Chris it's wonderful to have you on floor Talk thanks for joining me today thank you happy to be here what a thrill it's my first time you just rang the opening bell an exciting moment to be ringing the bell celebrating the 30th anniversary of the foundation I know know it was I mean I have been chair woman of this USDA foundation for about five years now it's really a great opportunity to give to these kids these underserved kids who don't normally have the opportunities we have a lot of after school programs we have 250 after school programs around the country and we had about 150,000 kids come through our program this year and it's it's basically after school it's basically all about combining tennis and education which is a powerful combination for an after school program to keep the kids safe to have they always have a safe haven to go to after school it's to provide the mentoring it's to provide life skills and you know I just I think it's needed idle time is not good time for kids so this is uh what we're trying to help now Chris you've been engaged with the USA foundation for many years what are you most proud of I think I'm proud of that the numbers are increasing each year you know we're getting to help more and more kids and um you know especially the adolescence it's a very tough tough age where you don't know what you want to do and you have a lot of free time and you have there are a lot of Temptations and there's social media and this gives the kids a direction this give the the kids are interested they're involved they're engaged in these after school programs and and again with the with the tutoring we we do teach them tennis as well because as we've known with Statistics playing tennis enhances your life span 10 years years which I don't know if you knew that or not but um we do teach them tennis and we just give them the tools to you know figure out the challenges and and um the problems that they may face later on in life so I like the mentoring part of it if you're ask me to narrow it down to one thing I like the mentoring part of it because I think we're lacking in mentorship and and these these kids are getting it why is it so important to you to make tennis accessible to today's youth I was brought up in the public park system you know I wasn't brought up in country clubs I wasn't you know we didn't have a lot of money growing up and my dad was a teaching pro and he gave us that opportunity to go to the public parks and it's really interesting because one day I asked him after I was ranked number one in the world he taught all five of our kids in our family and I asked him why did you teach us tennis why did you want us to be involved in tennis and instead of oh I wanted you to see the world or you know make a good living or he said said to keep you kids off the streets it was a very blunt answer and I didn't like it at that time but as I became a parent and I had kids I realized that idle time is not good time and you've got to keep your kids engaged after school so that's why we're trying to to buffer these programs with the mentorship and with teaching skills and with life lessons and you know we're trying to give them a safe place to go to Chris you are a six-time US Open Champion Serena Williams has also tied that um but how do you view the Legacy you've left at the US Open well first of all I always got fired up and motivated and inspired because it was the American crowd you know the New York crowd that really helps spur on American players if I were to look at my legacy now and and I were to say one thing I'm most proud of it's bringing young girls into the sport because at the time in the early 70s it wasn't um really the in thing to do to become a woman athlete it wasn't when girls were dreamt about being models or actresses or but not an athlete where you sweat on the court and you have to be tough and you have to have muscles and you have to you know that just wasn't the end thing at the time so I think when I came along at 15 and 16 I think young girls saw that hey this isn't this isn't bad and you know she's wearing earrings and you know she's she still has nail polish on and and you can be feminine and you can be a tough athlete and you can be a competitor and I think so bringing along other young teenagers I think that is what I'm most proud of well an amazing Legacy that you have Chris it's been wonderful to talk with you thanks for joining on floor talk today thank you it was a thrill thank you very much