BTCEB has been a proud supporter of the NorCal NICA League with its mission to build strong body, mind, character, and community through the inclusive sport of interscholastic cycling. This year, we strived to amplify our impact by increasing our donation by 5x and focusing on the grassroots level needs of NICA teams in our local East Bay area. We sent out surveys to all of the East Bay NICA teams and asked them to help us understand their biggest challenges and how funding from BTCEB could help address those challenges. Based on the needs that we heard, we awarded $5,000 across the following six local NICA teams: Oakland Composite High, Bishop O’Dowd High, Wildcat Composite Middle, El Cerrito High, Skyline High, and East County Shred Composite.
The Oakland Composite High School Team has run into a fantastic problem: they are seeing so much interest from new student-athletes that they are forming four new school teams that will operate independently from the Composite team! One of those teams, Oakland Charter High, will be racing as their own school team this year with the support of Oakland Composite. The funding from BTCEB will be used to cover additional expenses with supporting this new team.
The Bishop O’Dowd High School Team will be using the BTCEB funding to continue its growth as an independent team from Oakland Composite. There are many expenses involved with running a team including loaner bikes, bike fits, skills training, equipment, racing fees, and more.
The Wildcat Composite Middle School Team with over 100 students and 60 coaches has seen huge demand from middle schoolers to get involved in racing with the NorCal League! They will be using the BTCEB funding to upgrade their fleet of loaner bikes so that every kid who is interested can be part of the team without facing the common barrier of not being able to afford a bike. Additionally, we recognize the stand out advocacy performance by Wildcat students making public comments at East Bay Regional District Board meetings along with leading the East Bay in volunteer trail work hours.
The El Cerrito High School Team will be using its BTCEB funding to purchase more bikes for their fleet of loaner bikes to support new riders who they recruited to their team. Their recent recruiting efforts have led to an almost 3x increase in female riders, so they’ll have eight girls on their team of 34 student-athletes including three non-binary students.
The Skyline High School Team was recently able to secure some loaner bikes for their fleet through donations, but the bikes are in need of maintenance. The BTCEB funding will be used to repair the bikes so they are ready to be well-loved by the new students on the team!
The East County Shred Composite Team will be using its BTCEB funding to cover expenses for recruiting new students to their team with a focus on getting more girls on bikes.
We are looking forward to following along with these teams as the NorCal race season kicks off in February 2023! Two of our BTCEB board members, Lauren Haughey and Sarah Zaki, are volunteer coaches with NorCal NICA teams, so they will be attending the races to cheer on these student-athletes! To contact any of the teams mentioned above, you’ll find their info listed here.
We are always striving to improve within BTCEB, so we welcome your feedback about how we can improve our donations process to organizations like NICA for our 2023 giving year. Please contact info@btceb.org with your feedback.
