Magic Mania
Overview of Initiative Proposal
The Waterboy will create an initiative to give opportunity for underprivileged children and their parents attend Waikato/BOP Magic Netball games at Claudelands Arena.
Why this is initiative is needed
Every child should have dreams for what they one day want to become and achieve. They should have people to look up to and something to work toward.
For kiwi kids who are lucky enough to be raised in wealthy families, they have the opportunity to watch sport on television. Whilst watching that sport they start to look up to the players they are watching. They start to dream of themselves one day being able to be on television or playing in front of a crowd. They develop a love for a sport, and with it a healthy lifestyle.
The Waterboy works with children on a daily basis who would like to do sport but do not have the opportunity. The vast majority of these children do not have Sky Television in their homes and therefore they do not have the means to watch any sport. These children like the idea of playing sport at school but never have the opportunity to watch a professional level game of sport. They never witness the unique atmosphere of top level sport. The same atmosphere which captures the imagination of the privileged children prompting them to dream and do. These underprivileged children will give sport a go at school but they have not developed the love for the game, or formed any ideas about who they want to become.
The Waterboy always asks underprivileged children who their favourite players are - only about 10% of the children can even name a current New Zealand representative in their sport. The Waterboy has surveyed 19 girls who like netball. Only 1/19 could name a Silver Fern (Maria Folau), and that was because Maria went to visit her school.
The Waterboy wants to create an initiative to give opportunity for families who live below the poverty line to be able to fall in love with sport. Creating these experiences will create ambitions for a positive and healthy lifestyle, positive family bonding experiences, a large player and fan base for netball (and/or other sports), louder more enthusiastic crowds at Magic games.
Who’s involved and what do we need to do
The Waterboy are working with Magic Netballers Lenize Potgieter and Hayley Saunders on executing this initiative.
The Waterboy are introducing underprivileged children (and their families) to Hayley and Lenize so kids can meet the players first-hand and start developing aspirations and goals of their own.
The Waterboy with gather an initial group of 30 - 50 people to create the Magic Water Crew. This support crew will consist of families with underprivileged children. The group will come together to make colourful support uniforms and banners and practice their chanting. The Waterboy will team up with other non-profit youth support organisations Zeal & Te Ahurei who will provide a space to make the supports attire and some larger than life personalities to lead the chanting and get the crowd enthusiastic.
Lenize and Hayley will be there to help them create their uniforms and banners, and to practice their chants. It will be great for this crew to be able to develop a relationship with Lenize and Hayley and then watch them out on centre stage at Claudelands Events Centre.
The crew will meet at Zeal before games for one last chant practice and walk to Claudelands together for the games.
Seeking Sponsors
We will work with Magic a good deal on tickets for the support crew. Whilst it is within the interests of Magic to have this initiative become a success, we can not expect them to carry the full load financial load.
We are seeking philanthropic individuals and businesses who are willing to financially support us, as a means of living and showing their values - creating stronger NZ communities through sport.
The Waterboy will film this whole journey and tell meaningful stories about how this is impacting lives. The Waterboy has established fantastic relationships with print and television coverage through past initiatives and there has already been interest expressed by NewsHub (The Project) and various print media in covering this initiative.
Sponsors will receive film of this initiative to post on social media and their website, in line with our normal film (see our website for examples), and extensive exposure on our social media. It would be great if sponsors and their staff want to actively be part of the support crew - a fantastic way to increase staff morale and engagement.
