The subcommittee on early childhood, elementary, and secondary education will come to order. I note that a quorum is present. Without objection, the chair is authorized to call recess at any time. For generations, sports have served an important role in building the character
of America's youth, keeping kids active and teaching important lessons in perseverance, discipline, and teamwork. Today, fewer kids are getting these foundational skills from youth sports. 70% of children now quit organized
sports by age 13. This decline will have a negative effect on their long-term development and broader economic and societal consequences for the nation. Part of the decline stems from the increased commercialization of youth sports. In 2024, the average US sports
family spent more than $1,000 on its child's primary sport, a 46% increase since 2019. In total, the youth sports industry generates more than $40 billion $40 billion in annual revenue. But this revenue comes at a steep cost to
families. Parents are told that only year-round travel teams, private coaching, and early specialization will keep their child competitive and maybe even earn them a scholarship. That false promise has created a spending surge that prices out the average family while pushing
kids as young as eight into highcost, high pressure programs that simply aren't necessary for long-term development. Private equity firms are now pouring billions into youth sports facilities, tournaments, and leagues, further fueling exorbitant spending. As
programs get more expensive, fewer kids have access to affordable opportunities in their own communities to learn important life skills and to try new things. This leaves millions of kids losing the very benefits sports are supposed to deliver. Inactive youth feel
negatively about themselves at nearly double the rate of youth who are active. The broader consequences of declining participation are stark. Today, one in three youth ages 10 to 17 are overweight or obese. Medical expenses associated
with obesity alone cost taxpayers $173 billion a year with lifetime costs for today's obese use projected to exceed a trillion dollars. Meanwhile, on average, children spend nearly eight hours a day on screens. And
for kids who don't participate in extracurricular activities, it's roughly two additional hours every day. Excessive screen time is linked to obesity, depression, anxiety, and reduced self-esteem.
What we are witnessing is more than a drop in sports participation. It is the loss of one of the most effective tools we have to combat rising isolation and mental health challenges in our children. When children lose regular in-person team activities, they lose
daily opportunities to build confidence, belonging, and real world social connection. But here's the good news. We already have a national target to turn this around. The Healthy People 2030 goal administered by the Department of Health
and Human Services calls for 63% youth sports participation by 2030. It's the first ever national benchmark to promote physical activity and child development for America's youth. Achieving it would require about $3 million more kids to participate in sports and would result
in 80 billion dollars in savings from reduced medical costs and lost productivity, plus millions of additional quality years of life for America's youth. That is why we are here today. To shine a national spotlight on youth sports,
the critical role they play in America's future, and how increasing participation can save billions in health care costs and improve millions of lives. I'm looking forward to today's hearing. I'd like to thank all of our witnesses for your participation. And with that, I
yield to the ranking member for an opening statement. >> Uh, thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and thank you to the witnesses. I also look forward to this hearing today. Uh whether it's te-ball, track and field, baseball, lacrosse, soccer, football, hockey, swimming, or figure skating, or anything I left out, we know that
participating in sport sports has long-term benefits for young people, their families, and their communities. Studies show that participating in youth sports improves mental and physical health, lowers stress, heightens self-esteem, fosters social skills, improves academic outcomes, sparks
collaboration, joy, and more. More than 60 million children participate in youth sports in the United States annually. Sports have long been an avenue for all children to come together regardless of socioeconomic status. But the playing field is
increasingly a pay-to-play industry accessible more only to the wealthy. According to the Aspen Institute, who we'll hear from today, the youth sports industry generates, as the chairman said, more than $40 billion in revenue every year. That's more than the revenue
of the NFL. The New York Times reported that in 2024, the average family spent more than $1,500 on their child's sports. And as the cost of living continues to rise, working families must juggle skyrocketing health care costs,
housing costs, groceries, and more. And on top of this, families are now facing exorbitant fees and costs associated with team registrations, travel, lodging, equipment, and apparel. This enormous financial barrier to entry can and does prohibit families from
enrolling their child in these important activities. Youth sports used to be local recreational activities, but in recent years, we've seen this cherished pastime be consumed by corporate interests that put profit over play. Increasingly, private equity firms are taking advantage of families by buying
up and consolidating training programs and leagues and then setting sky-high prices. These private equity firms can drive up prices because they know that parents who can will try and will sacrifice to give their children the best opportunities and a chance to
succeed. But the gap is widening. Fewer children will have access to the benefits that come with participating in youth sports. And we heard about that from the chairman and I know we'll hear about that from the witnesses. With youth sports, it shouldn't matter where you grew up or how much money your family has. It matters how much you try
and learn and what you can do on the field. Increasingly, that's not the case. In many ways, the takeover of youth sports by private equity exemplifies problems we see throughout today's economy. Health care costs are already high and climbing, in part because private equity firms are buying
up hospitals, knowing that consumers don't have a choice in whether they receive necessary medical care. Private equity firms have swooped into child care and housing, often making everyday life more expensive without improving quality. After all, when you have a few entities that own and control everything
in an industry, there's nothing stopping them from increasing prices and tacking on fees. We want to give all students the best shot to succeed. For millions of families, this means access to highquality extracurricular and community-based programs like arts,
music, dance, and of course, sports. And unfortunately, the local organizations, school-based programs, and nonprofit organizations that once made up the youth sports scene have long been underfunded. Many community-based sports programs never recovered from the Great Recession and the COVID 19 pandemic,
particularly in lower inome communities. This chronic lack of local investment has given private equity firms and big corporations the opportunity to get in and hike prices. Then to make matters worse, the Trump administration is making it more difficult for youth sports to remain accessible. The budget
for fiscal year 2026 includes nearly $4 billion in cuts to national parks and recreation areas. And recent funding cuts and the termination of public education programs were will further contribute to the lack of accessible sports programs for children. And the
Trump administration has done nothing to reign in private equity, curb corporate greed or protect consumers. The majority of Americans live in a country where the economy doesn't work for them. And despite the president's claims, the Americans pe people know that the affordability crisis is no hoax. Youth
sports are a small but critical part of this affordability crisis. All children, no matter their socioeconomic status, deserve to have every opportunity to pursue their dreams, nurture their talents, and create lifelong memories on the field, the court, or the rink. Although private or corporate funding
may have a small role to play, it's not a substitute for sustainable and local federal investment, we must do our part to foster that local investment to prevent monopolization and promote access to sports for every child and every family, not just the wealthy and the well-connected. And Mr. Chairman,
that being said, I want to note that the title of this committee hearing refers to the quote the crisis in American youth sports. As important as sports part participation is for kids, there's also a much more pressing crisis at hand that the majority needs to recognize.
According to Education Week, there have been 17 K12 school shootings in 2025. There have been more than 150 shootings in the past five years. We know what happened on uh over the weekend. This doesn't even include shootings at High Institutes of Higher Education. Just
this weekend, two students were killed and nine others injured in a mass shooting at Brown University. the shooter is still at large. Uh at least a couple of the students at the university have previously survived mass shootings at their high schools and Sunday was the
13th year anniversary of the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre. The subcommittee has held sever several hearings this year, but we have not had a single hearing related to gun violence. We've not marked up a single bill that will make students safer from gun violence. We can talk about the other issues as much as we want.
>> [snorts] >> math, reading, CTE, screen time, student privacy, and sports. And none of that matters if children are shot and killed. So, I urge my colleagues in the majority to make it a priority in 2026 to address the real and ongoing crisis of gun violence in schools. It's not an issue
we can afford to ignore. Kids are counting on you. I do look forward to this hearing today, Mr. Chairman, and I yield back. Pursuant to Committee Rule 8C, all members who wish to insert written statements into the record may do so by submitting them to the committee clerk electronically in Microsoft Word format
by 5:00 p.m. 14 days after this hearing. And without objection, the hearing record will remain open for 14 days to allow such statements and other extraneous material noted during the hearing to be submitted for the official hearing record. I'll now introduce our witnesses. Our first witness is Mr. Dr. Tom Ferry,
the executive director for the sports and society program at the Aspen Institute from Sam Clemente, California. Our second witness is Mr. Steve Bole, the co-founder and executive director of 241 Sports from Hartford, Connecticut. Our third witness is Miss Katherine Van
Djk, a senior fellow at the American Economic Liberties Project from Washington DC. And our fourth witness is Mr. John O. Sullivan, the chief executive officer of Changing the Game Project from Bend, Oregon. We thank our witnesses uh for being here today and
look forward to your testimony. Pursuant to committee rules, I would ask that you each limit your oral presentation to a three-minute summary of your written statement. As committee members have many questions for you, the clock will countdown from 3 minutes. However, pursuant to committee rule 8D and committee practice, we will not cut off
your testimony until you [clears throat] reach the 5minute mark. I would also like to remind the witnesses to be aware of your responsibility to provide accurate information to the subcommittee. I will first recognize Mr. Ferry for your testimony. >> There we go. Chair Kylie, uh, Ranking
Member Bonamichi, and members of the committee, thank you so much for inviting me to testify on the crisis in youth sports. My name is Tom Ferry, and I lead the sports and society program at the Aspen Institute. Our signature initiative is called Project Play, which
works with many leading organizations in sports to develop insights, ideas, and opportunities to build healthy communities through sports. I'd like to I'd like to talk to you today not about my goals or those of the organizations that sit at the center of Project Play,
but your goals and our goals as Americans, those of healthy people 2030. The nation's plan to address our most critical public health challenges. Eight years ago, an inter agency group led by uh HSS
HHS began to capture data from the National Children's uh health survey on the percentage of youth ages 6 to 17 who were playing sports, 58%. And they set a target by 2030, a 10% lift to 63%.
