April 2017

THE quarTErly MaGaZINE OF STrEETFOOTBallWOrlD GOOD4FOOTBall

www.streetfootballworld.org

IN FOCuS

SOCCEr FOr GOODaTlaNTa 2017 Global leaders gather for historic meeting p. 22

lEVEllING THE PlayING FIElD

Kimleang’s story: From shy to mighty

p. 48

NETWOrK MEMBErS’ STOrIES

SPOTlIGHT

FaTuMa aBDulKaDIr

aDaN“I feel like every day should be

International Women’s Day.”p. 6

FOOTBall3 FOr rESPECT

NEW PrOJECT lauNCHED TO FOSTEr SOCIal COHESION IN EurOPE p. 28

IN-DEPTH INTErVIEW

FOOTBall FOr GOOD & PHOTOGraPHyLooking at football for good through the lens of streetfootballworld photographer Dana Rösiger p. 62

aBOuT THIS ISSuE

FOOTBall FOr GOOD & FEMalE EMPOWErMENTOne in three women in Latin America has experienced gender-based violence. In rural northern Kenya female genital mutilation ranks at 100%. Religious courts in Lebanon rule that a rapist can escape punishment by marrying his victim. All across the globe, many girls and women are a world away from gender equality. Together with our partners and network members, we at streetfootballworld have assumed our responsibility of getting the football rolling towards – and into – the fifth U.N. Sustainable Development Goal.

This issue is dedicated particularly to the wonderful women of our network who are both beneficiaries and agents of change. Read their stories about becoming a “Mighty Girl” in Cambodia, bringing girls out of the home and onto the pitch in Latin America, using beauty for good in the DRC or how a “girl from the Kenyan bush” joined the global football for good movement after only kicking a football for first time at the age of 25.

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INTHIS

ISSuE

DaNa röSIGErFootball for good and photography

WOMEN IN WarTIME uKThe forgotten story of the rise of women’s football during World War I

IN FOCuS

FaTuMaaBDulKaDIr aDaNTalks about her hopes for her country, the network, football for good and how she got to where she is today.

NETWOrK MEMBErS’ STOrIES

IN-DEPTH INTErVIEW

MEET Our NEW NETWOrK MEMBErS

FOOTBall FOr GOOD IN HISTOry

0662

SOuTH BrONX uNITEDUnited States

20

CaNaDa SCOrESCanada

14

TraINING4CHaNGESSouth Africa

16

JaMBO BuKOBaTanzania

18

EurOPEKicking off football3 for respect

28

laTIN aMErICaDiscover how football for good is changing the game in Latin America

42

KIMlEaNG’S STOry:From Shy to Mighty

48

60

MIDDlE EaSTInternational Women’s day tournament by ANERA in Lebanon

38

DaVID OSOrIOPerseverance, commitment and self-confidence

54

TaBlE OF CONTENTS

EaST aFrICa MEETING 2017Network members from the region gather in Addis Ababa

72COMING SOON

NOrTH aMErICaSoccer for Good, Atlanta 2017

22

aFrICaNoella Coursaris: Not just a pretty face

34

SPOTlIGHT

54

FaTuMa aBDulKaDIr aDaN

SPOTlIGHTfatuma abDulKaDiR aDan

rECIPIENT OF THE STuTTGarT PEaCE PrIZE, laWyEr, WOMEN’S rIGHTS aCTIVIST, PEaCE aMBaSSaDOr, FOuNDEr OF HODI aND STrEETFOOTBallWOrlD BOarD MEMBEr – FaTuMa HaS a BrEaTH-TaKING CV. IN all HEr WOrK, THE NaTIVE KENyaN IS DrIVEN By a PaSSION FOr FOOTBall.

Before Fatuma Abdulkadir Adan had even heard that a global football for good movement was underway, she used the power of the game to affect change in conflict-torn rural Kenya.

We meet Fatuma in New York shortly after International Women’s Day and on another day worthy of celebration. She emerges from the United Nations Headquarters with an even broader smile than usual: Fatuma has just been nominated to become part of the SDG5 Dream Team of the Global Goals World Cup, catching her completely unawares. She was attending the 61st session of the Commission on the Status of Women from 13th to 24th March and wasn’t even informed that a nomination ceremony was on the agenda. When her picture suddenly appeared on the big screen, she could not contain her surprise. She collected herself to talk on stage about her work in the defence of girls in her home country Kenya: “We play football to break the silence. Through football we created a forum for girls to talk about FGM.” The nomination to become one of the team players for SGD5 is recognition of a life dedicated to others.

We sit down with Fatuma to learn more about her hopes for her country, the network, football for good and how she got to where she is today. This is her remarkable story.

WE TalK WITH

76

We sit down with Fatuma to learn more about her hopes for her country, the network, football for good and how she got to where she is today. This is her remarkable story.

FaTuMa aBDulKaDIr aDaN DIDN’T KICK a FOOTBall uNTIl SHE WaS 25 yEarS OlD. FrOM THEN ON, THE BEauTIFul GaME WOulD HElP HEr TO KICK STarT SOCIal CHaNGE. Fatuma Abdulkadir Adan is founder and executive director of the Horn of Africa Development Initiative (HODI) based in Marsabit, northern Kenya. Her tireless efforts to bring peace to her home community, advocate for education and equal opportunities for girls and young women have earned her numerous awards like the Stuttgart Peace Prize in 2011 and invitations to speak at world renowned institutions like the United Nations.

She joined the streetfootballworld network with HODI in 2011. But that wasn’t enough for the hard-headed and ambitious woman whose energy knows no bounds. Four years later, she became the first African woman to be elected as a member of the streetfootballworld Network Board. She has just embarked on her second term for another two years on the board.

Fatuma Abdulkadir Adan didn’t kick a football until she was 25 years old. In Marsabit, a dusty outpost engulfed by the vast desert of northern Kenya, girls just didn’t play football. One day, the beautiful game would help her to kick start social change.

