WHY WE EXIST
There are 1.2 billion youth athletes around the world actively participating in organized or informal sports activities annually. Each of them has the capacity to be a changemaker. RePlay wants to help provide them the tools to feel empowered, using the game they love, to create impact in their communities, grow into leaders, and connect to a world bigger than themselves.
However there is a growing misalignment in youth sports as it’s become a $40 billion industry, with rising costs, hyper-competitiveness, commercialization, and burnout, leaving youth athletes and their families feeling overwhelmed, confused, and in a race to nowhere. In many cases, the focus has shifted from development to performance, from joy to pressure.
RePlay addresses this misalignment by meeting youth athletes during their most formative years, right when they’re most likely to disengage from sport, burn out, or get lost in the race. We seek to provide youth something that lasts longer than a single game: leadership skills, a peer community, and a sense of belonging beyond the field.
Tomorrow’s leaders and global citizens are being shaped today, and sport is one of the most powerful, global, and unifying arenas to do that shaping. RePlay creates the conditions for young people to find a supportive, connected community whose collective action and voice can be a powerful vehicle in shaping their shared future.
Community Action: Create Impact
Every year, billions of used sports items are thrown away, gear that still has life left in it. By coordinating gear drives, youth athletes take an active role in making a tangible difference in their communities. Taking ownership of these gear drives enables youth to experience, firsthand, that their actions have consequences that can ripple outward in impactful ways. By putting youth athletes as the leaders of collecting, sorting, and redistributing gear, the goal is to turn a simple act of recycling into a powerful act of community leadership.
Leadership: Build the Self
Leadership is something you learn through doing. When a young athlete organizes a gear drive and mentors younger athletes, they're not just collecting equipment; they're learning to plan, to problem-solve, to rally people around something bigger than themselves. They're building self-awareness, empathy, curiosity, and accountability in the process creating positive community impact.
Global Citizenship: Contribute to the World
RePlay aspires to help youth athletes see themselves as part of a larger interconnected global community. The love of sport is universal, and RePlay wants to harness that shared passion by developing a space for youth athletes around the world to engage with and learn from each other, share resources and broaden their perspectives and opportunities.