We at the Aspen Institute took that as a call to action for the private sector and the nonprofit sectors to step up. So, Project Play created a round table of 20 leading organizations that would show the way. Leagues like the NBA and Major League Baseball, Nike and Under
Armour, ESPN and NBC Sports, the top registration platforms, competitors in many cases rallying around an opportunity that will lift all boats, getting more children playing sports. We call this effort 63 by30 and
developed the value proposition. We work worked with HHS and university researchers to publish a peer-reviewed study in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine showing that if we can hit the 63% target by 2030, the nation will derive at least 80 billion
dollars in social benefits in direct medical cost savings and worker productivity gains alone. That's because active kids become more active adults. This cohort of today's youth alone will enjoy 1.8 8 million more QL or quality
years of life. And that's only scratching the surface on the benefits. If you played sports as a kid, and I know many of you did, you know what you learned. Resilience, teamwork, creativity, leadership, how to compete hard and within the rules while
respecting your opponent. All essential skills in life and the traits we need as Americans to make our country and our democracy better. to make it work. So, I commend you. I really commend you for calling this hearing. There's been a lot of talk on the Hill about what to do
with college sports, but youth and school sports is the largest and most important layer of our sport ecosystem, the foundation upon which everything else sits. Not just college and pro sports and the Olympic sports, but really the vitality of our nation. You
recognize what the original advocates of youth sports figured out at the start of the 20th century. That tool that sport is a tool of nation building and personal development. President Teddy Roosevelt used the White House pulpit to promote as much. Muscular Christians saw
sport as an agent of moral development. So they invented games like basketball and volleyball. Child savers like the health benefits. Military recruiters viewed sports as a way to build soldiers. Captains of inj industry like the Carnegies and the Rockefellers saw
sport as a model for capitalism with its with its sorting of winners and losers. So they introduced interscolastic sports, the playground movement which got thousands of parks built in the first 20 years of the 20th century and PE in schools. All of this helped build
our economy, settle world wars, and create a sense of belonging and freedom in our society. If the 20th century was the American century, I would argue that it was in no small way because of youth and school sports helped make it happen.
It's why we now see China and Saudi Arabia in Arabia investing significantly in sport for all models, building facilities and new programs. And where are we now in the US? Well, numerically we took a hit from COVID participation
fell all the way down to 49%. We've rebounded to 55% due largely to efforts by leading brands and organizations to raise awareness of the value of sports for kids and invest in programs for those left behind by an increasingly commercialized system that prioritizes
children from families with the resources to pay thousands of dollars a year into adolescence. But as a nation, our youth sport participation rate is still below that of 2017 when the data was first captured. That rate has dropped as prices uh has have
skyrocketed 46% since 2019 according to our research. That's twice the rate of inflation. Now we have new pressures bearing down on the games that children play. Private equity chasing the $40 billion a year that families alone
spend. They're rolling up clubs and facilities and companies that register the 30 million or so youth who play organized sports. technology which is turning kids into content from the moment they slip on a uniform. Advances in streaming mean that some kids today
will have nearly every moment of their sports journey captured on video. Artificial intelligence will cut up that cut that up into highlights and some adult will monetize it. Youth sport tourism the investments made by cities into the construction of vast so-called
megailities with >> We could wrap up here in just a just a moment. Thanks. >> Lots of fields. Okay. And NIL, which is sponsored dollars, and that is pushing down the uh that is pushing down the pipeline. Today's hearing uses the word crisis to to describe youth sports. But I think the crisis is we don't have a
plan to protect children and help all kids. So, let me give you a few ideas uh that do not involve a whole lot of federal spending, if any at all, that can make an incredible difference in the space. Number one, collect better data. We can tell you how many states there
are 11 that hit the 63% mark, but that data is not uh collected and distributed down to the >> we'll have a chance to revisit these ideas in the in the fiveminute exchange. This have to go to our next witness. Uh thank you very much. One wonderful testimony. Uh now uh next is Mr. Bole,
>> Chairman Kylie, Ranking Member Bonamichi, and members of the committee. Thank you for the opportunity to be here today. For more than 30 years, I worked as a school counselor and a multi-port coach across the United States. I am now the co-founder and executive director of 241 Sports, a nonprofit that partners
with schools and communities to expand access to youth sports and support healthy child development. While we are known for helping kids try new sports, much of our work today is in yearround school-based programming that reaches children from low and middle inome families who would otherwise have very
little access. Earlier this fall, I met with leaders at the Pentagon from the Military Community and Family Policy Office to discuss how programming like ours could support military connected families. Their focus on readiness, resilience, and well-being mirrors what
we see every day in schools and communities. Frederick Douglas once said, "It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men." For me, this work is as much about
prevention as it is about intervention. When sports are placed inside schools, especially in communities with fewer resources, we reach children early, consistently, and before challenges become crisis. That is where youth sports can have their greatest impact.
I'll tell you though that this work began as a very personal experience. When our now grown daughter, who's sitting in today's audience, tried out for a local travel soccer team, we were told she was their number one prospect. But when I mentioned that at 8 years
old, she was showing some interest in lacrosse, she went from number one prospect to we're no longer interested in your daughter. The message was clear. Pick one path early or step aside. In essence, as the
title of this hearing suggests, she got benched simply for being interested in another sport. That night, we came up with the tagline, life's too short for just one sport. And it reflects that what we see nationally where too many
children are sidelined because the pressure to specialize starts way too young or access to sport simply is not there. I get to see this from both the top down and the bottom up. this morning. Here I am at a congressional hearing. But last night I was in Hartford at a program and later today
I'll be consulting to one of our school-based partners in Ward 8 right here in DC. And that perspective matters because I get to experience firsthand how policy impacts boots on the ground practitioners. And I can tell you it all matters. I often share an anecdote that
plays out in many of the cities where we work. A teacher pulled us aside and said, "See that little girl over there? She lives in a shelter and was not coming to school until the program started. Now she shows up every day. But the teacher was clear. It was the
program that brought her in. And once she was there, she was able to experience the full benefits of school. That is why we are so passionate about delivering programs in schools and communities and why we see the powerful ripple effects they can have. My biggest
worry was never the school day itself. It has always been the hours between 3 and 6 p.m. when kids are dismissed, structure disappears, and too many are left to fill the time on their own. Children want a place to belong and something to look forward to. When that
connection is missing, screens and other temptations quickly take over. Sending kids home and expecting them to find their way back to sports later is not realistic. Keeping them connected where they already are is the smarter and safer choice. Over the course of my
career, I have learned that solving complex problems is rarely about working harder. It's about working smarter. I believe the most efficient and effective way to address the youth sports crisis and many of the challenges facing young people more broadly is to focus on
schools and local communities as the foundation for youth sports. If we take seriously Frederick Douglas's call to build strong children, then early school-based access to sport, especially in those critical outside of school times, outside of school time hours, is
one of the most practical and powerful ways to do it. Thank you for your time and I look forward to your questions. >> Thank you very much. And we'll next recognize Ms. Van Djk for your testimony. >> Good morning. Good morning, Chairman Wahlberg, Ranking
Member Scott, Chairman Kylie, and Ranking Member Bonamichi, and members of the subcommittee. Thank you for inviting me here today and holding this hearing. My name is Katherine Van Djk. I'm a senior fellow at the American Economic Liberties Project and Berkeley's Civil Justice Research Initiative. I
previously worked at the Federal Trade Commission and for two decades I represented small businesses and consumers taking on powerful corporate interests in court, including an antirust lawsuit challenging varsity brands alleged monopolization of
all-star cheerleading. I'm here to sound the alarm about the anti-competitive consolidation of the youth sports industry. Youth sports used to be a great equalizer where children from all backgrounds could learn teamwork and
grit and build community bonds. Today, it has become the next victim of a financialized economy. Private equity is stealthily capturing youth sports using the same playbook it has deployed in veterinary clinics, nursing homes,
firetruck manufacturing, and countless other industries. Kids are burning out because the spe because of specialization and injuries are on the rise. Families are going into debt and it's based on a lie. 49% of parents believe their children will earn an
athletic scholarship. In fact, only 2% of college applicants actually do. So, what does youth sports looked like today? Take Threeep. It claims to be one of the largest youth sport event organizers in the country. It operates
over 5,000 clubs across seven sports and promises families quote immediate national brand recognition within the college recruiting landscape. Black Bear Sports Group operates over 40 hockey rinks across the Midwest and East
Coast. A recent report by The Lever revealed that Black Bear is often the only game in town for hockey leagues and tournaments and forces parents into its streaming service to record games. Varsity brands monopolized competitive cheerleading, as insiders put it, from
bow to toe. So, how did this happen? First, a private equity firm acquires competitors through hundreds of small acquisitions. Next, it eliminates competition through vertical integration. So, it controls
the whole ecosystem. Finally, it extracts maximum profits from captive customers. In this case, parents who have to pay thousands of dollars for their kids to play sports. In short, private equity is turning what
was once an affordable public good into a profit extraction machine. The numbers tell the story. Youth sports has grown into a $40 billion industry, roughly equal to the annual revenue of the NFL and all of college athletics combined.