“My Kenya is a Kenya with no tarmac road, no proper schools, the hospitals are not well equipped…This year we finally got the tarmac. But did we have to wait 54 years is the question I always ask,” Fatuma says and laughs. It is also a Kenya where the rate of female genital mutilation still ranks at 100%. Fatuma’s part of the country is a far cry from the bustling concrete jungle that is Nairobi. She grew up at the epicentre of a tribal war between Borana, Gabra and Rendille ethnic groups. As the daughter of a Gabra woman and a Borana man, Fatuma was caught between conflicting sides, unable to see “the other” as an

enemy. When a massacre erupted in 2005 killing members of all groups and almost 100 children at a school, Fatuma was working as a lawyer in the country’s capital. She had battled adversity to succeed, but this horrific event lead her to rethink her goals: “I felt like the legal practice is good but it was empty in itself. It wasn’t solving the big problems. It was one-on-one cases and we had these tribes fighting and it was more of gun violence, more of people being killed every day and arranged cases.”

It was time to make the arduous three-day journey back to her home town of Marsabit. Beyond the courts and the killing fields, village elders “arranged” cases by ordering the payment of 100 cows to compensate the family of a killed man: “Half the price if it’s a woman,” says Fatuma shaking her head, “so it makes it cheaper to kill more women!” After failing to be heard at an elders’ meeting, the young lawyer decided to rally the women. This proved no easier feat: “What I didn’t know was that the women were not ready. They were the ones who were actually pushing for the fighting, they were the ones cooking for the men who were out in the bush with the guns, they were the ones singing for them,” Fatuma remembers. Instead of talking, the women were shouting. Abuse was hurled, so were shoes and chairs. Disheartened but not ready to give up, Fatuma arranged a second meeting. This time with a slightly different approach: “I took a chair, I sat in the middle and I said: ‘Don’t talk to each other, just talk to me.’” After listening to their combined stories of suffering through conflict, Fatuma asked them: “What can we do together, one common thing?” When the only response was deathly silence, she suggested performing a traditional massage: “So sitting across from each other a Borana woman was massaging a Gabra woman, a Rendille woman was massaging a Borana woman and they all broke down. That sealed it for them and they said: ‘Oh we’re ready now, we will make a joint statement.’” They marched to the District Commissioner’s Office waving a memo opposing the war and refuting their right to be avenged.

It was a large step in the direction of change, but not the end of the road. Marionettes to the elders, young boys were still fighting, shedding their blood in village raids. Fatuma’s work was only just beginning. And this time, football would come into play.

SPOTlIGHTfatuma abDulKaDiR aDan

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“

“

“I DIDN’T EVEN HaVE a rEal SOCCEr Ball, SO WE JuST COllECTED TraSH. ONE OF My BrOTHErS HElPED ME MaKE a Ball.”

It was Fatuma’s father who instilled the passion of football within her, traversing accepted gender roles and taking her to matches. She watched from the side lines, observing the players closely and learning by studying their moves. But she still hadn’t actually tried any of them out herself when she set off to lure the young warriors away from the battle fields and onto the pitch. “I didn’t even have a real soccer ball, so we just collected trash. One of my brothers helped me make a ball. He made a big ball because he said: ‘You’re going to make the big boys play, so it can’t be like this small, tiny ball!’” With it they strode off to the pitch and Fatuma boldly asked: “Can we play a joint game?” After 30 minutes of arguing, the boys finally agreed: “We are going to teach her how to play.” It was the first time Fatuma kicked a ball. It may only have been a football made out of rubbish, but it was enough. For the time being. When, at the end of the match, the young men asked her: “Why are we here?” Fatuma responded: “Let’s shoot to score instead of shooting to kill.” The seed was sown for one of HODI’s later projects that aimed to “replace bullets with footballs.”

The Horn of Africa Development Initiative was established in 2003 to foster peace, but also to provide legal aid to the people of Marsabit who lacked the funds for a lawyer. Until the conflict subsided, the main focus of the organisation’s work was on the young warriors themselves. Only when it became safe enough to enter the villages and engage with the girls, did Fatuma and her staff address another issue close to her community and her heart: Gender Equality.

From her own school days, Fatuma remembers large numbers of girls dropping out to be married. “I was in a girls’ school and we had 56 girls in my class. I was in grade 7 and as I transitioned to grade 8, we were only 17 and for everyone else it was ok and I was like: ‘It cannot be ok!’” Luckily, her own parents saw the importance of education for all of their children and her father promised not to force her into marriage. This supportive background allowed her to voice opinions others didn’t even feel they had a voice to express. She proceeded

to do so with a passion, prompting her father to throw caution to the wind: “You can win all your arguments, but that is not the reality out there, so you have to be prepared at times that something can belong to you and you know it’s yours by right, but someone else can take it away and then you have to learn how to stand up for yourself, defend it and fight to get it back.” To do so, she felt that law was the right medium.

“yOu CaN’T MISS a ClaSS, yOu CaN’T MISS a Day OF SCHOOl EVEN IF yOu’rE SICK, yOu GO TO HOSPITal aND GO BaCK TO SCHOOl, NOT BaCK HOME.”

At HODI, Fatuma began treading a different path: to tackle girls’ and womens’ issues before they made it to the courts. She and her colleagues began working with local schools, asking them to nominate girls to take part in a football programme. The simple act of having to shout for a teammate to pass the ball taught the girls to express themselves and stand up for their rights. But then the entire team was kidnapped for marriage.

BrEaKING THE SIlENCE PrOGraMME: “BE yOurSElF, BE HEalTHy, BE EMPOWErED aND KNOW SOMETHING aBOuT MONEy. SO NO ONE WIll CHEaT yOu a THOuSaND SHIllINGS!”

It took Fatuma two years to build up the courage to start again. She thought: “Maybe just working with the schools alone was not enough, so engage the parents, bring the fathers on board, have sessions with the mothers to engage the girls in a different way.” She also made the girls see that rights come with responsibilities: “You can’t miss a class, you can’t miss a day of school even if you’re sick, you go to hospital and go back to school, not back home. We’re able to monitor that through the class teachers and now it has become almost a culture in every school. I don’t want a single girl missing one lesson because one lesson is one too many.”

HODI has since established a programme called “Breaking the silence”, which consists of four modules: “Be yourself, be healthy, be

empowered and know something about money. So no one will cheat you a thousand shillings!” Fatuma laughs.

