SquashSmarts, the Philadelphia youth enrichment program, began its 25th anniversary celebrations at the 2024 Comcast Business U.S. Open Squash Championships Monday, October 21, at the Arlen Specter US Squash Center in Philadelphia.
More than four hundred SquashSmarts staff members, students, parents, donors, advisors, and board members attended the SquashSmarts VIP Night at the Open. Quinetta Bowden, SquashSmart’s senior program director and a SquashSmarts graduate, and Andrew Nehrbas, SquashSmarts Board President, welcomed the large crowd at the Arlen Specter US Squash Center.
SquashSmarts night at the open formally kicked off the anniversary celebration of the program that will span its twenty-fifth year.
Founded in 2001, SquashSmarts has just begun its twenty-third season. A 501(c)3 non-profit, SquashSmarts is an award-winning, free, intensive, out-of-school academic and athletic mentoring program changing the lives of Philadelphia’s public-school students. Students are recruited in middle school from Mary McLeod Bethune Elementary, Neuva Esperanza Academy Charter, Science Leadership Academy, Carver School for Engineering & Science and Overbrook Educational Center. The program’s students attend practices three days a week for seven years and then maintain a deep relationship after they graduate from high school.