Bar mitzvah project a home run for this Kendall Park youth

By Lauren Matthew

May 23, 2008
 

When Adam Rothstein saw a need in his community, he decided to do whatever he could to make sure that need was met.

Rothstein, a Kendall Park resident and member of Anshe Emeth Memorial Temple in New Brunswick, made it his bar mitzvah project to collect and donate sports equipment to the New Brunswick Department of Recreation.

"[The community]'s right by my temple, so I knew I could see it happen," he explained. "I could also see, like, how much they were struggling."

But Rothstein didn't organize just a small equipment drive, and he didn't just put together a few boxes of used soccer balls and cart them over to the municipal complex. He collected more than 1,000 pieces of gently used equipment for donation.

"I'm really into sports, so I'm doing something I like to do," he said.

Rothstein put together a drive in South Brunswick, setting up donation boxes and putting up fliers and working with the South Brunswick Post and the Department of Recreation to get his message out. Rothstein said he also "emailed everyone" he knows to tell them about it and get them involved.

After four weeks of these efforts, he said, he went to collect the filled donation boxes.

For his work, Rothstein received the 2008 Alec Baker Memorial Award from the New Brunswick Knights of Columbus. The award was given as part of the Annual Community Awards Night last month which recognized individuals who help make New Brunswick a better place to live.

The receipt of the award was surprising, Rothstein said, and wonderful.

"I was very, very happy. I definitely didn't go into it thinking about that... when I found out I won an award, it was just amazing," he said.

Mike Blackwell, director of recreation in New Brunswick, noted that Rothstein is the youngest recipient of this award and said that this was the largest donation ever received by the division of recreation. Because of the donations, he said, the recreation department was able to take old and damaged equipment out of circulation in favor of newer equipment in better shape.

"When the New Brunswick Recreation Department came to my house with a big truck to pick up the equipment, they couldn't believe how it filled our living room," Rothstein said during his acceptance speech. "As they drove away with a full truck, I had a tingling feeling inside and I felt like I was on top of the world because I knew that kids who had no equipment would now have some."