When she recently visited one of the local schools to assess the direct impact of HODI’s projects, she asked the teachers if the work was worth continuing with. “Fatuma, for three years not a single girl has dropped out of the entire school,” came the response: “No one will allow you to stop it.”

Though the situation in Marsabit has already vastly improved, Fatuma states that there is still much left to do. Her responsibilities, however, have shifted in recent years: “I have handed over the baton to the next generation to take it forward. So my role now is more networking and resource mobilisation and I don’t do the actual day to day work now. But, for me, that is also growth and letting the younger women take leadership.” Since being introduced to the world of football for good by fellow streetfootballworld network member Espérance (Rwanda) and a mutual contact at the German GIZ, she realised that she could use her expertise to affect change on a global scale.

SPOTlIGHTfatuma abDulKaDiR aDan

“1110

“I FElT STrONGly, IT’S NOT ENOuGH THaT WE Say WE WOrK WITH TWO MIllION yOuNG PEOPlE aND THEy DON’T SIT aT THE TaBlE aND My PuSH THEN WaS TO HaVE a yOuTH COuNCIl.”

Only a year after joining the streetfootballworld network with her own organisation, she took aim for her next goal: to become a member of the Network Board. Her first application failed. “I was carrying a baby who was six months old, breast feeding, going out to change diapers. I was in and out of the whole meeting. I didn’t feel bad, I was good,” she remembers. Two years later she

reapplied and was accepted. “I was elected in Brazil and I even felt much better than on the day I was admitted to the bar, which was just like I’m this lawyer but now I’m this champion who champions football for good. This accomplishment was way bigger,” Fatuma smiles. Her first term was dedicated to engaging the young people of the network: “I felt strongly it’s not enough that we say we work with two million young people and they don’t sit at the table and my push then was to have a youth council. A youth council that is elected by young leaders themselves and when we get to a meeting as board members then there should be the youth council meeting alongside the board of adults and

SPOTlIGHTfatuma abDulKaDiR aDan

that youth council should then inform and be the driving force for the network.”

For her second term as part of the streetfootballworld Network Board, one of her main roles will be to focus on gender equality. “Literally, three quarters of me is about gender equality!” she says laughing, “I feel so strongly about it and I feel we haven’t done enough.”

“I FEEl lIKE EVEry Day SHOulD BE INTErNaTIONal WOMEN’S Day.”

She intends to expand upon the foundation already laid by streetfootballworld and

translate the policies on gender equality into reality on the ground. When she spoke to FOOTBALL4GOOD Magazine just after International Women’s Day she was eager to start work and took stock of the current status of women’s rights: “Personally, I feel like every day should be International Women’s Day.” According to Fatuma, there is a lot to already celebrate and she wishes to send a message of hope to the young girls in the network: “Look at me! I’m just a normal girl from the bush and I’m sitting here, sitting on a board serving 125 organisations, reaching two million children. There is nothing impossible, you just have to believe in yourself, follow your heart and follow your dreams. It’s possible.”

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POETry IN MOTION:

CaNaDa SCOrES COMBINES SOCCEr WITH rEaDING, WrITING aND POETry

The beautiful game is at the core of Canada SCORES’ after-school programme. The majority of contact with the students is on the football pitch learning life skills, teamwork, sportsmanship during the training sessions twice a week and during game days where, once a week, Canada SCORES uses football as a community organising tool to bring together a diverse group of youth and inspire them to lead healthy lives, to be engaged students and have confidence on and off the field. Football runs all year with added poetry in the autumn and community service projects in the spring. The programme takes place throughout the academic year with specialised camps during the summer. Canada SCORES has an

interesting programme model, for it operates as a separate entity from the school system but has access to the school’s resources (social workers, teachers, infrastructure).

Canada SCORES currently reaches 200 students per annum and plans to expand to 500 in the next few years. The participants are aged 8-12, 60% of this group is male. They are the most at-risk youth in the respective schools. School administrations refer these students to the programme based on their risk of exclusion, failure to complete high school, practice of unhealthy habits, and criminal behaviour.

CaNaDa SCOrESNEW NETWOrK MEMBEr FrOM CaNaDa

MEET Our NEW NETWOrK MEMBErSCANADA SCORES

MEET CaNaDa SCOrES Vancouver, Canada

POETry IN MOTION: CaNaDa SCOrES COMBINES SOCCEr WITH rEaDING, WrITING aND POETry

Canada SCORES, an affiliate of streetfootballworld network member America SCORES, is a non-profit organisation that combines football, the art of poetry, and community service to empower young people to find their voice, achieve their goals, and

reach their full potential. Founded in January 2014, the programme is designed to help children from at-risk backgrounds, focussing on immigrants from war-torn countries.

Canada SCORES uses the same programme methodology as America SCORES, which has been implemented in school districts across the United States for the last 20 years. The organisation provides a unique after-school experience which includes two classroom days, two days on the field, and one game day. Canada SCORES primarily uses football as an integration tool and a way for participants to feel part of a team.

CaNaDa SCOrES CurrENTly rEaCHES 200 STuDENTS PEr aNNuM aND PlaNS TO EXPaND TO 500 IN THE NEXT FEW yEarS.

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MEET Our NEW NETWOrK MEMBErStRaininG4CHanGES

NEW NETWOrK MEMBEr FrOM SOuTH aFrICa

TraINING4CHaNGES uSES THE 5-a-SIDE VErSION OF FOOTBall TO FOSTEr SOCIal INCluSION, EDuCaTIONal SuPPOrT aND EMPlOyaBIlITy.

TraINING4CHaNGES training4changeS was founded in 2013 by Daniel Thomae and operates in Stellenbosch, Western Cape, South Africa. The organisation uses sport as a catalyst for holistic community transformation and to provide young leaders with essential life skills and values. training4changeS envisions a generation of leaders equipped to sustain change. It blends futsal coaching with life skills teaching, educational support, and employability skills training, focussing on at-risk youth in low income communities.

training4changeS uses three core initiatives to do so: the school futsal initiative; the Skills4Life employability initiative; and coaching education.

