Skateboard Angel gives boards to kids in need
Program pairs business, non-profit and children
“Your first board is like, it’s like receiving gold basically. It’s like a memory.” Alejandro Gaxiola Valley middle-schooler
As a kid who received his first skateboard by donation, 12-year-old Alejandro Gaxiola knows how big of a deal it is.
“Your first board is like, it’s like receiving gold basically,” he said. “It’s like a memory. You would want to keep it and cherish it forever.”
He received his first board from Skate After School, a non-profit that lends kids used equipment during guided skateboarding sessions at school once a week.
Last week, he got to help pass out new skateboards to other students as part of the non-profit’s new partnership with Cowtown Skateboards. The goal is to get new boards into participating kids’ hands for the holidays.
They have set up donation trees at Cowtown Skateboards’ four locations across the Valley and on its website.
Skate After School co-founder Timothy Ward said he originally hoped to get 14 donated skateboards — enough for one boy and one girl at all seven Skate After School locations.
Since it started the day before Thanksgiving, they have received 170.
Now, they are hoping to get a skateboard for every kid in every program across the schools, a total of about 220, Ward said, “which would be insane to be able to do that.”
Alejandro dreamed of skateboarding for as long as he can remember.
“But I didn’t have a chance ‘cause I didn’t have a skateboard at home and usually would stick to watching TV,” he said.
When Alejandro was in second grade, his older brother came home with word of a new organization at their David Crockett Elementary School at Van Buren and 36th streets in Phoenix. Skate After School was lending kids used equipment so they could skateboard in a guided session once a week.
“I was nervous, scared, thinking that people wouldn’t like me,” he said of his first day in the program. “I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t know how to even step on a board. I would fall off.”
But the non-profit’s co-founders — longtime skateboarders Timothy Ward, Ryan Lay and Bobby Green — were there to help him and, before he knew it, he could not only get on a board but also cruise around.
“It’s very fun once you get used to
it,” Alejandro said. “It took a while for me to get used to it, but it was the best moment of my life.”
He wanted to keep practicing, but it was hard without his own board. His parents couldn’t afford one, he said.
But about a year into the program, Skate After School gave him a board of his own.
Soon after, he completed his first trick, an ollie, which he said made him so excited he had “this feeling like if a bomb exploded inside of me.”
For an ollie, a skater kicks the board’s tail down while jumping to make the board pop into the air.
Alejandro started getting better grades so that his parents would let him visit skate parks. Instead of fighting with his younger brother, he would lend him his board and teach him tricks.
Even though he’s in middle school now, he still goes back to Crockett Elementary every week to help younger kids in Skate After School.
Last week, he got to pay it forward, handing out skateboards to a few kids who received donations through the first ever Skateboard Angel program.
Local chain Cowtown Skateboards approached Skate After School with the idea to have the roughly 220 participating kids across seven locations fill out cards to hang on Christmas trees inside their skate shops so customers could pick a child and buy a board for them.
Skate After School offers skateboarding at six schools and one program that all serve underprivileged kids in Phoenix: Crockett Elementary, Creighton Elementary School, Larry C. Kennedy School, Phoenix Collegiate Academy, Vista College Prep, Reyes Maria Ruiz Leadership Academy and a Boys & Girls Clubs of Metro Phoenix location in Phoenix.
The cards of children who haven’t been picked yet hang in Cowtown Skateboards’ locations in Phoenix, Tempe, Glendale and Litchfield Park. People can also buy a board donation on cowtownskateboards.com, and will receive an email with a child’s card.
Ward said the kids’ reactions have been mixed, depending on the school.
“At one of our schools, the kids were all huddled in a group and screaming when I read off the names,” he said.
At Crockett Elementary, 11-year-old Ali Al-Shawi beamed as he received his new skateboard and immediately began skating around the basketball court, showing it off to his friends.
“He is the most into skating, pretty lively, pretty outgoing ... he’s all about it,” Ward said. “It sounds corny, but the best part is seeing the kids get psyched on skating. I was around their age when I started skateboarding.”
Of the kids who have received boards, many have started bringing them to school every day. A skateboard is a mode of transportation that can expand their neighborhood and give them a reason to explore.
“All the friends that I have, the places I’ve traveled to and lived have mostly been related in some way, shape or form to skateboarding,” Ward said. “It can be a fun thing kids do and enjoy doing or it can be something that shapes a pretty crucial portion of their life.”