UIC - the Grinch Who Stole Christmas

Since 1995, Project Education Plus (PEP) has held a Christmas basketball tournament for freshman and sophomore high school teams. Since 2009, they have partnered with the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) and the event has been hosted at their Physical Education Building on Roosevelt Road.

Over 1,000 students on 68 teams were ready to play basketball December 20- 22 from 9AM to 8PM each day. This year for the first time, the annual Von Steuben/Whitney Young Holiday Tourney was scheduled to take place at the UIC Student Recreation Center at 737 S. Halsted St…until the university pulled the plug at the 11th hour. However, the contract had been signed twice and sufficient insurance was provided.

Vince Carter has taught or coached at Von Steuben Metropolitan Science Center since 1986. He has worked for Chicago Public Schools since 1976. Mr. Carter is also the Head Basketball Coach at Von Steuben. In addition, he is the founder of Project Education Plus. Tyrone Slaughter is the Head Basketball Coach at Whitney Young Magnet High School. And together, the student-athletes on their teams have achieved amazing things. It’s an event many CPS and Chicago-area student-athletes wait for and are excited about every year. Coach Carter has always had a verbal agreement with UIC about the dates for the following year while awaiting approval regarding the NCAA rules. In past years, they have never paid in advance and settled the balance on the last day of the tournament.

The timeline for this year’s tourney was the same. On May 7, 2014, they set the dates with Mr. George Mitchell. On October 28th, Coach Carter received an email stating PEP couldn’t use the gyms in the PE Building because they were renovating the floors. (That type of work has to be scheduled far in advance with the Facilities Office and the contractors. Project Education Plus does not understand why they did not receive notice about this before October so they could book another venue). On November 5th, PEP asked for approval to use the Flames Athletic Center (FAC) or the Rec Center. The request to use the FAC was denied on November 17th. After scrambling for space a bit, the organization thought they found a solution with the UIC Student Recreation Center and received a contract on November 20th. The contract was signed and insurance forms were given to Nathan Scott, the Associate Director of Facilities.

On December 9th, Mr. Carter received an email from Shannon Norkus, the Director of Compliance, saying Project Education Plus did not qualify as a scholastic entity and they should use Von Steuben as the entity. In a follow-up call, Mr. Carter was told that Ms. Norkus “could not find him listed as a teacher on the Von Steuben website.” But, she never bothered to call the school to verify his status! In addition, there were other calls and emails citing:
- No one could find Mr. Carter in the UIC computer as having been a prior facility renter.
- UIC could not accept a Project Education Plus check because the check had to be signed by a CPS principal.
- The contract needed to be signed by an authorized CPS official.

One thing after another started to unravel. Then another call came in from Ms. Norkus on Thursday, December 11th. Arrangements were made for Mr. Slaughter to go in on Monday, the 15th to sign the contract. Everyone thought everything was fine since Mr. Slaughter had previously held an event at the UIC Pavilion on December 4-5th of this year. Both Coach Carter & Mr. Slaughter went to the UIC office and signed the contracts. They asked if this was everything they needed and were told yes. Then an email was sent to Mr. Carter on Friday the 19th - the day before the tournament. It was from Rosetta Houston of the Office of Business Development Services stating they needed more information and initials on documents. After a discussion on the phone, it appeared finally everything was settled. Later that afternoon, Mr. Scott called Coach Carter to say PEP & Whitney Young’s teams could not enter the building…BEFORE PEP had an opportunity to provide the additional information they requested.

It’s a travesty that this annual weekend event for these kids was destroyed. It’s also extremely unprofessional for a university to deal with a long-time customer in this manner. Everything requested had been supplied. Coach Carter commented that “With both coaches having prior relationships with UIC, the lack of respect given to us is very surprising. Over 1000 of Chicago’s youth have been denied an experience they have looked forward to since they joined their high school teams.” The university should make amends. (You’ll even find their event listed on the UIC website through this weekend at http://recreation.uic.edu/facilities/facility_srf). When this author contacted the Rec Center for a statement, Marcus Williams, one of the managers, stated “I don’t know what happened. I came in early to set up for it and saw a sign that it was cancelled for contract issues.” When asked if higher level administrators were available to comment, he stated no administrators would return until Monday the 22nd.

Project Education Plus is a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization and their mission is to enlighten youth on how to take advantage of the educational, technological & recreational outlets in society and transfer that knowledge into a successful self-sufficient life. They have provided educational, camp & after-school programs for young kids, activities for seniors and holiday events in the Cabrini Green neighborhood since 1980. Details about the Chicago Demons Basketball team and Coach Carter’s other teams can be found at http://www.eteamz.com/ChicagoDemons.

After the shutdown of their site by the Chicago Housing Authority in 2012, PEP had been without an office. This year, things were turning around when they secured a new location at 1327 N. Larrabee which will open in January 2015. Programming will include a photography club, fitness & dance instruction, and those who want to run their own Arts program can also rent space. For more information on activities in the facility, email vince.carter@projecteducationplus.org. If you’d like to support the capital campaign for the new facility, donate to Project Education Plus at http://www.projecteducationplus.org/donate.html.