THE SCHOOl FuTSal INITIaTIVE

An after school initiative engaging young learners directly, with a blend of futsal coaching, life skills teaching, and academic support. Coaching sessions focus on the holistic development of each participant. In addition, a weekly match day involving all participants fosters social inclusion by creating space on and off the playing field for relationship building between racially divided communities.

SKIllS4lIFE EMPlOyaBIlITy INITIaTIVE

A unique initiative equipping at-risk young women and men with essential skills necessary for getting, keeping, and doing well in jobs. Skills4Life provides unemployed youth with a mixture of futsal coaching education, mentoring, and transferable skills training. It is designed to build deep transformational relationships with a small number of people, encouraging participants to step up and be the change they want to see in their communities. As a jumpstart on a pathway to permanent employment, participants are employed on a part-time basis to facilitate the above-mentioned School Futsal Initiative.

COaCHING EDuCaTIONtraining4changeS delivers high-level futsal coaching certification that also focuses on using sport for social impact. The organisation believes that a coach has an important role to play in the holistic development of an athlete, and empowers coaches to use futsal as a building block for a brighter future. All coaches are encouraged to live as positive role models and mentors who help athletes understand their true identity and realize their full potential on and off the field. The initiative also serves as an income-generating activity for the organisation.

MEET TraINING4CHaNGES Stellenbosch, South Africa

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JaMBO BuKOBaNEW NETWOrK MEMBEr FrOM TaNZaNIa

JaMBO BuKOBa E.V. IS a rEGISTErED NON-PrOFIT OrGaNISaTION BaSED IN MuNICH, GErMaNy, CurrENTly WITH MOrE THaN 300 MEMBErS. Since 2008 Jambo Bukoba has been working together with its registered subsidiary association in Tanzania to promote better education, health and gender equality by utilising the power of sports.

Jambo Bukoba combines sports and games as part of the school curriculum with experience-based learning and HIV/AIDS education. It involves girls and boys equally, integrates all relevant social sectors (such as teachers, parents and the community), increases the expertise of teachers and improves the infrastructure of schools.

Its vision is to give children, youth and especially girls a fair chance to fulfil their desire for a good future in Tanzania. Jambo Bukoba’s mission is to use sports to bring stakeholders like teachers, children, companies and institutions together to cooperate for quality education, better health and gender equality.

Jambo Bukoba’s programmes focus on education, health, youth leadership, the strengthening of education systems and on the capacity development of teachers and primary school children. The organisation has developed a teachers’ training manual that informs them how to deliver high quality physical education where none existed before. In these workshops, variations of fair play football - including football3 - are taught to impart

a number of social messages. Primary school children are the beneficiaries of the sport games and life skills workshops, and they also participate in sports tournaments.

Jambo Bukoba has introduced the concept at 717 schools in the Kagera region. A total of 482,000 children have been reached so far. Another of our accomplishments is that teachers have seen much higher rates of attendance and that average grades have improved significantly.

Jambo Bukoba has trained 1317 Tanzanian teachers how to use sport, games and discussions to teach their pupils about HIV/AIDS and help girls, in particular, to protect themselves better.

In what are known as “Bonanzas”, Jambo Bukoba encourages social cohesion and the self-esteem of girls and boys equally. In these Bonanzas, various school classes compete against one another in sports tournaments. The winning school receives a prize which is used for renovation work or to buy school materials.

“Bonanzas” are are specially designed to encourage children’s strengths and treat everyone equally.

To ensure that children have a real chance at education, in 2012 Jambo Bukoba began supporting needy schools by renovating classrooms, purchasing school furniture and constructing toilets.

The prerequisite for this support is that the school, the parents and teachers must contribute 25% in the form of active work or with the supply of construction material.

MEET Our NEW NETWOrK MEMBErSJambO buKOba

MEET JaMBO BuKOBa Kagera, Tanzania

TO DaTE JaMBO BuKOBa HaVE TraINED 1317 TaNZaNIaN TEaCHErS HOW TO uSE SPOrT, GaMES aND DISCuSSION TO TEaCH THEIr PuPIlS aBOuT HIV/aIDS, rEaCHING a TOTal OF 482,000 CHIlDrEN.

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SOuTH BrONX uNITED aIMS TO MaKE a DIFFErENCE IN THE lOCal COMMuNITy By ENGaGING aT-rISK aND IMMIGraNT yOuTH THrOuGH THEIr PaSSION FOr SOCCEr.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the South Bronx is one of the poorest districts in the USA. It also has hunger and obesity rates among the highest in the country. Together, the school districts perform the lowest in the state. At the same time, the borough of The Bronx, and the South Bronx in particular, have the fastest growing immigrant population in the city.

In 2009, South Bronx United started as a volunteer organization with one football team and has grown to serve thousands of kids in

the New York City area. SBU runs programmes twelve months a year, including a recreational soccer programme, an SBU academy, an immigrant programme for teens, and a health/wellness after-school programme.

South Bronx United (SBU) was born out of the idea that community youth needed an engaging programme to connect to and keep them off the streets, and that youth passionate about soccer should have a programme in which to develop. SBU has grown in response to the needs of the community, the challenges facing youth, and the synergy between soccer, education, mentoring, and support services. In 2015, the organization reached over 800 boys and girls through diverse programming on and off the field.

South Bronx United (SBU) promotes educational achievement, health and wellness, and character development through activities both

IN 2016 100% OF SOuTH BrONX uNITED’S aCaDEMy ClaSS GraDuaTED FrOM HIGH SCHOOl. IN COMParISON: ONly 55% OF SOuTH BrONX HIGH SCHOOl STuDENTS GENErally rECEIVE THEIr STaTE rEGENTS DIPlOMa IN SIX yEarS.

SOuTH BrONX uNITEDNEW NETWOrK MEMBEr FrOM uSa

on and off the football pitch. SBU works primarily with the immigrant population living in the Bronx, one of the five boroughs of New York City and the nation’s poorest congressional district. The organisation provides a college pathway for struggling youth, combining competitive and recreational soccer with academic enrichment, college preparation, mentoring, leadership development, and support services.

