West Orange High, Windermere High football teams volunteer at local food bank

High school football coaches often preach their jobs aren’t to win games but rather to help build their players into quality young people off the field — and those coaches accomplish that in unique ways. 

Coaches Geno Thompson, of West Orange High, and Riki Smith, of Windermere High, had a similar approach to the concept of developing their players into quality people — they gave their teams a chance to give back to the local community by volunteering at the Southeastern Food Bank. 

For Thompson, giving back to the community is at the core of his philosophy.

“Our whole football program is about building young men up and trying to teach them to be leaders in the community,” he said. “Our team’s mission is: Be the best version of yourself. We do that by helping the community … and we use football as a vehicle to guide and try to help them understand what is needed in this community and how they can make an impact.”

Smith sees community service and service to others, in general, as an obligation given to him as a Christian. 

“We were put on this earth to be servants, servants of the Lord,” Smith said. “Our job is to serve others… to give back — it’s only right. I’ve been blessed in this situation, to be able to be the head coach of Windermere but also a mentor to pour into 100 kids. For me, it’s my duty to essentially show them how to serve or how to give. Everyone likes to receive, but again, the best feeling in the world is when you give someone something.”

Each team had the opportunity to pack boxes full of food that would be given to families in need. The experience not only helped families in the area but also resonated with the players. 

“It has an extremely large impact,” Smith said. “What I’ve found in the past — and even this year — is that community service work like this brings them closer together, as brothers, as a team. ... I’ve heard the kids talk about it in conversation in the locker room, about how much fun they had doing it.”

According to both coaches, many of the players are fortunate enough to go through life not knowing the feeling of struggling for food, so when given the opportunity to help those less fortunate than themselves, it made them realize how fortunate they are.

“At Windermere High School … the majority of our players are in above-average situations,” Smith said. “So, when they had the opportunity to give back to the needy or families that rely on the food bank to get food, I think it hit home ... because they understand they are privileged enough to eat three meals a day and some, and there are people out there that don’t have any food at all and are reliant on the food bank.”

For Thompson, although he has seen similar outcomes from this opportunity to serve, he wants to take the experience one step further and give his team the chance to see its impact. 

“Anything we can do together is going to help build our team chemistry even more — which it’s in a great place thanks to our senior leadership,” Thompson said. “So, volunteering like this is a great opportunity for them to grow as young men and bring us together. But, I think, to truly get the kids to capture what it means to help someone, I would love to have them experience handing over that box to a family in need. I think that would show them firsthand how big of an impact they’re making.”

When asked if the team would do anything like this in the future, Smith said, “Our team does two of these events a year. We always do the food bank and in October we’re going to volunteer at a cancer walk fundraiser.”

Thompson said his team plans to volunteer once each quarter and is always looking for different organizations to give back to. He requested that any nonprofit organization in need of volunteers reach out to him at [email protected].