're not only building lives, but we're helping to unite these communities. And that is a terrific ancillary result that we never for saw. That's great. 

John Boruk: You were gaining some steam and everything was going along great.2019 and then 2020 [00:25:00] comes and then COVID. And I don't think there's a business in the world where COVID hasn't had a profound impact. So how did that change what you guys were able to do and how have you rebounded from that? 

Scott Tharp: It was sudden at right before COVID, we were probably serving close to 1900, 2000 kids a day at our various location.

And when all of a sudden we had to curtail live programming and we took away the ice and had to make a pivot. And, we can, we were able to continue a lot of our educational services and life skills services online. But, you can't replace the missing ice, which as I said, hockey is the hook.

That's the fun. That was the fun part. That was the reward kids were getting for [00:26:00] staying in. And during their work. And so we lost a significant number of kids particularly our younger kids. It wasn't drastic with our older kids because they had been immersed in our programming for many years, and they were on college track or on scholarship track for high performing.

but we probably lost 40% of our kids. We went down to about 900 to 1100 kids. And fortunately now that CO's over, we've done a fast rebuild. And I think by the first of this year, we will have eclipsed what we the number of kids we had in our program. COVID and that is being fully subscribed.

We basically we [00:27:00] have certain limitations. I'd love to be able to get to 10,000 kids, but y we're, we have limited space at the rinks in which we operate. 

John Boruk: Yeah. And I'm really hoping that if something like this a pandemic happens again, that we learn from some of the mistakes that were made and not to really bottle up.

Keep them confined in spaces because I think they're the ones, and you could probably attest this more than anybody, because you had that core group within your program. They're the ones that I think were so adversely affected by COVID in the sense that, they need that structure. They need, especially when you have parents, like a lot of the ones in the inner city where they go off to work and they need the Ed Snider program to be there and to help with all the things that they can't be.   

Scott Tharp: Yeah you're absolutely right. There's no doubt about that. And one of the things that we pride ourselves on is that [00:28:00] unlike a lot of youth enrichment organizations we're here all year for our kids.

We're not seasonal. Even though the hockey season is Fall through spring. Our programs are year round. We're in fact just as busy in the summer as we are, if not bus actually we're busier in the summer because we do full day camps rather than just after school programming. And we're not only here all year, but we're here year after year for our kids.

Our mantra is that we go from cradles to crayons to college to careers. That's a good, that's a good tagline. And we, we're not done with [00:29:00] our kids when they graduate from high school. We're not done with them when they graduate from college. We still want to hear from.

We still want to chart their successes and we want them to come back and either volunteer or come back and work for us. Yeah. 

John Boruk: You mentioned how summer's a big time. You really have summer camps. I'm reading here 26 full day camps across a 10 week program because that's as a father, I know sometimes that's the hardest part is now that the kids are outta school, what are we gonna do to keep 'em active?

You were part of that. You were part because I don't think that was implemented until you got there.  

Scott Tharp:. No. That that, that's true. When the foundation had started about a year prior to, to me joining and at that time we were a [00:30:00] school day program basically.

Ed Snider had made an agreement with the then superintendent of schools, Paul Valis, to designate certain schools that we would, that the foundation would provide the PE program by busing the kids from the school to one of the Flyer skate zones for an hour, twice a week to take part and to, to learn to skate, to learn to play hockey.

That would fulfill the state's PE requirement. When I first came, I had a meeting with Ed and I was really nervous going into the meeting because I was faced with telling him, Ed, I think we got it wrong here. I think we really need to focus on the out of school time hours when kids are most vulnerable to undesirable [00:31:00] influences and.

Taking them out of school for an hour, it's not worth it. What are these kids gonna do? They learn to play hockey. And then what's next for them? We need to build a structure that will not only provide for them in the out of school time hours, but we'll also have the next steps to it.

The progressions from going. Learning how to skate to skate, learning how to play hockey, playing in an intermural league, playing in a recreational league and beyond. And fortunately, Ed listened to us and we, we were also quite fortunate that just about that time when I had come and had this.

You might recall Mayor Nutter was the mayor then, and he made a [00:32:00] proclamation in Philadelphia that he was regretfully gonna have to close down I think it was 11 recreation centers and libraries. Libraries, yeah. And pools. He was emotionally distraught over there? Yeah. He didn't wanna do it, they just didn't have the funds to keep them open.

When I we saw this as a chance to make lemonade. We basically made an 11th hour deal with the city to take over the four hockey rinks actually five hockey rinks that they were gonna close down. And it worked out perfectly for us. It allowed us to provide the type of programs that we wanted to do in the outta school hours and the after school time hours. And we were so successful in getting kids into this program that we then felt the need that we had [00:33:00] to refurbish all of those rinks.