Football is integrated in their curricula and programme structure on a variety of levels. One example of this is their use of the Healthy Hat-Trick. The Healthy Hat-Trick is a curriculum created by fellow streetfootballworld network member City in the Community Foundation, and used in after-school programmes across New York City. The curriculum teaches school children health and well-being. In SBU’s academy programme, football and academics are not as intertwined and sport is used as an incentive for their participants to meet their attendance requirements. In addition to these programmes, SBU offers legal support and a non-competitive

soccer league for the community.

In recent years, South Bronx United has served 1000 and more youth between the ages of 4 and 19. In 2016, 98% of all participants were from immigrant families, of these participants 72% were male. The majority of their target youth are at risk of gang violence, truancy and teen pregnancy.

99% of youth in the SBU Academy and 70% of all participants are from immigrant families. Last year, South Bronx United served young people born in 25 different countries, with families from 39 countries across 5 continents. After their own families, SBU is the strongest network that many have. Their mission is to build the next generation of leaders and scholars.

100% of the SBU Academy Class of 2016 graduated high school. In the past five years, every senior has gone on to graduate. In comparison, only 55% of South Bronx high school students generally get their state Regents diploma in six years.

MEET SOuTH BrONX uNITED New York, USA

MEET Our NEW NETWOrK MEMBErSSOUTH BRONX UNITED

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THE NOrTH aMErICa aND CarIBBEaN (NOCa) rEGION IS ONE OF HuGE POTENTIal FOr FOOTBall FOr GOOD. FOOTBall4GOOD MaGaZINE PaID a VISIT TO THE CENTrE OF THE aCTION.

The diverse and culturally rich city of Atlanta, Georgia, is quickly making a name for itself as one of the top football cities in the United States. The city’s new Major League Soccer franchise, Atlanta United, drew 55,000 passionate fans to their opening home game. The team set a league record for season ticket sales – all before a single ball had been kicked.

Alongside 30 dynamic community organisations, streetfootballworld harnessed Atlanta’s football-obsessed energy to stage one of the most internationally visible football for good events of 2017.

Four extensive items made for a packed agenda: a Community football3 Festival, a workshop examining citywide collaboration, streetfootballworld’s global Network Board meeting and a strategic planning workshop for the NOCA region.

SOCCEr FOr GOOD

aTlaNTa 2017

IN FOCuS: NOrTH aMErICaSOCCER FOR GOOD, ATLANTA 2017

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FOOTBall3 COMMuNITy FESTIVal

There is no better way to kick off a football-themed weekend than with a community festival. Soccer in the Streets, one of our founding network members and one of the oldest champions of football for good in the United States, hosted the community festival in a unique location. Station Soccer is the world’s first soccer field built on a subway station and creates a safe place to play for hundreds of Atlanta’s youth each week. As Kwaku Ntru, an 11-year-old from southwest Atlanta said: “It helps me in school because you just don’t go home and sit around - you know that you can come out here and play.”

While Atlanta’s football world is booming, there is another reality to the city that many visitors don’t see. Jill Robbins, from Soccer in the Streets, reflects: “We have our own set of problems. A lot of people imagine that the United States is shiny and pretty, but there are areas where people live in desperate poverty. Atlanta has one of the greatest income disparities in the nation, if not the highest.” Many of Atlanta’s youth experience extreme isolation from the mainstream American culture and exist in insular communities due to language, citizenship, and socio-economic barriers. The festival brought together 65 youth aged 5-14 from communities across Atlanta, giving these participants an opportunity to escape their challenges and play football. The community festival erased such labels, where participants who often feel marginalized, were given a place on the pitch.

A highlight of the festival was the exhibition game between the streetfootballworld Network Board, representatives from the NOCA region and local Atlanta youth. The match laid the foundation for the rest of the weekend by showcasing football for good’s belief that change comes from working with the local youth. After a close match (and a few sore muscles from the old-timer board and NOCA representatives), the group was able to have informal discussions and learn a bit more from one another.

aTlaNTa: rISING uNITED

After an exciting morning on the field, streetfootballworld kicked off ‘Atlanta: Rising United’, a workshop co-hosted by Soccer in the Streets and Laureus Sport for Good Foundation. The dynamic workshop brought local community-based organisations together with Atlanta United, Atlanta Public Schools and the streetfootballworld network members from across the USA.

The workshop was modeled after a hackathon, where individuals collaborate intensively to accomplish a goal, encouraging all participants to bring innovative solutions to local challenges. After hearing from local Atlanta youth about their challenges in the morning, the group spent the afternoon brainstorming solutions. Using Atlanta as a case study, the facilitators lead breakout sessions on the topics of sustainability, accessibility, inclusivity, and collectivity.

Pharlone Toussaint, a programme coordinator at Laureus Sport for Good Foundation reflects: “Every representative we met was very passionate and thoughtful about their presence here. It was very intentional and welcoming to the Atlanta Sport For Good network and we gained some valuable information and resources to use as we embark on our journey here.” Toussaint adds: “It’s vital to engage local stakeholders to participate in our global movement of sport for social change.” The hackathon translated into tangible outcomes, such as a new potential partnership between corporates, the next Station Soccer, and a new programme site for a local community-based sport project.

IN FOCuS: NOrTH aMErICaSOCCER FOR GOOD, ATLANTA 2017

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STrEETFOOTBallWOrlD NOrTH aMErICa aND THE CarIBBEaN

streetfootballworld hosted the first ever North America and Caribbean (NOCA) regional strategic meeting with 11 network members spanning the United States, St. Lucia and Haiti. We were fortunate enough to welcome Lindsey Whitford (Soccer Without Borders, USA), Lawrence Cann (Street Soccer USA, USA), Sean Hinkle (America SCORES, USA), James Louis-Charles (GOALS Haiti, Haiti), Tod Herskovitz (The Sanneh Foundation, USA/Haiti), Tony Sanneh (The Sanneh Foundation USA/Haiti), Heidi Warren (Starfinder Foundation, USA), Delroy Alexander (Sacred Sports Foundation, St Lucia), Darius Shirzadi (Project Goal, USA), Becca Johnson (Fugees Family, USA), Shell Ramirez (Soccer in the Streets, USA), Drew Chafetz (love.futbol, USA/Brazil) to the strategic meeting.