You how did we get here? The 2008 financial crisis, slashed parks and recreation budgets, the CO 19 pandemic delivering another crushing blow. Community programs have disappeared and private equity is ready and eager and
has filled the void. These firms control leagues, tournaments, venues, uniforms, tech tech platforms, and even governing bodies. They create a flywheel that extracts more and more revenue for wealthy
investors, and trapped families have no choice but to pay. Here's the good news. Congress and our agencies can break the strangle hold that private equity has on youth sports. We can use our existing antitrust tools aggressively to stop
anti-competitive mergers and roll-ups and break up monopolies. We can strengthen those tools by modern modernizing our laws to ban vertical integration, require transparent accounting practices, and stop corporate looting. We must ensure also that our
antitrust enforcers have the funding, the staff, the resources, and the political support they need to go after back bad actors. We must ban forced arbitration so parents and small businesses can enforce their rights. And
we must modernize our antitrust laws to protect competition and give parents choices. In conclusion, our children deserve better than a childhood for sale to the highest bidder. They deserve a place where they can learn the importance of
teamwork, fair play, and perseverance. They deserve an environment where sports is about joy, not profit extraction, and they deserve opportunities that are affordable. Thank you very much, and I look forward to your questions.
>> Thank you very much. And lastly, uh, Mr. O. Sullivan is recognized for your testimony. >> Thank you, chairman, and uh committee members. Um my name is John O Sullivan, and I've spent five decades in sports. First as an athlete, three decades as a coach on every level from 5-year-olds to
NCA Division One soccer. Um [clears throat] 2012, I founded this organization called Changing the Game Project. And uh our mission is to put a little more play back in playing sports. So these days I travel extensively doing parent education and coach education and
leadership development for youth and teams. And in my travels I see firsthand everything that we're going to talk about today from the threearters of kids that drop out to the injury epidemic and the financial burdens. Um because the business of youth sports is not set up
to meet the needs of children in sports. And with this re recent influx of private equity money and purchasing clubs and facilities, many of our children have just become commodities in sports. It's an incredibly sad. But instead of reciting all this today, I just want to tell you all a story um
about a couple of teenage boys I met 10 years ago in Montrose, Colorado, because their story is what inspires me to do this work every single day. I [clears throat] was hired by the city and the parks department there to give a workshop on youth sports participation and coaching. And as the room filled up
that that morning, five boys walked in uh with an adult. And I just assumed that was their coach. And so I went over and introduced myself and asked them what team they played for. And they said, "No, uh we're residents at the Robert A. Brown Center for Youth, which was a juvenile detention center for
teenage boys." And during our workshop in a segment about why children quit sports, each of those boys volunteered to stand up and talk about their youth sports experience. And they they smiled about talking in love with soccer and basketball and football. And then their
demeanor totally changed as they talked about why they quit. Um, one couldn't afford to play. Another had a coach who never let him play a single play during an entire middle school football season. And a third told a story about horrible bullying from his teammates. and a coach
who just laughed along with them. Uh each of those boys quit sports and they could each trace a direct line from the moment they quit and ended up and ending up in juvenile detention for theft, for substance abuse, and even assault. Once
the positive influence of sports was gone in their lives, it was replaced by something far more sinister. And and that's why I think what we're doing here today is so important. Um so I want to finish with this. The Reverend Billy Graham said, uh, "A coach will impact more people in a year than the average
person does in a lifetime." And that's the power of influence. And I don't think I've ever been in a room in all my travels with the potential influence that the members of this committee have to bring attention to the sad state of youth sports and make a positive change.
So I hope all of us today are aware of that influence uh and that we have to give sports back to our kids. Put a little more play back in playing ball so that today's generation can have the same positive sports experiences that many of us did years ago. Thank you.
>> Thank you very much to all the witnesses for that uh fantastic testimony. Under committee rule nine, we'll now question the witnesses under the fiveminute rule. I'll first recognize the chair of the full committee uh Mr. Wahberg. I I thank the chairman uh and I thank
the witnesses for being here and chairman. This this is and may I suggest to my good friend and colleague the ranking member that this is a hearing on school safety. Uh I contend as the witnesses have
already today done so well that if we did this right again, we would have less violence in schools. And as the last witness suggested about the youth facility that was had former desirable athletes who were no longer
desirable now in the youth facility, these are the type of things that will change the perspective of kids and what they do in life itself. And so this is a hearing on gun violence etc that goes on. Um,
before I dive into my questions, I want to briefly mention a sports issue I've heard a lot about from constituents back home and some of my colleagues as well. Colleges are increasingly recruiting international student athletes, taking away important scholarship opportunities
or participation opportunities from Americanborn kids. Uh, we need to make sure American kids have a fair shot at those opportunities. Uh this may be something this committee will look at later, but today we're here to focus on
youth sports. Um Mr. Ferry. Um I I remember in the late 60s or the late 50s in the 60s um excitedly waiting to see what color baseball cap I would get for the little
league program and what t-shirt, not jersey, t-shirt I would wear, whether it say athletics or Cubs or White Socks or Orioles, not the dreaded Yankees. [laughter] um and what team I would be on. Uh in in
Babe Ruth league, we did get uniforms that we could wear, but we still had the enjoyment of playing with our teams. And we also knew that practice sessions meant we would have time on that field and we didn't have to fight for it like the rest of the week because kids were
filling up the diamonds on the neighborhood and the and the parks. uh that the the league went from June through end of July and then we waited for September and October for Pop Warner
or CIO football leagues that went on and they ended. Um that was life and we all had a chance to participate and to fight to get on the the station wagon of our coach the the tailgate so we could drag our spikes on the way to McDonald's for
a milkshake afterwards. that wouldn't be allowed today. I understand it. But that was youth sports and it it it allowed all of us at a point in time and most of us didn't go on to a college scholarship. We didn't go on to the um
pro leagues, but we had a wonderful experience. Uh you mentioned that a family now spends over $1,000 on child's primary sport. Um up 46% since 2019. How has that cost increase hurt the affordable local
programs that most American kids have typically depended upon? >> Yeah. So, what's happened? I appreciate the question. What's happened is we've had uh when you were growing up, there were in town recreation leagues, classmates playing with classmates, low cost, low barriers to entry. What we
have seen is early forming travel teams, these tryyoutbased teams being created at earlier and earlier ages all the way down to second grade or so. And once those are created, sport gets very expensive. Yeah. >> Goes from couple hundred dollars a year
to several thousand dollars a year. And when that happens, it it it peels away some kids, peels away coaches, reduces the number of kids in the local league. And by fifth grade or so, certainly the town that I raised we raised our kids in in Connecticut, the in town wreck league
was gone and you only had that travel team option going forward. And if you couldn't afford it or if your family didn't have the three hours a day to to travel kids and wash clothes and so forth, then you were kind of out. >> And so now the kids filled their time
with other things that were less productive, less enjoyable, and didn't prepare them for life. If I want to jump over uh to Mr. S O S Sullivan um in your testimony you written uh about many parents today who feel they have to
chase expensive travel teams. How do you help those families see that that's not the case and encourage them to focus on the child's long-term development instead? >> Yeah, I think parents what they need to do is is begin at the end, right? What do you
want out of sport? And I don't think anyone ever says, "I want a child who's beat up, injured, burnt out, whatever." They want a healthy functioning, high character human being. And and so that's what I say. Begin at the end and then sign up for sporting programs and find coaches and find leagues that support
that mission. And that the the goal is the purpose is to develop a great human being. and and then maybe the goal if you have the um the the luck and the genetics, you know, you you do well and you you get a scholarship, maybe you play at the next level. But it's really
about human development first. And I think just a lot of parents are scared. They're scared that if they don't sign up, if they don't leave the wreck league, their kids going to get left behind. >> From your lips to to parents and God's ears. Thank you so much. I yield back. >> Uh Mr. Scott, the ranking member of the
full committee is recognized. >> Thank Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Um, we've, um, as previously been mentioned, we've been asking for hearings on gun safety in light of the recent shootings. I think those are even more important
now. But in the meanwhile, I'll ask Mr. Ferry, you've talked about um, crime and health. Do you have studies that show that a student is more likely to graduate if they participate in sports? >> Uh, yes. Students are more likely to
stay in school, more likely to graduate, more likely to go to college, uh less likely to suffer a range of chronic diseases, everything from 13 types of cancer to on and on. Um and then they they are generally more active adults and because of that they have more active kids.
