Hispanic Heritage Leadership Award

Published: September 24, 2013

Luis Navarro, UW Bothell MBA Alum ‘05 is the recipient of the 2013 NFL Hispanic Heritage Leadership Award. The Seattle Seahawks present Navarro with the award prior to the game on Sunday, September 22, 2013. He was nominated for his work with One League for Everyone (OLE), a program that helps low income children play soccer.

Navarro, Director of the Port of Seattle’s Office of Social Responsibility, says OLE is much more than a soccer program. “It is an amazing non-profit founded by school teachers and other kindhearted people in Redmond.” He says the mission goes beyond helping the kids on the east side play sports. “Children are required to keep good grades and their parents get involved and come out to the games and practices. Most of these parents are farm workers who live on the edges of Redmond and are non-English speakers.”

Navarro says he believes the OLE model can be exported to other school districts and across the country.

He says his UW Bothell experience contributed to his ability to make an impact in the community, “The MBA program helped me to improve my skills related to working in groups, listening and accepting different opinions and points of views, and I developed excellent planning and project management skills.” Navarro added, “These skills not only apply to business projects, but also I am also able to apply these skills in my community activities, as in the case of my work with One League with Everyone.”