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Helping south-metro kids take a timeout

A Burnsville woman is the driving force behind a group of parents who want to prevent the over-scheduling of children.

By Molly Kentala, Staff Writer

Andrea Grazzini Walstrom is quick to say she is a former jock. The third of four children, she began playing soccer and hockey at young age. But her parents never forced her to join a team. The drive came from within.

Allowing children to develop their own love of the game is a driving principle behind Balance4Success, Grazzini Walstrom's grass-roots organization that is promoting Sundays as a day free of organized youth sports.

Her Taking Back Sundays campaign promotes Sundays as a day for rest and family time in the communities served by the Rosemount-Apple Valley-Eagan School District. Parents can sign a petition to boycott all sports activities that day, at www.balanceforsuccess.org.

"My dad brought me to soccer registration, but I signed up and I found the team," the Burnsville mother said.

She remembered walking to the nearest baseball diamond, soccer ball in hand, and kicking her ball into the backstop for hours on end.

"It was about the sheer love of the sport," Grazzini Walstrom said. "Nobody told me to go up there. Nobody was applauding me. It was the feeling of doing it all by myself and being successful in my own right."

She encourages families in District 196 to replace busyness with balance, to shy away from overscheduling children and engage in more together time.

"I really marvel at her as a woman, mother, friend and wife," said Terrie Pearson, a parent leader for Balance4Success. "She tries to live the balance that we're talking about."

Grazzini Walstrom says coaches demand ever higher commitment levels from their players, scheduling evening practices and weekend tournaments that take away from time with family or friends.

"My daughter Lucia just loves to play - build forts, dig in the garden, try to climb a tree," Grazzini Walstrom said. "More and more, her friends are less available. They'll be at hockey practice or running off to gymnastics."

A hospital stay prompts a reevaluation

Grazzini Walstrom, a freelance writer, grew up on Lake Alimagnet in Burnsville. She attended Apple Valley High School and went on to the University of St. Thomas in pursuit of a business degree. She did not graduate, but became involved in a family tile and marble business, Grazzini Brothers & Company.

At age 29, she cofounded PeopleNet Communications Corporation. The company uses Global Positioning Systems and wireless technologies to track commercial vehicles, she said.

"She has a good business sense in strategizing, but also the ability to understand how people work," said neighbor Dee Maurer, who is also a member of Balance4Success. "She's really good at listening to a bunch of different opinions and coagulating them, finding that nugget of commonality."

A few years before she turned 40, her son, Weston, was born three months premature. After a stay in the hospital, he was quarantined at home for six months due to his fragile immune system, she said. It caused Grazzini Walstrom to reevaluate her priorities, particularly in work. That's when she started writing, she said.

Along with her career change, she looked at her values and how she could apply those to her new job. Grazzini Walstrom wanted to address kids' issues, so she began writing on the topic.

"Especially in a school district like this that's very sports oriented, you need someone who will keep everybody's values in line. Andrea has done that," said Karen Kellar, a family services manager for District 196's Early Childhood Family Education. Kellar also serves as a community leader for Balance4Success.

Group's popularity growing

Grazzini Walstrom's work generates many phone calls and e-mails each week from parents and coaches. She said she has had school districts from around Minnesota contact her about starting their own Balance4Success groups.

Bill Doherty, a professor of Family Social Science at the University of Minnesota, said Grazzini Walstrom has "passion and commitment for her own family. She realizes that she's raising her children in a larger community that will have a big impact on them. One of the best ways to help her own children is to make the community better."

She first contacted Doherty a couple of years ago for help in starting up the initiative, he said. The result has snowballed and Balance4Success is growing by the day.

"We really support sports and organized sports, but so much of it is organized now," Grazzini Walstrom said. "We want kids to realize they're good at [sports] themselves without somebody saying they should be a fullback or a left wing."

Molly Kentala - 612-673-7616