It’s game time on a Saturday afternoon at the Brownsville Recreation Center. Middle schoolers in haphazardly tied pinnies are battling it out on the basketball court under the watchful eyes of black leaders and sports stars painted like graffiti on the gym’s walls. The figures seem to be saying that there are possibilities outside of Brownsville—outside of the “hood.” But youth need more than colorful role models plastered on concrete.
“That’s the shot,” Randy Millard shouts at one of the sweaty players on his team, sliding across the waxy floor in blue Nikes. Clusters of older boys fill a few rows of the stadium, gossiping about girls and waiting for their chance to play in the next game.
At halftime Randy lets the littlest boy on his team play. Sitting on the bench, his feet don’t quite touch the ground, but on the court he fights viciously to get his hands on the ball. He steals a peek at Randy every so often for a look of encouragement.
And Randy gives him the direction he needs with arms high in the air, like an air traffic controller, pointing this way, then that. Randy’s team wins by two points, sending a dozen boys skipping through the air.
Randy says he knew many of these kids “before they even knew themselves.” In fact, he used to be one of them. At the age of 11, Randy started going down to the BRC, where his dad often worked. He picked up a basketball and, in this haven from the often crime ridden streets of Brownsville, he found his calling.
Now, 14 years later, Randy has come full circle. When he’s not working as a family counselor or assistant coach at the same high school he once attended, he volunteers at the Rec Center, coaching and mentoring local youth all weekend long.
Randy differs from most other twenty-somethings living in the area. He went to college, a rare feat in a neighborhood where less than ten percent of residents have a degree. And instead of receiving his diploma and checking out, Randy came back to guide the next generation of hoop stars and hopefuls.
“Where I’m from needs a lot of help, but nobody wants to come back,” Randy said. “This is where I was put. They need me here. Some people graduate and get families and move away for jobs, but that’s not me.”
Randy graduated from Norfolk State University three years ago with a degree in mass communications. Good grades paved the way for his entrance to college, but Randy says that basketball was ultimately what saved his life.
“Basketball just kept me out of trouble. It was pretty cool to have something to do and not get in trouble for it,” Randy said. “It really changed my life.”
As a teenager, Randy and his best friends, all of whom ended up attending college, played daily. They usually set up three games, stumbling home at night with aching muscles from the hours of play. They traveled to games in every borough, and the best part was that basketball didn’t come with a price tag.
“We were young and tired and played too many games,” Randy said, shaking his head with a silly grin. “But all you needed was five dollars for the whole day when you were playing.”
Randy and his friends were competitive on and off the court. They had a different mindset than many of the other teenagers they knew – instead of looking for trouble they pushed each other to do well in school and use basketball to their advantage.
But Randy admits to being curious about the darker side of teenage life in Brownsville. He never went to jail or became a “thug,” but he was a keen observer of those around him.
“I decided I wanted to go to college. I saw people not doing what they should,” he said. “And I got myself together with the help of these gentlemen here.”
“These gentlemen” are the many men who work or volunteer at the center, dedicating their lives to helping Brownsville youth stay off the streets. Several of them are at the basketball game today, cheering on a new crop of young men they’ve come to know and love.
Daryl Glenn could talk for hours about the 28 years he has worked at the BRC, while touting its reputation as one of the best youth centers in Brooklyn. He’s known Randy since he was two feet tall and speaks about him with the pride of father.
“The teenagers love him because they see something different,” he said, slipping some skin to the boys that pass. “They see that you don’t have to be a yes man or a gangster, or have your pants sagging.”
Glenn said that too few college grads from Brownsville come back and spread the wealth. But the spirit of giving back pervades the Rec Center. Its manager, Greg Jackson, was a former NBA player who came back to Brownsville and used his own success to foster change in the community.
Now Randy is doing the same and using his youthfulness to his advantage. His number one rule? Never talk down to a child.
“I’m someone they can relate to, even though this generation is different,” he said. “A lot of these kids are learning things that even I wasn’t learning at that age, but we have the wisdom and experience.”
Randy sees the good inside most of his players, even if they succumb to or become the victim of more powerful social forces. Just two weeks ago one of his high school players was shot dead in the back, never to dribble a ball again.
“He was 50/50,” Randy said without pause. “A good kid with bad friends – a knucklehead.”
These kinds of experiences have shaped Randy’s outlook on Brownsville. When he’s not on the sidelines or counseling in his office, Randy likes to write about the place he grew up in and the game he loves. Oftentimes he’ll pull out his blackberry to compose a short piece about something on his mind, sending it to his friends.
“Writing is like a form of therapy,” he said.
Randy and a few of his friends started a blog last year, The Brownsville Journal, which was an outlet for Randy to share his thoughts about the good and bad of Brownsville. He likes to tell real stories, what he calls “movies with words.”
He stopped blogging when his computer broke and work caught up with him, but he wants to make a better site in the near future.
“The blog was just a snippet of what I can show people,” he said. “A lot of things aren’t talked about and I want to show what’s really going on here.”
And as a family counselor, Randy listens to the stories that few are privileged to hear. He feels like he’s making more of a difference by counseling people in his own community and plans on going to graduate school for psychology in the near future.
But for now another BRC game is finished, and its time for Randy to coach the next team ready to take the stage. This time it’s the big kids – teens who actually have a chance of using basketball as a free way into college and out of Brownsville.
He looks to a group of boys next to him and rubs his hands together, saying with a sly smile, “We’re gonna smoke these kids.”
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