The objective of the meeting was to develop a regional strategy, a guiding principle for all fundraising, projects, and exchanges over the next three years. An exciting and challenging reality of the NOCA region is the contrast between social issues faced across the entirety of the region. The first part of the workshop centred on brainstorming these challenges and aligning the regional focus. While there are many similarities, the size and span of the network creates many areas of need. streetfootballworld sees the importance of bringing together organizations working in different communities all with the shared vision of changing the world through football. After several hours of workshops, mapping, and brainstorming, the NOCA region finalized a collective vision and collaborative actions over the next 3 years. With a focus on 1) inclusion 2) safe spaces to play 3) health 4) understandings of gender, NOCA members committed to yearly milestones to reach these ambitious goals.

Jill Robbins, a former board member and the NOCA representative from Soccer in the Streets, reflects: “When like-minded individuals get together, you can’t help but learn and find yourself reenergized. You feel like you’re not alone in your struggles and triumphs. More importantly, you find friends and you find family – knowing that these are people who are generous and dedicated. Events like these always help me feel recommitted to the long and arduous path we’ve chosen…changing the world, which isn’t a short-term prospect.”

After four days of collaboration, discussion, and play the streetfootballworld members returned to their respective communities with a newly ignited energy for change.

STrEETFOOTBallWOrlD NETWOrK BOarD

Simultaneously, the streetfootballworld network board hosted the largest conference of associates in its history.

The streetfootballworld Network Board has been in place since 2005 and consists of five streetfootballworld network member representatives, elected to the board every two years. After the elections, streetfootballworld holds a transitional board meeting when the previous board hands over leadership to the one succeeding it – which, in this case, is the board for 2017/2018, elected at the streetfootballworld General Assembly during festival16 in Lyon.

The Network Board is responsible for keeping streetfootballworld’s mission aligned with the missions and goals of a network spanning over 75 countries, as well as aiding the screening and approval of new additions to the network. One of the main achievements of the previous Network Board was the creation of the streetfootballworld Youth Council, elected at the Youth Forum during the Festival 16. The Council has given youth a voice on the Network Board for the first time.

The main objective of the meeting in Atlanta was to jointly define the role of the Network Board and the specific roles of the individual members in the upcoming term. Thanks to the enthusiastic cooperation of the previous board, who shared the learnings and challenges from the previous term and the commitment of the new board, the meeting was a great success. Fatuma Abdulkadir Adan, who is helping to facilitate the transition as she embarks on a second term, raised the question about changing mindsets: from “what can we get out of streetfootballworld” to “what can we do for streetfootballworld.”

After three days of workshops and discussions (and, of course, competitive football!), the agenda of the new board term was clear. The new Network Board has defined five social topics to which they will devote particular attention: Peace Building, Gender Equality, Youth Empowerment, Youth Employability and Social Inclusion. The new board will also focus on three internal processes: Sustainability strategies for the network, New business opportunities, Network development processes and growth.

On the third and last day of the meeting, the new board began taking up its newly defined responsibilities by approving four new members to join the streetfootballworld network (find out more on pages 14 to 21 of this magazine). We are humbled and excited to begin this journey with our new network board!

IN FOCuS: NOrTH aMErICaSOCCER FOR GOOD, ATLANTA 2017

THE NEW NETWOrK BOarD HaVE BEEN aSSIGNED rESPONSIBIlITIES aCCOrDING TO THEIr EXPErTISE aND WIll BuIlD ON THE alrEaDy laID FOuNDaTIONS WITH DEDICaTION, GrIT, aND INNOVaTIVE SOluTIONS.

FaTuMa aBDulKaDIrHorn of Africa Development Initiative (HODI), Kenya

lIMOr lEVIMifalot, Israel

PEaCEBuIlDING yOuTH EMPlOyaBIlITy

aNNE BIrOuSTE Football United, Australia

SOCIal INCluSION SuSTaINaBIlITy STraTEGIES FOr THE NETWOrK

ESTEBaN rEyESTiempo de Juego, Colombia

yOuTH EMPOWErMENTNEW BuSINESS OPPOrTuNITIES

GENDEr EqualITyNEW BuSINESS OPPOrTuNITIES

yIaNNy IOaNNOu Tackle Africa, UK

NEW BuSINESS OPPOrTuNITIESNETWOrK DEVElOPMENT GrOWTH aND qualITy SEal

STrEETFOOTBallWOrlD NETWOrK BOarD 2017/2018

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raCISM, VIOlENCE aND raDICalISM arE SOME OF MOST PrESSING CHallENGES FaCED By yOuTH all aCrOSS EurOPE. 13 STrEETFOOTBallWOrlD NETWOrK MEMBErS FrOM 11 EurOPEaN COuNTrIES HaVE uNITED TO TaCKlE THEM HEaD ON.

Together, they will expand the existing football3 toolkit and tailor it to fittingly address these issues. 500 coaches will be instructed how to implement training sessions with 50,000 young girls and boys. From 30th March – 1st April 2017 the partners met in Hungary to kick off the programme.

Over the last two decades streetfootballworld and its network members have developed a unique methodology that empowers young people with the skills they need to flourish off the pitch, combining a focus on fair play, equality and teamwork with discussion and reflection: football3.

Named after its ‘three halves’ – a pre-match discussion, football game and post-match discussion – football3 incorporates key life lessons into every match. In mixed-gender teams, players collectively decide on the rules before the game. Following the match, they reflect on their behaviour and that of their opponents, with points awarded for goals as well as for fair play. As football3 is played without referees, players must learn how to resolve conflicts themselves through dialogue and compromise.

FOOTBall3 FOr rESPECT

500 COaCHES WIll BE INSTruCTED HOW TO IMPlEMENT TraINING SESSIONS WITH 50,000 yOuNG GIrlS aND BOyS. FrOM 30TH MarCH – 1ST aPrIl 2017 THE ParTNErS MET IN HuNGary TO KICK OFF THE PrOGraMME.

NEW PROJECT LAUNCHED TO FOSTER SOCIAL COHESION IN EUROPE

IN FOCuS: EurOPEFOOTBALL3 FOR RESPECT

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THE FOOTBall3 FOr rESPECT PrOGraMME WIll aDaPT THE FOOTBall3 METHOD TO TaCKlE THE CHallENGES OF raCISM, VIOlENCE, aND raDICalISM FaCED By yOuTH aCrOSS EurOPE.