>> What about um likelihood of committing crimes? >> Um yeah, there there is a there is a relationship. I don't have the data right in front of me. I can get it for you, but there is a relationship. If you could provide us with those studies, that'd be that'd be helpful. >> Happy to. >> And Mr. Bo, you mentioned the time
between 3 and 6. Do you have studies that show the value of filling up that time? >> I'm a programmer and a counselor, so I'm I'm not great on the data. It's life experience and anecdotal. Uh it's it's about what we see. Um and it's about
what we know. Um there's certainly Tom's team's really good at getting the data for us for something like this. Well, you're talking about lessons, lessons like what teamwork means and sportsmanship. >> 100%. I mean, I think as as was alluded to, most folks here probably I mean, at
least I knew personally, right, I couldn't wait for the end of the day because I was going to be with my team. I was going to be with my coach. And I think for trying to create belonging and connectedness, there's nothing better than sports. And some of the kids we work with just don't get that opportunity. Well, like the chairman, I
played little league baseball growing up and that meant a lot to me. So, I know what you're talking about. Uh, Mr. Sullivan, um, obviously very relatively few people will be playing varsity uh, level. How can we guarantee that others will have
the opportunity to participate in sports? Yeah, I think our our goal in sport has to uh be to develop children to be active for life and the statistics are around that around after the age of 21 91% of people's uh sporting pursuits
are individual in nature. So one thing is not just the focus on team sports but running, swimming, cycling, climbing, all these different things are really really important sports to uh bring into kids and and just yeah I mean I just think it's it's not just there there has
to be a pathway for the very best athletes but then there has to be a place where the ones who are not on that pathway still move into community programming and become just you know part of the part of the local wreck league. you know, with the value of um sports and recreation. Traditionally, I
think it's been alluded to, parks and recreation. I ran the little league baseball when I was growing up. Um and a lot of people had that opportunity. U Miss Van Djk, why is why what happened to parks and recreation?
Why are we relying on private equity rather than public funds, parks and recreation or public schools to provide these opportunities? So, as a as a result of the 2008 financial crisis, parks and wreck
budgets were were slashed. And that really did leave a void where private equity firms came in and filled it with highcost flashy elite club teams. And by filling that void, they were then able to continue to build their flywheel
where they gained control of the venues and the governing bodies and the apparel companies. And they really and and that flywheel also builds a moat that the that the community groups that my colleagues here are talking about can't compete with they can't penetrate it
because the travel these private equity companies aren't just capturing the teams and the leagues they're capturing the players. >> Well, it seems to me that we got to get parks and wreck and the public schools back involved uh so those opportunities will be there. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I yield back. Uh, I'll now recognize myself uh for five minutes. Uh, so growing up, my main sports were basketball and uh soccer. Unfortunately, I didn't make the freshman team for basketball. Still blamed that on a late growth spurt. Um, and uh I played one year of freshman soccer, but wasn't good
enough uh for varsity. I did end up playing tennis for uh all four years. Uh although nowadays, to be honest, I play more pickle ball. Don't tell anyone. Um but uh you know the point is kind of like uh the ranking member was just saying uh there's this sort of inherent winnowing process in a lot of sports and
uh so to follow up on Mr. O Sullivan on your last answer. How do we maintain opportunities for uh young people of different skill levels? I think soccer does a pretty good job of this. You have wreck and select and competitive but even then sort of the wreck leagues tend to winnow out as kids get older. So how do we make those opportunities more
durable? Well, I think it's again this education around what is the purpose of sport? And you know, parents ask me all the time, how does my kid make the elite team? And I think that's the worst word in sports is elite for little kids. And I just say, you know, just change the name of your team. That's what everyone
else does is they just call their team elite, right? Um so, you know, I I just think it's it's this thing that we have to keep as many kids as possible as long as possible in the best environment possible. uh the the countries that do it best in sport development, they keep
those kids. They're not making cuts at six or seven years old. They're not forming competitive teams. And you know, I remember uh I had a friend who lived in New York City, an author named David Epstein, and he said to me, you know, John, I live in Brooklyn and I have um I look out the window and there's a
seven-year-old competitive travel soccer team practicing in the park across. He goes, "And I find it really hard to believe that a seven-year-old team has to travel to get a competitive game in a city of 10 million people." >> And Mr. Bole, it seems to me maybe one of the issues here uh is uh the state of
of PE in our schools. Have you looked at that at all uh to the extent to which um you know there's a connection between uh robust PE programs and and youth sports participation? Yeah, it's interesting because we get the luxury of walking into lots of schools across the entire country and it's there's no consistency
as far as physical education's concerned. It's the patterns are just weird. Sometimes you might get one PE class every two weeks or maybe you do two weeks or four weeks of PE and then you don't get it till the next year. And so, and there's not always a focus on
sport. And I get it. My PE colleagues would say there's more to physical education than just sport. But I don't think it has to be either or. I think that, you know, schools can work in a way that teach fundamental sports skills so that kids have some confidence to perhaps do some sports outside of school
time. And so I think there's an opportunity here to create some consistency around what how it's being delivered and to recognize the value of sport. >> Yeah, I think that's an important aspect of this is that is how a lot of young people get habituated and learn different sports and learn the value of
of physical activity. And uh Mr. Ferry, uh, you had a couple other, I think, policy, uh, recommendations that you wanted to share with us. Do you want to take just a moment to go through those? >> Yeah. And again, I appreciate for going along the first time. Uh, number one, collect better data from the federal government, push it down to the local level so folks can make decisions at a
local level for what makes sense to them, right? Second of all, I would suggest that we register all youth sport organizations. You can't manage what you can't measure, right? The Safe Sport Act of 2017 requires that any member of an NGB or a national governing body
register with the US Center for Safe Sport and get their coaches trained in abuse prevention and pass background checks. The problem is that covers at best one-third of youth sport providers. I think all youth sport providers should be required to register with the center
and they should res receive a benefit for doing so. Maybe it's free or discounted background checks or abuse training. I think that will reduce costs, level the playing field, and help manage a very messy landscape. Secondly, I think you can redirect the sports
betting tax. So, I'm not a fan of sports betting, but it's here and it's not going away, and it's raising significant revenue for the federal government, nearly $400 million last year in excise taxes. What if instead of that money going into the black hole, that's the
federal budget, that it went to closing gaps in youth sports, background checks, coach training, injury prevention, programs for low-income youth. Take from the treetops and give to the grassroots. Thirdly, I would recommend that you review federal investment criteria. So
taxpayers already support local recreation through the land and water conservation fund which is which uses proceeds from offshore oil drilling to provide municipalities with gr m matching grants to build facilities. Educate states on ways to prioritize
access to community sports. You can also uh use economic development assistance grants to build sport facilities, use sport facilities. I think there's bipartisan support for that. Um, and one my final ask is please don't please don't reform college sports without
looking at the implications on youth sports because anything you do at the college level in terms of employee status or NIL or sport offerings will have a downstream effect on youth and school sports. >> Thank you very much. Representative Adams of North Carolina is recognized.
>> Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and uh thank you to our witnesses for being here today. Youth sports should not be a luxury item. They should not depend on how much money a family has or how far a parent can travel or whether a a private
equity firm thinks that a field or a league is profitable. When kids play sports, we know what happens. They're healthier. They do better in school. They build confidence, teamwork, and resilience. But across this country, too many kids are being benched, not because
they lack uh talent or interest, but because the system has become too expensive and too concentrated. Uh a GAO study found that that tight K12 budgets are already limiting access to sports because schools struggle with
transportation, facilities, and staffing. And at the same time, we're seeing private equity buy up leagues and facilities and equipment suppliers driving prices up and pushing community-based programs out. That combination is squeezing families,
schools, and and small businesses all at once. So today I I want to focus on who is getting left out and and what role the public sector must play to make sure that that youth sports remain accessible to all kids not just those who can
afford paytoplay systems. So let me turn to uh our witness uh our Democrat witness van Djk. Uh so uh let me um say that a GA study found that a GAO study
found that K12 budgets have made it harder for schools to to offer sports because of costs that are tied to transportation facilities and staffing. So can you talk a little bit about the role that public sector can play in expanding access to goods and services
like youth sports particularly through investments in schools, parks, and community based programs as a counterweight to to rising private costs? >> Thank you for that question. I think that what Mr. Ferry has talked about and
Mr. Sullivan and Mr. Bole have mentioned are all really important when we think about how we get kids back in sports and how we make it accessible and and affordable. Public funding absolutely is crucial to making sure that we have community-based and nonprofit-based and
school-based programs because when we don't have those, what we have left is these really highcost monopolistic entities that aren't interested in growing their programs to make them affordable and accessible to everybody.
They're simply interested in profit. They're interested in protecting their monopoly and driving cost up. That's why we see a 40 billion dollar industry that is growing according to investment firms. But it's growing as participation
is going down. What does that tell us? It tells us that they are jacking up prices and that they are solely pro focused on profit. And so when um representative, you talk about community-based programs, we need that because we need programs that are
focused on the growth of the children and accessibility, not programs that are focused on profit. >> Okay. Thank you. So, you know, we also hear a lot from families and small business owners in my district who feel like they're being priced out not just of youth sports, but of the broader
economy. So, I want to zoom out for just a moment. Uh uh Miss Van Djk, my constituents are deeply worried about small businesses. From your work on antitrust and competition, what are the main forces driving consolidation in the economy right now? And what policy
choices have enabled that consolidation? >> The consolidation is largely driven by a lack of um enforcement and by a continuing growth of businesses getting bigger. when you see businesses getting bigger and bigger. So, for instance, the
the federal um enforcers abandoned what's called the Robinson Patman Act and that prohibits price discrimination against small businesses. It's specifically designed to protect them. And in the last administration, that law was reinvigorated. But Chairman Ferguson
at the FTC dismissed a lawsuit against Pepsi where Pepsi was spec specifically trying to quote advantage Walmart by driving up retail prices at small businesses so that customers would stay there. >> So let me let me move on quickly. Uh
what policy tools should Congress be considering whether through antitrust invest uh enforcement uh support for community based programs or public investment to ensure that youth sports remain affordable, local, and accessible rather than becoming another profit-driven industry? Got eight eight
seconds. We need to make sure that our agencies are adequately funded so that because they are tasked with policing our entire economy. We need to make sure that small businesses and consumers can adequately enforce their rights by prohibiting forced arbitration clauses
and class action waiverss. And we need to modernize our laws to take on vertical integration and serial acquisitions. >> Thank you very much. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back. >> Representative Miller of Illinois is recognized. >> Thank you, Mr. chairman, and thank you to each of our witnesses for being here
today. We all agree daily exercise is vital for a child's development. President Trump was right to reestablish the presidential fi physical fitness test to help ease America's expanding childhood obesity rates. And I actually
have grandchildren in a school that are preparing all the students in the school to take that test. Exercise has many benefits. Greater focus in the classroom and I actually my personal um
impression is that our boys especially uh benefit from exercise. Uh lower risk of well they benefit in light of focusing on their academics when they're allowed to move more. That's what I mean by that. Lower risk of heart disease,
cancer, stroke, and diabetes. lower recorded instances of drug abuse, greater development of hand eye hand coordination and improved sleep. Yet today, children are met with greater technological distractions. I think this is one of the issues of why we have less
participation. Outside of school, the average child spends nearly eight hours a day looking at a screen, whether that be through TV, social media, or video games. Parents are finding it increasingly difficult to have their children participate in sports due to
rising costs. But also the thing that I noticed over the decades when I was raising my seven children is that if you did not get your child in club sports like under 10, so age six and seven, they basically were left out. They
couldn't they didn't have that opportunity. And I hope one of the benefits from this hearing is that we start saying we start talking about the value of protecting family time. Children under 10 and families that have super young children should not have to
forfeit their family time. Children should be allowed to have free time to engage with nature and in these family relationships. Maybe even taken up an instrument or experiment. Which sport do I like? like you were saying, your daughter just considering that she might
want to play a different sport, sideline her, put her on the bench. These are issues that we should be talking about and making it uh difficult then for parents to get their children into the sports teams. Also, um I am concerned
about biological boys being allowed to compete in girls athletics. So related to that, my first question is for Mr. Ferry. What is being done to address the growing crisis that young girls face in sports as they are forced to unfairly compete against biological boys?
>> So we are really focused on the 63% goal. How do we move from 51 to 55 to 63? So we've put most of our energy into the larger opportunities. the uh population of kids who who are trans um
it's very small doesn't mean it's an insignificant population but we haven't put a whole lot of energy into that. I would say that we do have a position that every child should have an opportunity to play sports and that we as a society should make every effort to give every kid a chance to play sports.
But there are biological differences especially once puberty hits and there are very complicated equations about which sport and safety and health it and we just we haven't weighed in on that necessarily. >> They are in the minority but they're playing against the majority who parents
or grandparents don't want their daughter across the net from a large biological male. That's a deterrent to the girls being in it's also dangerous. I do want to bring up another issue because we keep talking about access to
sports for every child for every family and there are many homeed educated children in our country that are meeting barriers because uh the states I believe probably 20 states refuse to allow home
educated kids to have access to public um public public school athletic programs. And you know, the team Tim Tim TBU Tim Tibo law ensured equal extracurricular access. And I think that
we should um recognize that we have slammed the door shut unfairly to those students. And thank you and I yield back. >> Ranking member Bonamichi is recognized. >> Uh thank you, Mr. Chairman. What what a fascinating hearing. I appreciate all of
you. I just want to make a a comment at the outset in response to my colleague. Uh let me be clear that all students including LGBTQI students and trans students deserve access to and benefit from educational opportunities including participating in sports. Um Miss Van
Djk, you um said in your written testimony and and you mentioned this that 83% of parents believe their children have the talent to earn athletic scholarships. 49% are confident that they will, but in fact it's only 2%. Uh, you have a citation there. I I didn't get a chance to look into the
details, but I mean when when my now adult son was in elementary school, he wanted to be an NBA player, but so did half of his classmates. I mean, we don't have height jeans in our family. But can you talk a little bit about um where that expectation is coming from, because your your next sentence is that the
industry's promises of more are puffery at best and deceptive vi violations of state and federal consumer protection laws at worst. Thank you for that question. I think it's an incredibly underappreciated consumer protection issue within youth sports that these
organizations Black Bear is promising exposure to college recruiters. There's an entire company called Perfect Game whose sole purpose they serve thousands and thousands of athletes and operate in 40 states and their sole purpose is the promise of expensive exhibition games
for college recruiters to go to. um three-step also it you just it takes about 30 seconds of scanning through these organizations websites to see these promises and that and they can't deliver on them. [clears throat] >> It it's a fascinating issue. I'd like to follow up on that in in the future. You
you were talking earlier in response to Representative Adams about the Robinson Patman Act. So, so looking at the example of Black Bear Sports Group buying up youth hockey rinks across the country and then charging these absurd fees, what would antitrust enforcement
look like in that in that situation? And what would be the benefits to parents of student athletes? >> I'll try to be brief, but there are a number of ways to take on this kind of consolidation by private equity. The I think the first and most important is banning vertical integration in youth
sports. There is absolutely no reason that the vi that the CEO of Black Bear Sports, who controls access to venues and owns hockey leagues, should also own the ranking system for those teams and players and should also serve as a
commissioner on a junior hockey league. Those are ridiculous conflicts of interest that allow, for instance, giving preferential treatment for ice time at the only ice rink in town to their teams. It allows them to create rule. They can create blackout rules
that prohibit competitor leagues from holding events at the same time. That's what that was one of the things that varsity was doing with >> sounds like a tremendous amount of power. >> Yes, it is an enormous amount of power. So I think that breaking up those companies using our existing laws and creating new laws that prohibit these
conflicts of interest would be extraordinary. >> I also want to want to talk about the sort of crucial role of schools and and and infrastructure. So in the district I represent, I have a lot of urban areas. Mr. O Sullivan's from Oregon, he knows Portland and Beaverton areas, but I also
have a lot of very rural areas as well. So even something like school bus drivers, right? If there's a bus that's going to take students somewhere, u school bus driver employment is down 10%. What's going to happen for students who are hoping to engage in these extracurricular activities if they don't
have that vital transportation, especially in rural areas? Many kids are going to be left out. So, do you agree? >> I absolutely agree. There is a huge participation gap between low-income and high inome families. Certainly, a parent who has a job where they have to work on
the weekend or at nights can't drive their kid to school or might not even to their game and might not even have access to a car. They certainly can't afford to play at expensive out of town tournaments at diamondplated youth sports facilities. So, I think it's absolutely right to be thinking about
this in that context. And also going back to what Representative Miller talked about early, creating these community-based programs protects family time. So, I think it's I I think that this is a bipartisan issue that we all need. I >> I think so, too. Uh, Mr. Ferry, you recently stated to the New York Times
that there is a great demand for kids to play sports and parents will spend money they don't have. So, what sacrifices have you seen parents make to afford all the expenses associated with athletics, registrations, equipment, travel, lodging? >> Um, they pay what they have to. We love
our kids. We will do just about anything for them. And many of us are under the impression that if our child at age eight is scoring a bunch of goals, then they might actually have a chance at getting a scholarship or preferential admission to selective universities. This is a big motivator uh in in middle
and upper income families as well. Um [snorts] so uh they they're presented with um a system that is dysfunctional at best and broken at worst and they're responding to it. They love their kid. I spend very little time blaming parents. there is bad behavior, but like they're
they just love their kids. I >> I I appreciate that. And as you yield back, Mr. Chairman, I want to note that uh at the end of this month, there's a lot of families in Oregon and across the country who are going to see their healthc care premium skyrocket if we don't take action this week and I hope we can do that. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
>> Uh Mr. Muan of Guam is recognized. >> Thank you, Chairman Kelly and Ranking Member Bonanichi. Thank you for hosting today's hearing on youth sports and looming crisis before us. Participation in sports can have a real benefit bringing communities together, increasing self-confidence and getting
kids active. I just remember growing up in our village down in Guam and Tuman, how fun it was with the neighbors to go to our baseball field and just have a great time until you hear your mom calling and it's getting dark and we had to go back in. But it was really exciting. And at the at a time when Americans youth are struggling both
physically and mentally, the withdrawal from our youth from sports is especially troubling. According to Georgetown University, 24% of the US population ages 2 to 17 experience obesity.
