The Have a Ball Foundation puts smiles on kids’ faces by providing sporting equipment to remote schools in outback Australia as well as raising money to support the health and well-being of indigenous children. We sat down with founder, Rohan Duncan to chat about his experiences and his goals for the future.

Q: Why did you start the Have a Ball Foundation?

I had a life changing moment when I was travelling with my family in Sri Lanka in 2011. A group of local kids who lived in a shanty town next to our hotel would come after school and play cricket on the beach each night as they were so passionate about their sport. They invited us to play one afternoon and I noticed they only had an old cricket bat, rough old tennis balls and a block of wood for stumps. We ended up buying them a couple of brand new bats and balls, as it didn’t mean much to us as it was only $4 a bat from the local market, but when we gave it to them, each one of those kids came up and said ‘thank you, thank you,’ like we had given them all a million dollars.

That event stuck in my head and when I was back in Australia, I looked at ways I could help kids in need, especially our own indigenous communities who I had previously interacted with on earlier travels. I came up with the concept of getting some sports balls out to the kids in need to keep them fit and healthy.

I approached my local principal and asked if we could organise a ‘bring a ball’ day at a local school as most kids have got balls lying around at home and they could either buy a new ball or donate a good condition secondhand ball. We had an event at the school and I delivered these donations to six communities around the Alice Springs region in Central Australia. The response was amazing.

Q: Since it was established seven years ago, how much has the Have a Ball foundation grown?

We are now a formal not for profit foundation with tax deductible gift recipients set up. We’ve just hit 50,000 balls which have been donated which have been distributed to over 100 different remote communities and around 15 overseas countries. Chem Couriers, a local trucking company is our major sponsor, so they transport trailer loads of balls from Melbourne to their main hubs around Australia such as Alice Springs, Darwin, Perth and Cairns. We then have a number of volunteers in these locations who can distribute them out to kids in remote communities. Teaming up with Rotary Club has also extended our distribution opportunities as we are able to send sports balls to their warehouse in Footscray and they are able to distribute to a whole range of overseas countries in need such as Kenya, India, Sri Lanka and Papua New Guinea.

Q: What projects have you been able to fund?

Earlier this year when the cyclones were going through Arnhem Land, all the communities from Arnhem Land were flown into Darwin and the army set up tents for them to stay. I was in Darwin at the time and I heard of this on the news. I called in and spoke to the evacuation coordinator and asked if I could buy some balls for the kids so I just went down to the local Kmart and bought a couple of hundred footy and soccer balls and they were just rapt with them.

We’ve also used some money to help out remote schools, from planting veggie gardens or citrus trees at the schools, installing shade sails in the playgrounds due to the extreme heat in these locations, or arranging new football goals or replacing broken basketball rings.

Q: What is the next step for Have a Ball?

I’m looking for a major sponsor to employ someone as the growth opportunities are endless. With some additional resources, proactively marketing and running more school events, there is the potential to generate around 30,000 to 40,000 balls a year. I’m currently restricted from a resourcing point of view as I have to rely on volunteers and balance working for the foundation with my full time employment.

Q: What is your full time job?

My title is the eAdmin Centre of Excellence Lead for the Catholic Education Office, so essentially I’m a team lead for an IT project where we are rolling out new administration systems for all 500 Victorian Catholic schools. I’ve also got three girls so I’m pretty busy running them around to their sporting commitments!

Q: What do you think are the major benefits of giving these kids access to sporting equipment?

There’s a whole range of downstream benefits that are hard to measure. Getting kids go to school is a big challenge out in the communities where their attendance rates are really low, so some of the teachers use these balls as rewards. But essentially the balls help the kids stay fit and healthy and encoyurage them to lead a healthy lifestyle as well as connecting with everyone around them by playing sport.

It was really touching when I delivered a bag of balls to a small school in a remote central Aust school when the teacher came out and was so thankful for the donations. She said she would put them in her office as the kids don’t get any presents at Christmas.’ She wanted to keep all the balls as a Christmas present for the kids so they all have something to take home which made me realise that we take so much for granted and how much we spoil our own kids in major cities.

Q: How can people get involved in Have a Ball?

Most of the details are on the website, but they can volunteer for events if they want to help out, otherwise donations are always needed to fund events, help out schools in need and purchase more balls. People can also contact their local school or sports club to see whether they would be interested in holding an event or have any balls to donate.

Visit Have a Ball’s website to learn more about the foundation and how you can support kids in remote communities, and watch this video to find out a little more about their story.

The Have a Ball Foundation has reached a proud milestone of distributing over 50,000 balls to kids in remote communities in outback Australia and underprivileged kids in 3rd world countries. We would like to thank all those who have generously supported the Foundation as well as the team of people who have assisted in getting balls out to kids in these remote areas.

Thank to you our sponsor Chem Couriers who truck all our donations throughout the year to these locations. We couldn’t operate without your great support.

Thanks again for the continued support from the Basterfield Park Tennis Club in Hampton VIC for another bin load on tennis balls. These will keep hundreds of kids entertained playing all sorting of sporting games.

The poem “Spirit of the Country” was written by Jason Capuano and Rohan Duncan on the way to the community of Yuendumu in the Northern Territory to deliver sports balls on behalf of the Have a Ball Foundation.

The poem tries to capture the emotion of the outback and soulful feelings it brings. The Australian outback is truly a magical place full of amazing scenery, people and history.

We hope you enjoy it – please view with sound turned on for maximum effect.

The term ‘life changing’ gets thrown around a lot, but fair to say what I experienced last week in Central Australia was nothing short of that. Having the opportunity and privilege to not only spend time in this wonderful part of our country, but to see and experience first hand the amazing work that groups like the Have a Ball Foundation are doing to make a real difference in remote communities was very special.