So we invested about $14 million at the time, enclosed the city rinks and renovated them for year, round years. Because before when we, but when we first went into the partnership, they were just out all outdoor rinks that were only operational from November to March. 

John Boruk: For people who want to get involved and let's say you have a, a child.And you can afford hockey and all that, but you want to be part of this program. Do you guys take volunteers? 

Scott Tharp: We do. Okay. We do, and we also have open enrollment. The only as far as getting your kids involved in our program, the only requisite is that you have to be a city resident. We really have always wanted to be a walkup type of community.

[00:34:00] Preferably you would live within a mile or so of our rinks, but for people that just wanna volunteer, absolutely just go to our website get Snider hockey.org. And we're easy to find and easy to access and get all the information you need. 

John Boruk: What opportunities are available for those who want to do donate their.

Scott Tharp: Academic aids. Okay. Tutors we have a lot of adults that just come in and read to the kids. Reading is fundamental. It's one of our early reading programs and we call it reading buddies. And we have a lot of people that that like to do. We have people that just like to [00:35:00] come and help tie skates and Oh yeah, that's, until they're about 11, 12 years old.

But, look we're open to any creative ideas that people might have. We also have built some terrific partnerships with not only corporations, but mom and pop shops in the neighborhoods that, that, in which we operate that supply us with snacks.

And the used equipment drives. One of the things you mentioned everything we provide, whether from equipment to travel to our educational initiatives are all of no. To, to our kids. Recycling equipment is, becomes a big chore for us as [00:36:00] the kids, that start very young and as they grow older, we're constantly recycling and refitting.

And any hockey families out there that have equipment laying around in their garage or basements that they want to get rid of, we're more than. To recycle. Yeah, absolutely. 

John Boruk: You've really become the gold standard when it comes to this particular program, Inner city youth program. And I say that because, I've played in that golf tournament that raises a good substantial amount of money, played in that golf tournament, and Mark Messier was there and Mark Messier was part of that golf tournament, because he wanted to find out more about the program and how he could replicate that program. I believe it was up in New York or back in Canada, wherever he was at.   

Scott Tharp: In New York? Yeah. Yeah. In the in the Bronx. [00:37:00] Yeah. Mark and I have become very good friends and I actually was hired as a consultant by the company that, that hired Mark to, to try to re.

What we're doing and with trying to maintain modesty. But we're very proud of the fact that the folks in the National Hockey League, Gary Bettman, has basically called us the Gold Standard when it comes to youth enrichment programs, and we're, We'll take that. That's a, that's pretty high accolade.

John Boruk: How is Messier's program doing there in the Bronx? I'm sure it takes time. It's a slow build. It's not, you're not gonna, you're not going to change people's ways overnight. 

Scott Tharp: They've had a couple setbacks. Their initial [00:38:00] financial backer had to back out at the last minute.

They thought that they had a location that they. We’re zeroing in on to build a facility and they didn't get the zoning they had hoped for, but they still have high hopes. And right now they're running their programs out, out of Harlem in a And also in Central Park and I know they'll get to where they want to be because Mark is really that determined.

He'll find a way. He's taken some of the lessons that he learned during his playing career and applying it to something like this. But he also tried to start this, as we talked about, with c a few years, right? That. For you guys, you had already been established. If you're trying to come through and you're two or three years in it, you can take a major hit.

John Boruk: Graduation rates because I know that graduation rates in the inner city aren't too high, [00:39:00] but you guys take great pride in that. What are those numbers? 

Scott Tharp: Right now we have a 99% grade to grade matriculation rate among all of our kids that are in our after school. When, as I mentioned in the very beginning when we were thinking about launching the program and trying to recruit kids into the program, we did a lot of town hall meetings and we were looking for some commonalities among the neighborhoods that we wanted to get into.

And at that time, the biggest community concern, which was at a crisis level, was the high school graduation. In the city of Philadelphia. And at that time it was around 50%. It's not much better today. And so we really hung our [00:40:00] hat in the beginning on we really wanted to affect that rate.

And, we found it's not really rocket science, if you can get kids to show. To go to school every day and to do their assignments in a timely manner. They're gonna graduate, they're gonna, they're gonna matriculate from grade to grade. And we decided that we were gonna collect report cards.

We don't charge any money, but we ask for some sweat equity. We ask our kids to turn over their report cards and. Give us access to their grades while they're in school. And they also have to commit to doing a certain number of community service hours to us within their community at some of our partners, like the SPCA, Philabundance, things like that.[00:41:00] 

And so by getting the report cards, by having access to their grades, we were able to make early intervention on the kids that. Not doing well, and we took away some of their ice privilege. If you tell a kid that he can't play in the game on Saturday because his grades are bad, that can be a, a pretty huge motivational incentive for the kids to, to get back on track.

