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LAWRENCE, Mass. – The holiday season helps remind us of everything we have to be thankful for. It is also a great time of year to give back in any way you can. Members of the UMass Lowell men's basketball team recently spent time volunteering at a local school to encourage students to reach for their dreams both academically and athletically.
 
Junior Tyler Livingston (Hudson, N.H.), along with redshirt freshmen Josh Gantz (Grove City, Ohio) and Dontavious Smith (Cullen, La.), joined the River Hawk mascot Rowdy in visiting the Spark Academy to participate in the school's Friday Community Meeting Series. Spark is a public middle school in Lawrence, Mass. dedicated to closing the achievement gap by supporting students' academic growth, health, and wellness. In an effort it promote the institution's goals, the Friday Community Meeting Series is a weekly assembly designed to discuss college, careers, and all-around success and well-being in many areas.
 
"It's really exciting and special to have student-athletes take time out of their busy schedules to come visit a school, especially an inner-city school like ours," said Sharleen DeLosSantos-Lazaro, an associate math teacher and incentive coordinator at Spark Academy. "It's great for our kids to see that hard work off the field academically is just as important as practicing and working hard athletically in order to be successful at that next level after high school."
 
The River Hawks' visit included a question and answer session with the students. The middle schoolers had a wide range of questions for the college athletes, such as how to balance school and sports, and what it is like to share a dorm with friends.
 
"Coming here and seeing the kids really light up when you talk about achieving both in school and in basketball, and what they need to do to get to where we are, is really an amazing experience," said Gantz.
 
The assembly concluded with a game of knockout between the River Hawks and select student representatives.
 
"Doing visits like these are definitely rewarding," said Livingston. "You have to love seeing the way they react to us. It makes you remember how much you were motivated to be better by speakers who came to your school as a kid, so it's awesome to come back and give that back."
 
The River Hawks spent some time shaking hands, signing autographs and even taking a few selfies with the Spark Academy students before heading out. Alieen Arias and Anthony Rivera, two students at Spark who hope to continue to pursue athletics, talked about how much it meant to them to meet and talk to the UMass Lowell teammates.
 
"This means a lot to me because I can see my future," explained Rivera, who spent some extra time discussing his favorite NBA players with the River Hawks. "I want to play Division I someday. I wasn't a very good student, but I'm realizing that I need to behave better and get better grades to be like (the UMass Lowell players)."
 
"I play a lot of sports, so it was cool to see that (the college athletes) have sort of the same background as me," added Arias. "They give me hope that I can make it as far as they have. I'm a high honors student, so I think that I'm on the right track."
 
The event was not only educational and fun for the middle schoolers, but equally so for the members of the UMass Lowell basketball team, who all enjoy spending time giving back whenever they can.
 
"I love these events," concluded Smith. "It's a part of basketball that I don't think everyone gets to do enough.
 
"It's fun to go out to support the community, show the kids how much they mean to us and that we really enjoy taking time out of our day to come do this. It means the world to them, which means the world to me. I love to make their day."