Since its origins in Medellín, Colombia, football3 has been further developed by streetfootballworld network members around the world into a comprehensive methodology to address a range of social topics, such as gender equality, peace building and health. A toolkit was created and launched in 2014 including a handbook that provides a step-by-step explanation of the methodology and a website featuring additional information, tools and videos providing an insight on how football3 can be used on the ground.

The football3 for respect programme will adapt the football3 method to tackle the challenges of racism, violence, and radicalism faced by youth across Europe, many of them migrants and refugees. They all must deal with the negative consequences on a daily basis, often finding themselves with fewer opportunities, which in turn makes them more susceptible to disaffection and withdrawal from society. In the long term, these individuals are also vulnerable to mental and physical health problems.

The cost is high - not only for the individuals themselves, but for European society as a whole. Compounding this challenge, in 2015 Europe faced the highest inflow of refugees since World War II, creating an additional group of young people with a high level of need.

With the support of Erasmus+ funding and in collaboration with 13 partners from 11 different European countries, the football3 for respect project aims to address these challenges. The partners involved are: Albion in the Community (United Kingdom), Balon Mondial (Italy), CAIS (Portugal), Fare Network (Europe), INEX (Czech Republic), MSIS (Poland), Oltalom Sport Association (Hungary), Red Deporte (Spain), RheinFlanke (Germany), Shumenski Universitet (Bulgaria), Sport4Life (United Kingdom), Sport Against Racism Ireland (Ireland), Sports dans la ville (France).

PrOJECT aPPrOaCH football3 for respect focuses on building local capacity and, in turn, equipping coaches with the skills to counter violence, intolerance, discrimination and radicalisation through their training sessions in grassroots sports projects.

The programme will also develop comprehensive tools that will allow progress to be measured every step of the way. Through football3 for respect, young sportspeople will become empowered as role models within their communities and impact the lives of others far beyond the parameters of the programme as multipliers of the methodology.

A significant gain from the project will also be the strengthening of relations between the participating network members, offering them opportunities for exchange and knowledge transfer.

As Saad Mohammed from Sport4Life UK comments: “This programme allows us to work with some amazing organisations from around Europe from whom we hope to learn a lot and with whom we can form long lasting relationships moving forward.”

DEVElOPING COMPrEHENSIVE TOOlS THaT WIll allOW PrOGrESS TO BE MEaSurED EVEry STEP OF THE Way.

aDaPTING THE FOOTBall3 METHODOlOGy TO TaCKlE THE CHallENGES OF raCISM, VIOlENCE aND raDICalISM IN EurOPE.

STrENGTHENING rElaTIONS BETWEEN THE ParTICIPaTING NETWOrK MEMBErS.

IN FOCuS: EurOPEFOOTBALL3 FOR RESPECT

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Over the course of a 24 month period, the project will create and disseminate a common multilingual Train-the-Trainers toolkit that will serve as the basis of Train-the-Trainers seminars, enabling coaches in each partner organisation to further expand and improve the implementation of football3. In these seminars at least 500 sport coaches will receive thorough instruction and, through them, around 50,000 young people across Europe will be reached.

The toolkit will contain modules offering a step-by-step approach to simplify the implementation of football3 and ensure its success. It will also act as a mutual framework that will enable the impact of programmes to be measured. At the end of the

project in December 2018, the 14 partners will be positioned as experts in the field and serve a so-called “knowledge hubs” of football3 for respect. To ensure free access, the toolkit will be available online, on paper and in practice.

The programme was launched at a kick-off meeting in Budapest and Gödöllő, Hungary, from 30th March to 1st April hosted by network member Oltalom Sport Association. The project partners gathered to lay the groundwork for the development of the toolkit, as well as the related Train-the-Trainers workshops. During the first visit, partners shared the challenges they face within their communities and set forward ideas on how football3 can be used to help address those challenges, especially as it

relates to racism, radicalism and social integration. The project team also actively took part in Oltalom’s Fair Play Football Roadshow event in Gödöllő, getting a first-hand look at how football3 can be used to bring different groups together.

The project partners will reconvene at four further site visits and meetings. The second leg of the football3 journey will be hosted by Sport Against Racism Ireland in Dublin to kick-start the development of the toolkit and gather first-hand experience from running programmes. Cologne will be the setting for the third meeting staged by local partner RheinFlanke and will serve to further test the toolkit. A fourth meeting will take place in early 2018 to finalise the toolkit, while the fifth and last meeting

will be an opportunity for partners to share results and experiences, as well as to discuss the project’s legacy. Simultaneously, football3 for respect will be put into practice at football3 festivals with one pan-European festival planned and local events hosted by each partner.

As the kick-off meeting in Budapest drew to a close, the participating network members voiced their enthusiasm and hopes for the 24 months to come: “Except for football3 we don’t have many detailed methods to fight for equality and against racism,” said András Rákos from Oltalom, “The football3 for respect project can be one of the very few (and maybe the last EU project for some of us) that can create something that we can use in our everyday life”.

PrOJECT GOalS

OVEr THE COurSE OF a 24 MONTH PErIOD, THE PrOJECT WIll CrEaTE aND DISSEMINaTE a TOOlKIT THaT WIll SErVE aS THE BaSIS OF TraIN-THE-TraINEr SEMINarS, ENaBlING COaCHES TO FurTHEr EXPaND aND IMPrOVE THE IMPlEMENTaTION OF FOOTBall3.

IN FOCuS: EurOPEFOOTBALL3 FOR RESPECT

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WE TalK TO NOElla COurSarIS MuSuNKa, FOuNDEr OF THE GEOrGES MalaIKa FOuNDaTION It’s an exciting year for Noella Coursaris Musunka and her team at the Georges Malaika Foundation in Kalebuka, in the south eastern reaches of the Democratic Republic of Congo.

The year 2017 marks the 10th anniversary of the non-profit that empowers Congolese girls and their communities through education, health and football. “Malaika”, as it is known for short, provides education to 252 girls, clean drinking water to more than 10,000 people and partnered with FIFA to build the Kalbuka Football for Hope Centre. In the month of April the foundation also celebrates its first anniversary of being a streetfootballworld network member. Having just returned from the DRC, we caught up with Noella in London. She tells us about her own personal journey that lead to the foundation of Malaika, her hopes for the future, and how the beautiful game comes into play to kick start lasting change in the DRC.

