East Bay teen to receive prestigious award at ESPY's for founding Girls4Sports youth program

DUBLIN, Calif. (KGO) -- A Bay Area teen is headed to the ESPY's this week to receive the prestigious Billie Jean King Youth Leadership Award.

The nonprofit Girls4Sports started in 2021, quickly evolving into the world's largest youth led organization fighting gender inequality in sports. We sat down with the 17-year-old founder who shared how this dream began.

"As I was getting older specifically around when I was 13 years old I noticed that more and more girls were dropping out of the swim team that I was part of because they were receiving sexist comments. Emphasizing female inferiority in sports and after receiving such comments myself I was pushed to found Girls4Sports," said Maegha Ramanathan, founder of Girls4Sports.

The nonprofit holds two to three camps a year and has served close to 40,000 undeserved girls in the last four years. Making all this possible are their 1,500 volunteers.

Luz Pena: "How would you describe Girls4Sports?"

In a circle, seven members of the Girls4Sports nonprofit described it as: "Inclusive, community, inspiring, passionate, motivational, empowering, cooperative."

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We met them in Dublin at the local park where they held their latest camp.

"We check in the kids around 9-9:15 a.m. That occurs at those three tables over there. We do age groups four through 12," said Shreeya Kamboj, a volunteer with Girls4Sports.

"We have sports like badminton and tennis, and we recently got the grant, so that we hope to start introducing sports like pickleball and paddle ball with new equipment that we get," said Shreeya Rao Lalam, a volunteer with Girls4Sports.

That grant is worth $10,000 and is coming from a prestigious national sports award.

Luz Pena: "What went through your mind when you realized that you won?"

"When I read the email saying that I won the Billie Jean King Youth Leadership award, it was absolutely surreal. I couldn't believe my eyes. But, honestly, the thing that I thought about was why I started Girls4Sports: to achieve a mission like this where girls can believe in themselves and find leadership," Ramanathan said.

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Girls4Sports has expanded its reach to 30 chapters in 20 states.

"In the Bay Area we've held about 10 to 20 camps in the past four years. These camps are cost-free. We teach a variety of sports, including tennis, badminton, volleyball, soccer and track and cross country. Teaching girls to find sports that they can fall in love with and become passionate about, because they haven't received exposure in the past," Ramanathan said.

Luz Pena: "What is your dream for Girls4Sports?"

Maegha Ramanathan: "I want to see Girls4Sports internationally, because -- especially in third world countries -- access to sports is very limited. I want to make sure we have sports camps there as well."

All their work with a collective goal to open doors for girls to play sports everywhere.