The Capital One Rocks & Rings program is designed to introduce the Olympic sport of curling to elementary school children.By bringing the curling rink to the school gym we reach children that would otherwise not have access to the roaring game.The best part? We bring everything to the kids – no field trip or school buses required! Curling is a highly social sport that can be enjoyed for a lifetime. It is a fantastic physical activity that can be enjoyed by all ages and abilities. It also promotes sportsmanship and camaraderie and is an inexpensive and less dangerous alternative to many other sports.
Success Stats and Figures
We recently wrapped up our second year of operations and reached over 50,000 kids during the 2009-10 school year. We’re currently in 6 cities in Canada (Vancouver, Regina, Winnipeg, Toronto, Ottawa and Halifax) and have ambitious plans for further expansion in 2010-11 when we will be adding approximately 6 — 10 more cities/regions.
US & International Expansion Plans
We have been approached by a number of groups wanting to launch the program in their countries and will be doing so soon. Of course our neighbors (not neighbours!) to the south are top of our priority list. We are currently looking for a title sponsor of the Rocks & Rings program for the US market and once we have one we’re hoping to be able to launch in 10 markets and grow from there. In the meantime we are working with a handful of US groups to explore piloting the program in their respective areas.
Curling is gaining immensely in popularity due to the Olympics, more so outside of Canada in countries where the sport is less “mainstream”. The US falls in love with the sport every 4 years and curling hangs on to more and more of those followers each Olympic quadrennial.
Once up and running, the Rocks & Rings program will be the vehicle that introduces the future stars and American curling medallists to the roaring game. Soon your kids will be coming home from school and telling you all about the Rocks & Rings program and how much they love curling!
