Olympians Teach Success In and Out of Sports

Past Olympians and NFL Hall of Famers alike came out for the 6th Annual Joetta Clark Diggs Foundation Sports Extravaganza, held at the Friday.

The fundraising event, titled featured dinner, live entertainment, guest speakers and the presentation of $1,000 “Joetta’s Geniuses” Scholarships to Hillsborough High School’s Aisha Jackson and Sussex Tech’s Hailey Guhr.

The evening is a way for Diggs and her fellow athletes to promote a positive message to the community.

“What we do is we go across the country, and we do our programs in the school systems,” said Diggs. “We teach kids about nutrition, eating right, exercising, life skills and all of the things they need to be a healthy and whole person.”

Those aspects of a complete lifestyle also include success outside of athletic competition, which is something that the athletes in attendance—all of them college graduates—would emphasize to the hundreds of students in attendance on Friday night.

“What we want the students to realize is, yeah, you can be a great athlete, but you can also graduate from college and go on to do better things,” said Diggs. “All of our Olympians and athletes have graduated from college, and they all do great things in society. Even though we’re a sports foundation, we focus on life skills and education.”

Several organizations and fellow athletes were more than happy to support the event, including six-time Olympic track and field medalist Jackie Joyner-Kersee.

“I have the utmost respect for Joetta and her family," she said. "I know Joetta’s commitment to this community and to young people across the nation."

“For her to be putting on this extravaganza, it’s really great," she added. "More importantly, this a great leader, a great woman that has had a vision for so long. Getting the support to also be able to impact the next generation says a lot. When Joetta calls you, you answer, you come, and you support her.”

Perhaps even more important, though, was the opportunity to set an example for student-athletes in the most defining years of their young lives. Several of the athletes attending on behalf of Diggs’ foundation were more than willing to share what they’ve learned throughout their lives.

“Number one, you have to learn to set priorities," said Norman Tate, a former United States Triple Jump champion. "I teach my kids the principle of the three 'D's. Discover what you want to do and what you want to be, develop those skills and then go out and demonstrate what you’ve developed on a daily basis, whether it be in athletics or the classroom."

“I’m an assistant coach at Rowan, so I’m dealing with student-athletes every day," he added. "There’s times when we preach to them to be the best they can be. If you come out as an athlete, you want to be the best athlete you can be.”

A common theme among the athletes in attendance was to not keep one’s mindset exclusive to athletic performance. Student-athletes were encouraged to find something that they were passionate about, and apply it to success in all areas of their lives.

“I just gave a talk to some kids yesterday," said Hazel Clark-Riley, a three-time Olympian in the 800-meter dash. "What I told them, and this is what I believe exactly, is that you have to find something that you’re passionate about. It may not be running, it may not be sports. It could be something academic, it could be dance."

“Whatever it is, you find something you’re passionate about, you take the talents that God gave you, and you do your best with them," she added. "If you put all of your focus into that, and you work hard at it, things will work out, but it has to be something that you’re passionate about.”

Added John Thomas, a two-time Olympic medalist in the high jump, “I tell them, first of all, learn something, and if you can’t learn something, get someone to teach you. When I was competing, you went out for sports because it was something to do. It’s not like today, where you try to make money and everything like that. Whatever you did as far as sports goes, that was good, but getting your schoolwork done and learning something, that’s really most important.”

To find out more about The Joetta Clark Diggs Sports Foundation, visit Diggs’ website.