Tuesday's With Dave

  Their Journeys live on in those they impacted If you are reading this please click on the following link to register for the Olympia Alumni Association: . https://forms.gle/woWsggqM7zpUyHge9 There are literally thousands of Olympia Sports Camp alumni and the camp  has created an App that will allow Alumni to connect with the camp events, connect with each other, read content about some amazing Olympia people, and maybe sign your child or grandchild up for the week of their lives.  This week is not about an Olympia Alumni, but it is about someone who led a hero's journey. It is about a man who had the guts and foresight, when there was no real quality rep system in place for girls to learn basketball and prosper, to take the bat off the shoulder and create a basketball program that would end up influencing thousands and changed the face of girl's basketball in Ontario, and probably Canada.  Today's blog honours the memory of Doug Harrison, the founder and architect of the

The Alumni We Meet on our Journey One amazing truth about the journey of writing A Hero's Journey: Beyond Little Norway and Olympia Sports Camp and then continuing on the journey with this blog is that there is a multitude of people who have walked the grounds of Interlaken. Their stories are inspiring examples of what Olympia has been all about for 50 years. The Hero's Journey. Of Dave Grace. Of all of us. There is a movement afoot to establish a database of Olympia alumni staff, coaches, campers, and parents. If you are reading this please click on the following link to register for the Olympia Alumni Association: . https://forms.gle/woWsggqM7zpUyHge9 Olympia has created an App that will allow Alumni to connect with the camp events, read content about some amazing Olympia people, and maybe sign your child or grandchild up for the week of their lives. The greatest part of the Olympia story is that the Olympia experience  has now become generational.  The return ( stage 12) of

 Allies Who Help Us Grow along Our Journey. Al Overwijk is a world champion. ( check out his story in A Hero's Journey: Beyond Little Norway and Olympia Sports Camp ) ) Al had a great playing career at Carleton. Al coached at Carleton. Al is now a basketball coach and math teacher at Glebe Collegiate in Ottawa. Al just took his team to the AAA OFSAA Championships, taking his 13th ranked team to the quarterfinals. Quite a journey, but this blog is not about Al Overwijk. It's about the man that helped Al start on this journey as his high school coach at I.E. Weldon Secondary School in Lindsay, Ontario. Ron McGinnis. I had the fortune to watch the Glebe team play a couple of times this season and hoped that they would qualify for OFSAA in nearby Hamilton. The experience got better  when I got to Glendale HS and met Ron McGinnis. Having interviewed Al and written his inspiring story for my book, I knew the name and story of Ron McGinnis.  I was excited to meet the man who laid the

 The Olympia Tree of connections  Rob Simmons and I never worked at Olympia together. We knew of each other but never really got to know each other until I had the good fortune to interview Rob and good friend Kevin O'Reilly in the M unit one afternoon for my upcoming book A Hero's Journey: Beyond Little Norway and Olympia Sports Camp. His story of the bat off the shoulder and leadership in education is inspirational.   The Olympia 50th reunion weekend  brought  Rob, along with friends Matt Akler, Brian McMahon, the Petrushchak sisters, and others to Olympia to celebrate Olympia's 50th Anniversary and our Olympia connection was cemented over a great weekend of memories and stories. Last week Rob and I decided to go to Western for an OUA semi final basketball game between the Mustangs and the Brock Badgers. We connected with another Olympia alum (and Rob's sister in law) Christine Stapleton, the Athletic Director at Western, to get primo seats. I've always been proud