Cairns Midnight Basketball hits 300

The Hoop Dreaming Project’s Midnight Basketball Program continues to soar with over 300 young people turning out for last Friday night’s program.

This marks the second Friday night in a row where over 200 kids have turned up to play Basketball at the Bendigo Bank Basketball Centre, between 9pm and Midnight.

“It’s great to see so many kids down here hanging out and having fun.  Our goal was to gradually increase attendance and have 300 kids come to Midnight Basketball just before the program broke-up for Christmas.  To have 300 here now in our second night since restarting the program is great.”  Midnight Basketball Coordinator Joel Khalu noted.  “The kids are really starting to see the Cairns Basketball facility as a Community Centre, a place where you can do more than play basketball and that’s the message we want to promote.”

The Hoop Dreaming Project team is also running Midnight Basketball on Friday nights at the Smithfield YMCA with over 40 young people turning out on a regular basis.

This year alone the Midnight Basketball Program has also been successfully implemented in both Innisfail & Yarrabah, while there are plans for the program to be delivered in both Mareeba and Edmonton before the end of the year.

Along with Midnight Basketball, The Hoop Dreaming Project in partnership with CHOICE Australia will be starting an afternoon ‘RAP-UP’ program at Cairns Basketball, where school students can come down and participate in free after-school sport and recreation activities while also getting homework assistance in the Hoop Dreaming Project Centre.

For further information please contact Joel Khalu or go to www.hoopdreaming.com.au