John Boruk: It's an incentive that you can apply to any kid. Exactly. Which is great. And that's an important step. Part of this is teaching responsibility to take care of what you have to take care of, be responsible and all you're doing is asking 'em to do the required work. Show up, participate, do the required work.

Scott Tharp: not a lot for what we feel we were giving 'em in return. Sure. But they do buy into it. 

John Boruk: Did you, did from the [00:42:00] parents, did you always get a 100% buy in or was there some pushback in the very beginning. It was almost the response from some parents was a sideways glance ‘This is too good to be true.’  

Scott Tharp: What's the catch? You trying to come take over our recreational centers. Are you take, are you trying to take something away from us in turn and to convince them, No, we're giving you more and each year we're gonna give you more. It wasn't an uphill battle, but it, it took finding a few advocates in the community, to help.

But, once we got started people wanted to jump on they wanted to join us. So it's, now [00:43:00] the problem isn't so much finding. The right kids to come in our program, which are, underserved kids. It's keeping the wrong kids out. We never meant to provide free programs for kids.

That of means, that, that could otherwise afford it and which is why we really do restrict our services to the inner city. We, we have no suburbanites coming in, in their Mercedes trying to get in our programs. 

John Boruk: And you have kept it within the city limits too.

What's the vision moving forward? Do you, how much do you see it growing? See a adding other aspects to this. You got education, community service [00:44:00] sport giving back job programs. There's so many different elements. Is there, do you have a vision moving forward that even expands on that?

Scott Tharp: I used to ask Ed that a lot. People always used to call Ed a visionary. I don't know that he would agree that he was a visionary. He was just somebody with an abundance of common sense. But I'd say, Ed what do you see his next steps? And his answer was always the same.

It was more and more, and Oh yeah. Just more of the same. Yeah. And more . And that's what we're gonna try to do for as long as we can. And, we try to be really agile. If we see a need we'll try to address it during COVID hunger and food shortages were a need.

[00:45:00] And we, one of our pivots was. To be able to hand out meals in the neighborhood to, to the folks. We also saw a need in our, in, in the community that we serve to be able to help people get COVID shots, get vaccines, get vaccinated. So we set up vaccination services. You and so we'll always really try to keep a finger on the pulse of the community and our growth will really come from the community's needs, yeah. 

John Boruk: I have this vision that what I think would be really cool and something that would just change the whole complexion of any city is to have almost like you're a multicomplex, where you have multiple rinks, you have other [00:46:00] sports and, but now you're talking a whole other level of funding and something that someone have to, would have to step in and really think about.

Scott Tharp: Funny story in the beginning. We, that, that was one of our thoughts. When I first came to the foundation. Ed was still and Comcast spectacle still in the Sixers as well as the Flyers. And our thought was to build a multipurpose facility in South Philadelphia on Patterson Avenue, the land right next to the Eagles complex.

And we were gonna build a multi rink center with also basketball and other recreational. And include educational classrooms and computer labs. And we were close. We even had the architectural designs and we [00:47:00] were close to making this decision when it occurred to us that maybe that's something for the distant future.

Right now it's more important for us to be in the communities that really need us the most. Where kids will have real walkup access to us, which is why we decided to go the route of refurbishing the five rinks throughout the city. Yeah. And now one of our focuses, about five years ago, we totally refurbished the class of 23 at the University of Pennsylvania because that.

It's a great asset for us because that whole Mantua Grays ferry area there, there's a lot of, that it really fits the demographics that, that we're trying to serve and it's been a huge asset to us. [00:48:00] To be able to have area on a college campus is just incredible because we're able to benefit.

All of the ancillary programs that take place on college. And we get volunteers from their educational programs their students come and tutor and it, it's been terrific. So now I wouldn't be surprised if you see us someday building a rink on the Temple campus.

We're in negotiations right now to build a rink at Newman University, which we feel will serve the Chester Upland community, a community that's in dire need of our health. And in fact the capital campaign for, that's already under re way. So I think that'll be our next big announcement soon.

John Boruk: That would be fantastic to grow it into the underprivileged areas. Scott [00:49:00] Tharp, thank you so much for coming the at Snyder Youth Hockey and Education program. Like I said, the gold standard of any program like this in the country and what you guys have done have, has been absolutely fantastic. 

Scott Tharp: So thank you, John.

Thank you so much for having me. I appreciate our friendship. 

John Boruk: Yeah, absolutely. And you know how much I love the game. Just continue to grow it, continue to do what you guys do. Our quote of the day, Playing time isn't your decision. It's out of your control. You can control doing what it takes to become a better player.

If you wanna play more, then do more attack threats, practice more. Perfect. Your role. Be better. You're the only person responsible for what you control. 

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