A 2023 CDC survey found that 29% of high schoolers experience poor mental health and 40% experience symptoms of depression. And a data brief from NCHS last year found that more than half of all the
teenagers have four or more hours of daily screen time. Concerningly, a 2025 pre uh research center report details that nearly half of all teens think they spend too much time online and that
social media harms people their age. So, in short, we're seeing more and more of American youth retreat from the real world to the virtual world. And while we can all recognize the benefits of the internet, it would be a dangerous it will be dangerous for us to ignore the
harms it can bring and the impact it is having on our youth's mental health. Youth sports offer an active, engaging and a fun way as long as I remember as a kid as long as I caught the ball or hit the ball. It's a fun way to counter these concerning health trends.
Participation in youth sports has been linked to better academic performance, lower rates of anxiety and depression, lower risk to future illnesses including heart disease and diabetes, improved sleep and a greater greater likelihood of physical activity as adults.
Additionally, in 2023, American Heart Association paper found that 80% of the youth athletes were within the normal weight range and only 15% experience obesity. So, Mr. Ferry, the state of
play report briefly touches upon the health benefits of youth sports. Can you please elaborate more on that and touch upon the benefits of youth sports, especially among communities disproportionately impacted by these health crisis?
>> Yep. So, the research is clear. 20 years ago, we didn't have this, but now it's all put together in one infographic that we we talk about within Project Play. Physically active kids are onetenth as likely to be obese. They're more likely to stay in school. Girls are less likely to get pregnant. They have lower
athletes. Physically active kids have lower drug use rates, higher binge drinking rates. So the data is not all good, but they're it's mostly good. They go on to college. They're more likely to be active parents, and they're more likely to have active kids. So this incredibly virtuous cycle can be
unlocked if we can simply get kids off the couch without running them into the ground, you know, through overuse injuries, year- round play, etc. >> Thank you. Anybody else like to chime in, please? >> I would just add that um first of all,
thank you for uh your statement to start, Congressman, because you you just supported our life's work. So, uh, it and I I would say that, um, we walk in parallel worlds here, right? At least in my universe, I do middle inome America, what we're looking at is trying to get
kids to not specialize, but you go one or two zip codes over and it's an access problem. And so, if we're worried about the issues that you're talking about, we have to figure out a way to go where the kids are, and the kids are at schools. And so, I'm less worried about the travel program stealing these kids
because that would be a luxury for them. I think we need to be smart and efficient about how we access them and really think through what are the policy changes we can make so that there's a greater opportunity. Uh the the chairman asked about physical education. A lot of the teachers we hire to deliver our
program or our our programs are physical educators. But what we do is sports is the best place to teach the skills of social emotional learning. How to manage your reg how to manage your emotions. I was both hyperco competitive and wired anxious as an athlete and I suffered
from anxiety in my 30s at the point where I I developed panic attacks and it was debilitating and embarrassing and all those things. Now I talk about it openly because we treat it as a sport skill for kids. If you can calm yourself down when you're in an anxious state, you're a better athlete. If you can calm
your anger down when you're hyperco competitive, you're a better athlete. So sports are the best opportunity to teach these skills of mental health in my opinion. And I think there's an opportunity here, especially in our underserved and underresourced communities to go there and do that kind of programming.
>> Thank you. We're all on the right track and I think that will make uh even better for our national defense with the people that join our armed services with that mindset there. Agreed. >> Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Yet, >> Representative Gala of uh Arizona is recognized. >> Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and
thank you um to the witnesses. I would argue that it is the lack of investment in public school programs from elementary to high school that have opened the door to these p private equity firms. Having served on a school board, Southern Arizona's largest school board for 20 years, the push not only
from the federal government, but at our state level to take cuts away from the classroom, PE teachers and all of those those um what a lot of people think of outside of the classroom and unnecessary are the first things cut. And we all know that's wrong. But when you have
limited funds, you have to direct them, you know, where you need to. So, all parents want the best for their children. I'm a mom of three. We do everything we can for those babies. But it's because the options at our public schools have been decimated um because of chronic disinvestment. Many look to
private programs that really hit families in their pocketbooks. This creates a larger divide of families that can pay to play and those who can't. Um the T-ball, youth programs, those that have been discussed here, especially those in our communities are run by committed volunteers and parents who do
fundraising as much as they can. Same is true for school-based programs and other community programs. I hope that the push the chairman spoke of and in his introductory remarks about the increased push for participation means more federal funds dedicated to school-based
programs. Um and you know, I do want to thank Mr. Ferry for not taking the bait about trans youth participating and that this is a conversation about all youth having greater access. I really appreciated that. Um my first question or depending on how much time I have my
question will be um to Miss Van Djk. In your testimony you explained that private equity firms have been drawn to youth sports over a number of factors highlighting competitive cheer from bows to toes. um and that parents want to provide their children the best
opportunities and are captive in vulnerable market. While wealthier families have resources to afford exorbitant costs associated with team registrations, travel, lodging, athletic camps, where does that leave low and middle inome families who also want the
best opportunities for their children? >> It leaves those lower and middle inome families out. And that's an important fact here today to talk about, not just in terms of youth sports participation. We've heard a lot about how it um reduces obesity and keeps kids out of
trouble with the law and gets them into college. It gives participation in sports also creates an admission boost. There was a study that came out a few years ago that showed that the highest earning families children had a 24% admission boost to elite universities
directly related to their family's ability to pay for them to participate in sports. >> Yeah. Do any of the other witnesses want to add something into that question? >> Um, I would just uh building on your point about the value of schools. Um, it's PE, but it's also the structure of
school-based sports. One of the problems we have here is like there'll be 80 kids who try out for the boys basketball team and 15 will make it and nine will get playing time and we end up structurally pushing aside not just you, [laughter]
Mr. You understand this better than anyone else. We structurally push aside kids because of the because of our traditional structure of school-based sports. But there are models out there where they're creating multiple teams. You might have two freshman teams or three JV teams. We need to move to an
environment where the supply of experiences meets the demand for them and that's that's partly a function of schools rethinking their model. >> Yeah, thank you. And also that means more resources. You need more uniforms. I mean all of it all of it ties to resources really. Mr. Bole.
