A South Florida charter school company says that Miami Heat star Dwyane Wade has failed to live up to his end of the deal to promote education to at-risk youth, and this afternoon it formally ended its association with him.
The company, called Mavericks in Education and based in Fort Lauderdale, struck a partnership with Wade in 2007. Back then, Mavericks President and CEO Mark Thimmig was elated to land a superstar spokesman: "Kids related to him. Parents related to him. Even grandparents related to him! He was the biggest celebrity ever to be connected with the national high school dropout crisis."
Considering Florida's abominable high school graduation rate (around 50 percent), Wade struck school officials as the kind of glamorous figure whom young people would listen to. "We need to get these kids back in school," Thimmig says in his emphatic way. "We
need them to get high school diplomas! Sometimes they don't want to
accept that from educators or from parents. Dwyane Wade was supposed to
be the catalyst that brought them back and kept them there."
Over the past year, the company landed government contracts to run six schools in Florida, including three in Miami-Dade County. The schools are set to open this coming fall. They were supposed to be called Mavericks High, D. Wade's Schools.
Then Wade basically dropped off the face of the Earth.
"The
contract called for him to take an active part in promoting the schools
on a number of levels," Thimmig says. "At this point, he has not done
that." Wade has not been available for print ads or television
interviews to attract students. On top of that, Thimmig suggests the
baller has dodged pleas to reengage: "I haven't been able to reach
him. He knows we're here. We're not hiding."
Without
divulging exact numbers, Thimmig says that "thousands of hours and millions
of dollars have been invested" in getting the schools off the ground.
Thimmig waves off criticism that government dollars were being funneled
through the school into Wade's pockets; the dropout rate, he
says, is "a big problem that needs a big solution." The schools are
nonprofits, he explains, and would be justified in spending some
dollars on marketing and advertising their programs. Although, he
adds, "it would have been tremendous if he had offered to do it at no
charge." At this point, Thimmig says, he does not anticipate filing
litigation for breach of contract. "Our message is that we're moving
on."
Thimmig had little to say about Wade's wife's recent
allegations of cheating and passing around STDs ("Although," he said,
"if those allegations were true, they would not be in keeping with
strong family values."). Likewise, he was largely unconcerned about
Wade's restaurants going down the tubes or his wearing funny Band-Aids
on his face. The biggest bummer of all, Thimmig says, is that Wade could
have had a positive impact on the dropout rate. "It's a tragedy of
missed opportunity. Everybody gives up on these kids. We don't want to
be the ones who do."
The lone good note: Thimmig says the schools are hiring.
