Author to speak in Lynchburg at annual Sports Outreach banquet
By: Amy Trent | The News & Advance
Published: October 01, 2012 Updated: October 01, 2012 – 6:50 AM


Author and former Sports Illustrated senior writer Tim Crothers will bring the story of his new book, “The Queen of Katwe — A Story of Life, Chess, and One Extraordinary Girl’s Dream of Becoming a Grandmaster,” to Lynchburg College the same day his book is published.

Crothers met the subject of his book, 14-year-old Phiona Mutesi, through Lynchburg-based Sports Outreach International. He will speak at Sports Outreach’s second annual banquet at 6:30 p.m. on Oct. 9. Crothers will sign books in the Lynchburg College Memorial Ballroom for 30 minutes prior to the banquet.

Sports Outreach is a Christian ministry that works with impoverished children through sports, namely soccer. The ministry provides children with food, clothing and educational opportunities.

About two years ago, a small group of children attending Sports Outreach in Katwe, a slum in Kampala, Uganda, began learning to play chess.

Surviving in Uganda, like chess, requires a strategy, said Lynchburg College professor and Sports Outreach member Todd Olsen, who teaches an LC course on public health in Africa.

Crothers met Mutesi in Uganda and chronicled her journey through the World Chess Olympiad in Russia in 2010 to the World Chess Olympiad in Turkey in 2012.

Crothers has been invited to Lynchburg College this October to help Sports Outreach celebrate its successes; raise awareness and, hopefully, funds to allow the ministry to continue.

Rodney Suddith, president of SOI, said the money raised by his group is spent in the country being served to help grow the middle classes and provide children with what they need. The agency continually provides children with shoes, clothing and books and is in the process of building a library for children.

Suddith hopes the Tuesday evening event — which features both author Tim Crothers and LC professor Todd Olsen — will shine a light on the ministry and what can be achieved through outreach.

Olsen, an epidemiologist and the college’s women’s soccer coach, has traveled to Africa several times and LC has become an integral part of SOI’s effort to teach Africans about public health.

Olsen coordinates annual events locally to raise funds and then gives the money to Sports Outreach which uses the money to build wells and help teach children about health. He and his students travel to Africa each year as part of a three-credit course to teach children about everything from how to clean wounds to avoid infections, to sexually transmitted diseases.

His students also train SOI missionaries about public health so they can spread the message to the children they work with throughout the year.

Later this year, Lynchburg College will announce a weeklong awareness campaign to raise funds for Sports Outreach and to support the college’s public health work in Africa.

Source: http://www2.newsadvance.com

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