>> Yeah. I I think also it's it's thinking about early access. I mean I think when we we don't always define youth sport and everybody has their sort of own age group that they might have in their mind. We do a lot of work at the elementary level especially in the cities because what happens is a lot of times if kids haven't had exposure when
they get to middle or high school they just don't have the confidence to try out. And in the Tik Tok generation, no one wants to show up on somebody's screen or YouTube of having gotten their ankles broken or whatever they might say. >> We have to teach kids skills so that when they actually get to those settings where they have an opportunity to track,
they know. We go places, kids don't know the rules. They hit the ball and they don't know where to run, right? They don't know where first base is. So, if we don't do early access to sports in a smart way, we're going to lose a whole generation of kids who who will never try it because they're just afraid to,
>> right? Or you you have young people who've been playing te-ball since they could hold up a little bat and you get to an area where you're like these kids have been playing five years and exactly you know you're in >> third grade. Yeah. Well, thank you very much. I'll yield back. >> Representative Owens of Utah is
recognized. >> Thank Thank you so much. This is such a a very very important uh topic and and we're really fighting for for the culture of our country through our kids and I appreciate everything you guys said so far. I was just on the way in this morning. I read a article about a
college player who was entering the portal because a coach called him lazy. Um that is prescription for failure. If we don't teach all kids that we don't run away from hard, we we run toward it and we
you know we gain that life lesson. So I just appreciate this particular topic and uh I appreciate this u uh this committee really taking it on full full tail. I've learned some of life's best lessons of playing sports. Learned uh the concept of teamwork, of respect for others, leadership, and where grit comes
from. It's understanding that you cannot control the schoolboard, but you can control the hustle. These lessons once learned set us up for success regardless of our endeavors. Children need the opportunities for that youth sports provide establish healthy habits and muscle memory before they reach
adulthood adult adulthood. As as uh youth sports moves further out of reach for students and families, some children will lose critical chances to develop life lifelong skills and character. They will miss out on those lessons that are so valuable that were so valuable in my life. So, I want to thank you guys again
for for uh this this conversation. Um >> uh Mr. Mr. Ferry, when we when you had your opening statement, you were going through a list of things and I don't know, I hope I didn't miss it. uh a list of things that you thought would be important to kind of get us back on track. Would you mind just if you
haven't already done that, make make those statements or finish that that conversation you were having? >> Yeah, I was uh putting ideas on the table that won't cost no new federal spend, but things we can do to organize the money that's slloshing through the system in a better
way. One was collect better data so folks in Utah or elsewhere down to the city level can make decisions like okay you know only 40% of kids are playing and here are the different groups and here are neighborhoods how do we organize against how do we pull philanthropy into this how do we develop
better field use policies uh I mean this there's a real opportunity for for local communities to drive change themselves so it is not true that government does does not fund youth sports it funds youth sports through the building of a lot of facilities and you know that
includes municipal facilities. Uh all these for-profit clubs and nonprofit clubs are using public facilities, but we're not asking them to to have criminal background checks or uh you know, abuse training or coach training
or injury prevention or access. We're not giving discounts. Municipalities have a real opportunity to create the kind of environment that they want to have locally, but we got to give them data and we've got to give them tools to think about how to use the
power of the permit. >> Okay. Thank you so much. Um Mrs. uh Mr. O'Sullivan, uh you mentioned in your testimony you you've praised initiatives like the soldiers to sidelines that uh train returning military veterans to coach. What makes veterans a natural fit
for youth sports coaching and how can local leagues reach out to this type of leadership and to discipline in their and bring discipline to their programs? >> Thank you. It's such a great question. Um so we know that when we have trained coaches, kids stay in sports longer.
They're more likely to return and retain them. And so yeah, there's a nonprofit called S Soldiers to Sidelines that I've done some coach education work for. And what they are doing is they're taking the these men and women who have served our country and that we've spent millions of dollars training on
leadership and discipline and physical fitness and all that and then they come back and so many of them say, "But how can I continue to serve?" And so what soldiers to sidelines is saying is, "Hey, you can serve your country by going back to your community and coaching." And what an incredible
resource that we have in our country that we've already invested in. And so just on that way out saying, "Hey, can we connect you where you're moving back to to a program and and become a coach and and give back and and give back to all those kids and and show also what it
means to be a military member. I mean, I think it's such a underutilized resource and it's right there for us." >> Well, well, thank you so much. I'll just say this. Uh we can do everything right. we can shut down the border, bring down prices. If we don't get our kids to understand and be uh understand grit, uh
teamwork, we'll end up losing the whole process if we don't we don't keep that up. So, and I would just say this some kind of way we have to get our parents understanding that their kids are not the lotto ticket. Uh we have too many kids. We have too many coaches uh that see our uh their kids as something that
is going to give them a big badge, a big certificate. Uh we need to be teaching character. So, we'll get back to that. This is a great voice. appreciate you guys doing this. In some kind of way, we'll see if we can help out on the federal side some kind of way. So, thank you so much and I yield back. >> Representative Hayes of Connecticut is
recognized. >> Good morning and thank you to our witnesses for being here. Um, I have to say before I start, although that's not this subcommittee, but the full committee, I heard the comments from the chair of the full committee about this
hearing actually addressing school safety. And while sports are important for school safety, we have to have a hearing on this committee to address school shootings and the safety of our children in American schools. To have
woken up on December 14th, the 13th anniversary of Sandy Hook to yet another incident of school-based violence and shooting and for this committee to have done nothing is beyond irresponsible. Um, I sent a letter on September 12th
and while the chair has informed me that my comments were quote noted, as a member of this committee, I expect something more and the American people and I know that my constituents expect something more uh than just to normalize
school shootings and teach our children how to shelter in place. So, um, with that, I'll move on to the topic of this hearing. Um, Mr. Bole and Mr. Ferry, uh, welcome from Connecticut. Uh, it was a
little bit colder here this week. It feels like Connecticut. Not typically what the weather here is like, but thank you so much for your work in this area. Previously, children and communities across the country could participate in local recreational sports programs
regardless of their family's income. Unfortunately, today that is no longer a reality with private equity firms rapidly buying up youth sports leagues, training programs, recreational facilities, and even the software programs used to register youth
athletes. With each purchase, costs rise and families are left with fewer options. If you want to have a productive conversation about declining youth sports participation, we have to really be honest about what is really driving families away, and that is affordability. Parents are opted opting
out of youth sports because they're being priced out. There are not that many available options that are free. Private equity equity firms are rising co raising costs at a time when families are already struggling to make ends meet which was once what was once a community
activity has become a multi-billion dollar for-profit driven industry. Mr. Ferry >> Mr. fairy. According to the Aspen Institute, youth sports generated about 19 billion in 2022. Despite rising costs
for families, the industry did not just grow. It skyrocketed to roughly 40 billion, nearly doubling its annual revenue in only a few years. I've seen I mean as a teacher I've seen so many of these kids who did not make one team but uh travel leagues were not an option
because their family could not afford the equipment the fees uh the time commitment all of those things and they truly believed in their kids and wanted the best for them. In your testimony you acknowledge that parents are being priced out of youth sports and private private equity forms have played a
growing role. How can participation grow when the price to play continues to rise and families have nowhere else to turn? >> Yeah, I appreciate it. Uh, by the way, we raised our kids in Connecticut and uh understand everything you're talking about. Um,
again, I think part of the part of the the equation is um helping municipalities understand that they have some say so over this. They have the ability through the power of the permit, through the use of these fields, renting out these
fields under certain conditions. You could say to local groups, terrific, we'll rent this to you, but also show us that like you've got x number of kids, a percentage of your kids who are lowinccome or, you know, free and reduced lunch, however you define it, or you're serving kids from the community
and not kids from all over the county, and you're taking our best uh playing fields. So, I do do think it's a level of local control. I also think it's a matter of schools fully appreciating the value of sports. So if sports do develop students cognitively, educationally,
academically, why are we building the whole model around the kids who are just the very best athletes or who are the early who are the, you know, the early starters? If it's really valuable, shouldn't we create opportunities for every kid to be
physically active in the school? whether the school providing that opportunity or having a partnership with a local park and Rex or other community uh groups in the area to connect them to experiences that they could have. >> Thank you. Um, my time is almost expired, but you reminded me of many a
time where the the quarter was about to close and kids knew that a game was coming up and that if their all of their assignments were not completed in my class that they were not I mean it it created this relationship where kids understood the they were student
athletes and the academics came first and I saw so many of the kids who were passionate about sports thrive academically. because they understood that they had to do well in the classroom in order to even play on whatever field it was. And it just
created an amazing symbiotic relationship between myself and those children and their families. With that, I yield back. >> Representative Lee of Pennsylvania is recognized. >> Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Um, I'm I am actually really glad that we're
talking about youth sports because I for one, as somebody who availed myself of youth sports when I was in school, I recognize how important it is that it is more accessible and more affordable. But we also know that when school uh when school budgets are tight, sports, just
like arts and debate and other extracurriculars are usually the first things that are on the chopping blocks. But we also know how important they actually are to children's development. Um, as academics, uh, and these things really do go hand in hand. My worry is
that this administration's efforts to defund public schools and their protection of corporate interest all but guarantee that children's extracurricular activities will be outsourced to private equity and reserved exclusively for those kids and those families that can't afford it.
