Skate for Joy

The first skill that Carolyn Drumm teaches her ice-skating students is how to fall.”That’s what they are all so freaked out about,” Drumm said. “This way, they get over that fear right away.”

The second skill she teaches is how to get up.

That is her goal, really. Drumm wants to teach disadvantaged kids how to pick themselves up by learning a new sport and new skills. She wants them to feel a sense of accomplishment of progressing from wobbly baby steps to smooth, gliding strides across the ice.

“It’s much more than just skating,” Drumm said.

Drumm founded Skate for Joy two years ago. The nonprofit organization outfits low-income children with skates, helmets and skating bags. About 25 children aged 5 to 14 participate in weekly skating lessons given by Drumm and volunteers. And it’s all free.

Drumm, 41, a Warwick resident, was inspired to start the program after watching The Oprah Winfrey Show.

“She had this segment on called ‘Use Your Life,’ and she just mentioned whatever talents you have, use them for giving back to others,” Drumm said. “Ithink that’s when I had that light-bulb moment. I said you know what — I used to be a pretty good skater at one time.”

Drumm skated competitively as a youth and spent her summers at a training center in Lake Placid, N.Y. She performed for one season in an ice show at Busch Gardens and in another show in Puerto Rico.

But she quit skating to start a family.

“I hung my skates up for about 14 years, got married, helped my husband build a business, had my kids and made them the focus of my life, and now they are getting bigger,” she said.

That’s when she saw the Oprah show.

“I decided I could use my skating and put it to good use and teach some disadvantaged kids to skate,” Drumm said.

She started giving informal skating lessons three years ago, and then created Skate for Joy. The program is a U.S. figure-skating basic skills program for both figure skating and hockey skating. The children receive badges for each skill level they achieve.

Skate For Joy is financed by Drumm’s husband’s company, J.D. Cement Works, and Bank of Rhode Island. She is looking for more corporate sponsors. The organization is hosting its second annual fundraiser March 3 at the Federal Reserve, in Providence.

It costs about $20,000 to pay for the equipment and a full season of ice time. Drumm’s dream is to run Skate for Joy as an after-school program throughout the school year. One of her biggest obstacles is renting space at an indoor rink. She is desperate to find a rink that is willing to rent to the skating program during the peak after-school hours.

When she can’t find an indoor rink — last Thursday, for instance — Drumm gives the lesson at the Bank of America Skating Center, formerly the Fleet Skating Center.

The temperature was 15 degrees.

The first 20 minutes of the hourlong lesson were spent lacing up the kids’ skates and bundling them in warm clothes. With red Skate For Joy sweatshirts pulled over their winter coats, the children tottered to the rink.

Drumm followed, wearing leopard-skin skates and a furry headband and holding the hands of two new skaters. On the ice, she asked them to let go of her hands. They refused. She finally persuaded them to let go.

“Fall down,” she instructed them. They stood frozen. She let her own skates slip out from under her and landed on her butt. The children realized Drumm was serious, and they silently squatted down, as slowly as possible, until they lost their balance and hit the ice with a thud.

Then, of course, Drumm taught them how to get back up.

First appeared in the Providence Journal
Sunday, January 30, 2005

First you fall; then you learn
Skate for Joy sharpens low-income kids’ skills on the ice
by: Cathleen F. Crowley