Joseph Claunch, a member of the Puyallup Tribe in Tacoma, Washington, was 23 years old when he met some Zuni kids at a football camp at the University of New Mexico. He recognized himself in them. “Meeting those kids really helped plant the seeds to give back to tribal communities and to work directly with kids to provide them opportunities to have a better life.”
So Claunch moved to Zuni, a Pueblo nation in New Mexico, in 2010 to become a teacher and coach. He soon recognized there were challenges he wasn’t helping his students to overcome. So he left in 2012 to get his PhD in sport and exercise psychology with a focus on youth development and motivation. He returned to Zuni in 2016 as co-director of the Zuni Youth Enrichment Project (ZYEP) with its founder, pediatrician Tom Faber, MD. ZYEP envisions a Zuni community where every child is able to reach his or her full potential and provides activities, primarily through sports leagues, summer camps, and mentorship, to build self-esteem. The organization was just beginning to develop a concept for a park that expands the definition of health.