Because even when schools do have robust athletic programs, we already know that poor kids, po uh kids from marginalized communities are already uh falling behind their wealthy peers who typically and now as we see kind of uh this movement of these private uh sports, AU
club sports, right? Those kids are starting at around four and poorer kids are not able to access those sports sometimes until they're in junior or high school. Um, but it's also making it wildly inexpensive for everybody where these expensive p uh private programs
are running $40 billion and have a $40 billion corporate monopoly that have no real regard for these kids' health or their well-being. Corporate sports leagues either box lowincome kids out entirely or um they use the empty
promise of free higher education to co or families into spending exorbitant amounts of money that they don't have for their very young kids to specialize in extreme training for one sport. Committing their lives to something that will generate billions in revenue that
they'll never see. um are sacrificing other parts of their lives to follow this one path that has only ever been available to a small fraction of students. Um uh let me look around. Uh Miss Van Dyke, in your testimony, you shared a survey that showed 83% of
parents believe their children have the talent to earn them uh an athletic scholarship, but only 2% of college of applicants actually receive them, and most don't even cover full tuition. Do elite youth sports companies use predatory tactics like the promise of college sports or excuse me, college
scholarships to recruit families uh into their programs? >> They absolutely do. It's really easy to look at their websites and their promotional materials to see those promises and they have to make those promises to justify the high costs that they're charging those families. And those high costs are the result of
consolidation. It's not just youth sports where consolidation makes prices go up. Study after study, a study from the Census Bureau a couple years ago, a study in 2015 by John Quoka, a study in 1989, all show that when mergers and col
consolidation are allowed to happen, prices go up, wages go down, and small businesses close. And that when we actually enforce our antitrust laws and stop these mergers, prices go down, employment goes up, and small businesses succeed. Yeah, thank you so much for
making those various connections there. Your testimony refers to youports turning into a profit extraction scheme. How and you and you and you've mentioned how these markets are shifting through uh the consolidation through anti the lack of uh any sort of antitrust laws
and as with all sectors, right? When you sports are taking over by corporate monopolies, they don't prioritize are no longer or at least able to prioritize the benefits to participating. And as we've heard from the other witnesses today, sports benefit children's development. They teach invaluable
skills like social emotional learning. Mr. Bole, as the executive director of an organization that offers school-based uh uh sports programs rooted in social emotional learning, um I know you mentioned it briefly, but would love if you could share the connection between you sports and why is so important.
>> Yeah, and again, and it's all kids. It's it's it's like all kids benefit from the skills of of SEAL, right? And because sports is the best place for teaching these things because the emotions happen in real time and so you know a kid
standing over a putt, a kid about to take a penalty kick, a kid about to take a a free throw that matters. Uh those those are life skills you can teach in real time. I was a school counselor and so I would I would always be told you got to go in and do a lesson on anxiety or anger management or conflict
resolution. It was a heck of a lesson. You know what impact it had? None. the next day it was gone. We wouldn't teach piano once and say, "Good luck. Have at it. Now, now you're good at it." You have to continue to teach these skills and use the opportunity of sports when those emotions are happening in real
time to say, "All right, this is how you can deal with this right here in a safe and fun place so that when you're about to road rage or lose it on somebody, you've developed those skills in such way." Sports is the best opportunity to do that. And we miss out on so many kids if we don't give them access to sports.
>> Thank you. That's that's my time. I I do appreciate I appreciate the testimony today. Sports is something that I value. Uh but the connection between antitrust, these monopolies pushing kids out of sports and creating an industry that I think is not having the outcomes we want is really important to talk about. So,
thank you so much for your time and I yield back. >> Uh I'll now recognize uh ranking member Bon Bonamichi for her closing remarks. >> Uh thank you, Mr. Chairman, and and truly thank you to the witnesses today. It's been a a very informative hearing and I know we'll be thinking and talking about it in the days and weeks to come.
Uh for millions of children across the country, participating in youth sports brings them joy, promotes teamwork, friendship, improves physical and mental health, gives students a place to hone their talents, discover new interests, foster lifelong friendships. But unfortunately, we know that the rising
cost of youth sports, especially during an affordability crisis, is presenting a barrier for too many families. I wanted to note on the conversation about PE in schools that we here in Congress do not set curriculum. Uh that's not what we do. However, uh we know over the years
um that those decisions made at the local uh level uh there are federal policies that affect those and one of those is no child left behind which was well-intentioned. But what happened and I'm urging us not to go back to those days where we put um uh test scores in a
place of of acting as a punitive tool. Uh what happens when there's too much emphasis on test scores is that all of the courses that are not tested are cut. And we saw that with arts, with music, with PE, with social studies, with everything that's not reading and math.
So I'm very much encouraging us to to keep an open mind that a well-rounded education that includes PE and humanities and arts is is what students really need, especially today. um we cannot uh you know test our way out of this if we don't we can't have
schools just focus on test scores because they're not going to be uh enhancing and and providing classes like PE. We also know that without sustained investment it's going to be harder for local local organizations school-based programs nonprofit organizations that previously ran youth sports. They're
going to be left without sufficient resources. And I'm concerned about the the cuts in federal funding that are going for the the existing federal programs right now. Um, companies like Nike, which is located in the district I am proud to represent, they have, you know, they do product donations,
community grants, and and that's really helpful, but there is still a tremendous void. And that's why the private equity firms are swooping in and and buying resources, programs, fields. Uh some of your testimony, Miss Van Djke, really highlighted how serious of a problem
this is. And now they're are able to charge high prices for what should be a quintessential childhooden enriching experience. Too many students are left out. No family should have to choose between supporting their child's education and perhaps their dream, but also the the benefits of PE and and
youth sports. They shouldn't have to choose between that and paying their bills. We must do more to counter private equity's outsiz role in this industry. We must encourage local and federal investment so the youth sports are accessible and affordable for all students. We have a wonderful partnership in uh the Twallen Hills
Parks and Recck District, for example, with our schools in Oregon. That's a partnership between a local parks and recck district and school districts. We need more of that, not less of that. We need to make youth sports accessible and affordable for everyone, not just those from wealthy families. So, thank you
again, Mr. Chairman, for uh for the hearing. Thank you to the witnesses and I yield back. >> I think it's well understood that uh far too many young people uh don't have the best uh diets uh aren't getting enough physical activity, aren't spending
enough time outside, are spending too much time uh on screens and in isolation. and youth sports uh is a solution to a lot of those problems and can set off a virtuous cycle of positive lifestyle choices uh with tremendous
benefits for kids social emotional uh development. So, I want to thank all of our witnesses here today for the role that you're playing in helping to set off that virtuous cycle uh for many many kids across the country uh and to uh
restore the role of youth sports uh to the place it it should have uh when it comes to the upbringing of uh of kids in our country. I think it this hearing today we've identified uh a few uh areas where we could see improvement. Uh one is just uh programmatic in terms of
having more offerings for students to continue to be involved regardless of skill level. Uh having maybe more robust PE programs uh in schools. Uh the second is financial removing the barriers to entry that have gotten just exorbitant in many communities across uh the country. The third I think is cultural
just trying to re uh establish a a culture that is supportive of play and competition and uh giving kids these opportunities from an early age. I do have to say a few witnesses mentioned the experience of COVID really where we took this opportunity away for many kids in my state. Uh we were the last to
allow youth sports to continue again. I took part in what we call the let them play rallies with kids uh across our state and that was a period where the interests of young people uh were not the highest priority when it came to policy. Uh and this was one
manifestation of it and we really must never make that mistake uh again. Uh that's a broader issue. But on this specific issue of youth sports, I think we've had a lot of bipartisan agreement uh today. I hope that this forum uh can serve as an opportunity uh for uh those
of you who are here today as witnesses uh to continue and to amplify the tremendous work you're doing. So, thank you for being here today. Uh I'd like to thank everyone again for uh their participation. And without objection, there being no further business, the committee stands adjourned.