The puck dropped for the fourth annual Joel Schwartz Memorial Hockey Tournament presented by RioCan (JSMHT) on Sunday, March 9th at Chesswood Arena in Toronto. Nearly 400 players across three divisions took to the ice as hundreds of spectators cheered them on. This year, the JSMHT raised over $200,000 in support of Reena Foundation, a service agency for Torontonians with developmental disabilities.
Jonathan Schwartz, Zack Belzberg and Jesse Abrams – three young Toronto professionals – founded the JSMHT in 2010 in order to commemorate the life of Jonathan’s brother Joel. Joel tragically passed away the previous year at the age of 26. Joel struggled with Asperger’s Syndrome, a developmental disability on the Autistic Spectrum. Throughout his life, Joel and his family received a great deal of support from Reena Foundation, making it an easy decision to select the organization as their cause.
“Reena provided Joel with a network of friends, a support system, and, in all honesty, relief to my parents, who in their own careers had massive responsibilities on top of raising Joel with his unique developmental condition,” Schwartz admits. “Thankfully, Joel was high functioning and very self-aware and ‘grew up’ on his own, although, there is no doubt Reena played an important role in providing him with the necessary confidence and resources to do so.”
In four years, the JSMHT has experienced tremendous growth. Since 2010 it has expanded from a 10-team men’s tournament to a 24-team affair that includes a 4-team Men’s Boomer Division (45+) and a 4-team Women’s Division that began this year.
“I’m excited that a cause supporting inclusion honoured their values by working hard to create a coed tournament,” said Bailey Greenspon, a first-time player in the women’s division.
The JSMHT garners a great deal of community backing as well as corporate support from over 27 major sponsors, including Title Sponsor RioCan REIT and Jersey Sponsor MDC Partners. Such funding has allowed the young charity to amass over half a million dollars in under four years towards their cause.
In 2012, members of the JSMHT started a subsidiary organization called Joel’s Ongoing Inclusion Network (J.O.I.N.) that organizes specific inclusionary initiatives for individuals with developmental disabilities. J.O.I.N. uses the interest earned through an endowment fund housed at Reena to support a number of different programs in perpetuity. Programs such as subsidized gym memberships to the Schwartz-Reisman Community Centre, The Birthright Israel Shadow Program, and UJA’s Live the Cause are all designed to provide positive and organic opportunities for Reena clients to interact with the community at large.
For Schwartz, a championship run for his men’s division truly sealed the deal on such a special day. “Winning this tournament after three years with the same core squad of childhood friends was more meaningful than I ever imagined,” he humbly admits.
The JSMHT is still accepting donations for this year and will open up registration for the 2015 tournament in the coming months. To donate and learn more about the JSMHT, visit the tourney online and follow it on Facebook, YouTube and Twitter.
If you participated in the JSMHT, let us know in the comments below or tweet us @ViewTheVibe.