Sure, I was there primarily to capture photographs and video, but to really experience it and get immersed in what’s happening was truly an eye opener. Take the very small community of Wallace Rock Hole, approx 120 kms south-west of Alice Springs. The teacher at their tiny school was so delighted to receive our delivery of new & used balls (having been donated by primary school children in Melbourne), she told us that the children there don’t receive anything on Christmas day…and that she would like to hold onto the balls until Christmas so that they could at least experience for once the feeling of receiving a present – something we all take for granted.

And to think that the balls they received were all donated by Melbourne primary school kids who may have played with them for a while, but perhaps have just been sitting around at home, in a cupboard, under a bed or in the backyard. Stories like this are plentiful in these communities and I feel so honoured to have been part of the experience – something which will now become a part of my annual calendar.

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Another tiny community we visited was Imanpa, whose brightly coloured used car bonnets stand as sentinels at the entrance of the dirt track that takes you to their home. We were there just before school was scheduled to start at 9am. The ring of the bell echoed throughout the community, but no kids came running…for this was a community in mourning due to the death of an elder. It took the principal to get in her car and drive to a couple of houses to round up a few kids personally so that the teacher actually had some pupils to teach. Can you imagine that happening in the city…

If you’d like to know about the great work that the Have a Ball Foundation is doing, or to offer support, check out the website or Facebook page.

The last few days of our outback adventure involved catching up with some of our wonderful volunteers in Alice Springs including David Hewitt who does an amazing job in getting balls out to communities for the Foundation. We dropped off some more balls to the staff at the Owens Springs Juvenile Detention centre who are always pleased to keep the kids active with some new equipment.

We headed back out of Alice and back down the Lassiter Hwy towards Uluru again enjoying another beautiful night under the stunning night sky before waking early to call into another small remote school at the community of Imanpa. Another special experience listening to the stories from the staff of the school and meeting some of the kids and Traditional Owner in town.

We then returned back to Uluru, and as always, such a breathtaking site, due to its size, magnificent colours and features. We did a quick walk along the front base as it heated up to 41 degrees. Great to finally see the rock shut for climbing which occurred on 26th October. We drove around the rear of Uluru to our final school drop-off in the lovely little community of Mutitjulu where the school has the best backdrop in Australia. The kids were thrilled with their new sports balls as we called in while they were celebrating Halloween, playing some fun activities. We were lucky enough to camp in swags again at the Remote Tours campsite and it was lovely to freshen up with a swim after spending many days on the road.

It was an absolute pleasure being able to visit all the communities around Central Australia once again, concluding another memorable trip, meeting some amazing kids and characters of the outback and gaining some everlasting, rewarding and educational experiences. Thank you again to Chem Couriers for managing all our deliveries around Australia and to all the volunteers who assist with running events in Melbourne as well as the volunteers who assist in getting balls out to the communities during the year. Thanks to Jay for joining me on another great adventure and assisting with the deliveries and also Scott for doing an awesome job in capturing the amazing scenes and people of the outback on camera (visit www.cre8tivephotographysolutions.com.au to see Scott’s talented work)

We woke at sunrise and made an early start for a big day visiting 3 remote schools as we started past Kings Canyon & drove along the dirt road of the Mereenie loop heading towards Alice Springs. The landscape was amazing as we passed herds of wild horses and camels in the dry, deserted and picturesque country. We first visited Jonathon & the kids at the beautiful community of Utju Areyonga where they were so welcoming and friendly. We got the opportunity to spend some quality time with them play basketball during their recess time. As the temperature hit the high thirties we pushed onto Hermannsburg where we dropped another bag of balls off to the kids who only had a couple of balls at the school. We had a quick game of soccer with the kids then ventured onto our last school in the pretty little community of Wallace Rockhole. We were extremely touched when the teacher Maryse was so thankful for the balls donated as she explained the kids do not receive any presents for Christmas so she was going to keep them in her office hidden away so the kids could receive a ball each on Christmas day.
We had visited these schools when the foundation first started around 7 years ago so it was great to visit again and reinforced how such a small token of a ball donation by generous people from Melbourne sports clubs and schools is so greatly appreciated in these outback schools. Happy 50th birthday Jay!

It was great to fly back into Central Aust amongst the vibrant colours of the outback on another road trip, delivering sports balls to kids in remote communities. We flew into Uluru & hit the road to head out to Lilla in Watarrka National Park near Kings Canyon.

We spent the afternoon at Watarrka School and it was great to catch up with Reg Ramsden from Remote tours who kindly put us up for the night at his campsite. We inspected the new school building which had recently opened due to the wonderful support of businesses, the local community and hard work fundraising by Reg. This enables kids to stay on country to further enhance their education in a great new facility headed up by their wonderful teacher, Christine Munro.

We were extremely lucky to get memorable personal guided walk amongst the ranges with Lewis who educated us with many of his fascinating dreamtime stories of the area and explained their traditional laws and old ways. Unfortunately our drone got possessed as we were doing some filming of some of the kids playing football & took off into the bushland on its own and crashed, unable to be found.

We spent an awesome night under the stars in our swags in the beautiful barmy climate as the infinite universe revealed itself.

Thanks you to all the wonderful kids and teachers from Amoonguna School and Yuendumu where we flew up to Alice Springs to drop some balls of to the kids. It was another amazing trip meeting some great people who help us get our deliveries out as well as visiting the amazing sites and schools.

Thank you to David Hewitt and Blair McFarlane from Caylus in Alice Springs for assisting in distributing balls out to kids at the MacDonnell Shire Youth Team, the Gap Youth Centre and Tangenyere Youth Centre. The below photo is of one of the amazing Youth Leader workers at Santa Teresa Community, 80km east of Alice Springs, who was very happy to receive a couple of bags of balls for the kids.