Profile: Liz and Ken Moscaret
April 30th, 2009 | By: Kelsey Bowlby
When Liz and Ken Moscaret introduced their youngest son to Simi Reynolds, something special was put in motion. Simi was a star athlete of the senior class at Skyline High School in 2001, and the Moscarets’ son was suffering from a sudden onset of Tourette’s syndrome.
In this photo at Skyline H.S. Stadium (L-R) Ken Moscaret, Jimmy Reynolds (partially hidden), Simi Reynolds, Jake Stillwell (another past SHS mentor)
“It really wrecked his life,” says Ken, whose son’s social relationships, confidence, and self esteem were being challenged by his disability. Simi agreed with Ken and Liz that their son could benefit from a special buddy, and he unofficially took on a mentorship role for the younger boy. As Ken and Liz watched their son blossom under Simi’s wing, they realized that this model of youth mentoring could help other kids. And so Athletes for Kids was born.
In late 2001, Simi recruited a handful of fellow student athletes at Skyline by first approaching Josh Williams, a sophomore class leader and football teammate. Simi and Josh had a contagious charisma and had little trouble getting a small group of friends on board to participate in pioneering this program. Tragically only a few weeks after committing to work with Athletes for Kids, Josh Williams was killed in a snowboarding accident. A week after Josh’s funeral, when Ken organized a meeting of the founding student athletes with the principal at Cascade Ridge Elementary to discuss implementing the program with the special needs students at her school, every Skyline sophomore who had said they would be involved showed up for the meeting. When the principal asked them pointedly why she should encourage her teachers and parents to entrust their students to this new, unproven group of 16 year-olds, their unanimous response to her was, “We’re doing it for Josh now.”
That pioneer group of sophomores helped lay the foundation for a program that has now spread to six Eastside high schools. In addition to his day job as a legal consultant and courtroom expert witness, Ken took on the role of Executive Director for his fledgling organization, donating his time and money to getting Athletes for Kids off the ground. Teresa Bretl, who runs the program today observes, “It is so rewarding to see them come out a totally different person at the end.”
Athletes for Kids is unique throughout the entire nation as the only mentorship program to match up these two particular groups of students in such a close personal relationship. This arrangement was intentional in the design. As Ken explains, “In a small community, high school athletes have local star power.” The kids whom they mentor suffer from physical or developmental disabilities or even just at-risk situations and often have no friends. They have difficulty forming relationships and as a result have little self confidence, they feel like outsiders. With their student athlete buddy at their side, the mentored kids feel accepted and included again. Their siblings and peers look at them differently because they suddenly have a special relationship with a sort of local celebrity.
The relationship is mutually beneficial. The mentored kids gain a friend, a role model, a stronger sense of self, and more confidence. The mentors grow, as well. Through mentoring a child with a disability, the student athletes learn what it means to give back to their community, to commit their time to someone else, to overcome barriers in building a relationship with someone less fortunate than themselves, and to look at the world a little differently.
Fortunately, Ken and Liz’s younger son is fine now. Meanwhile, hundreds of Eastside student athletes and mentored kids have experienced the Athletes for Kids program. As Ken describes the program, “Athletes for Kids is transformative, it changes lives, and not just the two minors who are directly involved in the mentorship. Everyone connected with our program is affected in a positive way by Athletes for Kids.”
For more information, or to get involved, visit www.athletesforkids.org.
