Cedar Rapids native Dedric Ward hosts 17th annual football camp

CEDAR RAPIDS — Standing at the center of the Metro Youth football fields in Cedar Rapids on Saturday afternoon, Dedric Ward looked around.

He was back to doing what he loved.

The Cedar Rapids native and former NFL star hosted his 17th annual Dedric Ward Football Camp on Friday and Saturday. Ward played first at Northern Iowa, where he was inducted into the school's athletics Hall of Fame. He then played in the NFL for seven seasons, playing for the New York Jets, the Miami Dolphins and the New England Patriots (where he earned a Super Bowl ring for the 2003 season), among other teams.

The free camp, open for kids in fourth to ninth grade, is Ward's way of giving back to the community that gave him his start.

'A lot of people have been a part of my life throughout (my football career), and giving back was always something I was always interested in doing,' Ward said. 'What better ways other than having a camp, something I've done and been through a system of doing this. Giving back to my community was always something that's been important to me.'

Ward splits up the nearly 150 kids into two age groups, and then runs them through a number of drills and activities. They focus on offensive and defensive fundamentals, conditioning drills and even split up into teams to play 7-on-7 games. Ward said it really just depends on how the kids are responding to the activities when he decides how to structure his camp.

He's had to adapt his camp over the years, too. It started out as a five-day camp. But due to scheduling conflicts, among other things, Ward shortened his camp. Now, he thinks it's much more effective for the kids, and easier for the coaches, too.

Those coaches, he said, are what really makes the camp run smoothly. Ward invites many of his former teammates to coach, including former NFL players Kevin Williams, Leon Johnson and UNI Hall of Fame member Andre Allen.

'It's fun that those guys are able to donate their time to come here,' Ward said. 'Cedar Rapids isn't obviously a huge metropolitan area that a lot of stuff or activity is going on, but they've come back here year after year to donate their time to me and these kids. It's pretty special when you have that and understand how important it is to my success, to what I'm trying to do, and to have other people see that vision as well as I do. Hopefully that'll continue.'

And while his camp is a football camp, Ward said that isn't the main focus. He isn't trying to groom these kids to become incredible athletes or football players.

Instead, his focus is a little bit bigger.

'It's football, and we're going to have fun doing some football drills, but it's more about life,' Ward said. 'It's more about understanding how the sport of football parallels to their life as far as hard work, teamwork, and being in a setting where you have to see the highs and lows of everyday life. I want them to understand that it's fun, but there's also some hard work in conjunction of that.'

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