Run Your City Boston Teaches Running Skills and Racing to K-8 Athletes

BU track and field and cross country student-athletes coach and mentor local students at RYC Boston practices

Sports

BU track and field and cross country student-athletes coach and mentor local students at RYC Boston practices

The Boston University Track & Tennis Center has witnessed its fair share of collegiate-level running events. But this fall semester, it welcomes a younger group of athletes every other Saturday through November.

Nine Boston University track and field athletes have launched a Boston chapter of Run Your City (RYC), an international nonprofit run by student-athletes that aims to build community through running, regardless of skill level, gender, or socioeconomic status.

The student-athletes host track and field practices for kindergarten through 8th-grade students in the Boston area, free of cost, at the BU Track & Tennis Center.

The process started in late May when another RYC chapter reached out to Caroline Collins (COM’28), BU RYC copresident, through Instagram. Since then, the group of student-athletes has worked on community outreach, fundraised to cover the track facility rental and insurance fee, and begun holding practices.

BU Run Your City copresidents Luna Scorzelli (Sargent’28) (left) and Caroline Collins (COM’28).

The youngsters participate in a variety of track and field activities at practices, from relays to warm-ups. They have access to BU’s facilities, from the track itself to the long-jump pit. The athletes run with the kids, coach them, and moderate the practices to ensure the activities flow smoothly.

Copresident Luna Scorzelli (Sargent’28) says the practice schedule alternates, so one week the kids work on running and skills and the next one, they race. Ultimately, there will be three practices dedicated to learning the sport and three dedicated to racing.

Leonni Griffin (Questrom’28) (right), an instructor with the BU chapter of Run Your City Boston, pauses for a cooldown after a hard run with a participant in the biweekly running and exercise practices.

“All the kids want to do is run,” Collins says. “They want to run laps and laps and laps.”

Collins and Scorzelli say the practices are an opportunity for these K-8 students to have an accessible place to practice and to develop their passions—even if they decide those passions are not running after they’ve been exposed to the sport, which is another benefit of the program.

BU joins about 50 other RYC chapters around the country; there are two other chapters in the Boston area, Chestnut Hill and Cambridge (Collins says that Boston is the first city to have different chapters in the same area). With multiple locations, Scorzelli adds, the programming becomes more accessible to a greater number of people.

A participant emphatically leaps into the sand pit while BU student-athletes cheer them on.

Going forward, the BU group will need to recruit more executive members, Collins and Scorzelli say, if they are to have a spring season.

The free practices make running more accessible, especially with the expense of youth sports being so high, Collins says. In 2024, the average US family spent $1,016 per child’s main sport, a 46 percent increase since 2019, according to a recent New York Times story.

The Terrier student-athletes are hosting the events on their own, without compensation. “We are doing it for the kids,” Collins says, “and no one else.”

RYC Boston is seeking volunteers to assist with practices throughout the fall. Volunteers will serve as coaches over the course of the season, each with 5 to 10 kids on their team. Find the volunteer sign-up form here.

RYC Boston is also accepting donations to help cover the costs of snacks, water and ice, equipment, insurance, markers, and more. Submit donations to the organization’s GoFundMe page.