“I’M a MOTHEr, I’M a PHIlaNTHrOPIST, aND I uSE My BEauTy FOr a PurPOSE.”

Noella Coursaris Musunka is perhaps best known as an internationally acclaimed model. But she is certainly “not just a pretty face”. As she says herself: “I’m a mother, I’m a philanthropist, and I use my beauty for a

purpose.” Being there for her two young children is a particular priority, not least owing to her own background. Having lost her father at the age of five, Noella was sent to relatives first in Belgium, then Switzerland, as her mother lacked the means to keep her. At 18, she was starting out as a model in London, but the curiosity about her roots wouldn’t let her go. “It’s time to see my mum,” she said and boarded a plane to return to the place of her birth. It was the first time in 13 years that she would see her mother - an encounter of strangers that developed into a strong relationship: “My mum is my mum, even if I’m not with her for 13 years. I look like her a lot. I sit down the same way as her. I have a lot of similarity with her.”

Even before the visit, Noella knew for a long time that she wanted to help her community in some way. Her dreams ranged from becoming a surgeon to starting her own NGO. “I like modelling, but I’m a “builder”, I’m an entrepreneur, I like to build, I like to create,” she smiles. Travelling to the DRC and spending time in her former community, Noella saw for herself some of the consequences of the civil war that was ravaging the country. An economic and political conflict fuelled by the DRC’s vast mineral resources has claimed up to six million lives and left the remaining population fighting for survival. “It’s a tragedy! Congo is one of the richest countries in the world, but unfortunately one of the poorest when it comes to the population and I think it’s very important that we give back,” she says. Noella states that she isn’t someone who simply complains and enjoys spending hours talking about what could theoretically be done. So, she asked herself: “What can I do for my country?”

noella coursaris:noT JusT a PreTTY Face

IN FOCuS: aFrICaNOELLA COURSARIS: NOT JUST A PRETTY FACE

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“WE CaN COMPlaIN aBOuT THIS aND THaT BuT I THINK IT’S IMPOrTaNT THaT WE FIND SOluTIONS aND DO THINGS. I’M NOT SOMEONE WHO lIKES TO HEar PEOPlE TalKING TalKING TalKING TalKING. I JuST lIKE TO HElP PEOPlE, TaKE aCTION aND DO THINGS.”

Not just because her own son is a committed football fan and has decorated their London home in Dele Alli and Tottenham Hotspur paraphernalia, Noella is convinced of the power of the beautiful game. “Everywhere in Africa and in Congo you see a lot of people playing football. Many villages don’t have money, but if they have a goal, people can play anywhere.”

The Football for Hope Centre in Kalebuka does more than just provide goals – it has a fully equipped pitch and building that serves as a community centre: “The Football for Hope centre is not only about sport and football, people go there to learn, to read, write, the mothers learn how to sew in classes,” Noella says, adding that the school and the centre complete each other: “We have young girls playing football. Before, they were hiding, not playing. Now it is something that is accepted, we have tournaments for girls, for mothers and it’s fantastic to see all of them. We have run programmes with Coaches across Continents. We did this partnership for three years where we talked about values and HIV, family planning, child rights etc.” While the school and many programmes at the Football for Hope Centre are targeted at empowering the girls and women of the community, Noella stresses: “I celebrate women and girls every day but I think it’s very important to celebrate the boys and the men, too. I think we all have to be together.” Supporting the male members of the community aids the empowerment of women, but is, of course, a worthy cause in itself that Noella celebrates whole-heartedly: “I met a boy, Chris – I think he’s 18 or 17 – when I was there two weeks ago and he just wanted to speak with me in English because he was learning English at the Football for Hope centre and he was so confident. He said that it gave him the chance to become someone in his life.”

Noella is happy with all that she and her staff at the Georges Malaika Foundation have achieved so far and tells us that she looks forward to completing the school and to expanding the programmes at the Football for Hope Centre: “I would love to do vocational training where we can teach the youth about jobs and work.” Another important item on the agenda for 2017 will, of course, be the celebration of the foundation’s 10th anniversary: “We have a big event in New York and we’ll have one in the Congo. The celebration in Congo will be with all the students and the community centre. Every time I go there, it’s a celebration. It’s a highlight of my trip, just going to be with all of them!”

IN FOCuS: aFrICaNOELLA COURSARIS: NOT JUST A PRETTY FACE

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IN THE CurrENT SCHOOl yEar OF 2016-2017, THE GEOrGES MalaIKa FOuNDaTION IS EDuCaTING 252 GIrlS WITH THE aIM OF INCrEaSING ITS INTaKE TO 350 GIrlS IN THE NEar FuTurE. Growing up in various affluent countries in Europe, she enjoyed an extensive education, her friends and relatives, particularly girls, in the DRC did not even have access to. “You need an educated population to take control of their own country. The biggest resource in the DRC is individual, it is every single person that is able to leave their mark and write their own history, their own story,” Noella says. With education as “the key”, the idea of building a school slowly took shape, as did the physical buildings and a curriculum after the establishment of the Georges Malaika Foundation in 2007. It took several more years of careful preparation and negotiating local red tape before the school was up and running, finally opening its doors in 2011 to a class of 104 kindergarten and first grade girls. “Every year, we’re adding one more classroom,” says Noella.

In the current school year of 2016-2017, Malaika is educating 252 girls with the aim of increasing its intake to 350 girls in the near future. The school curriculum is based on the Belgian and Congolese education systems and focuses on girls, as they are the ones who lack opportunities the most but who also – as educated women – reinvest 50% more of their later earnings into society than men. This strengthens the backbone of the community to the profit of all of its members. Other projects tackle the need for clean drinking water by building wells and aiding local hospitals by providing them with the essential medical supplies they are desperately in need of. It was the school that caught the attention of the football for good world. One day, FIFA called: “They said that they had been following the progress of the school and were so amazed by its success,” Noella says smiling proudly. After a site visit and assessment, Malaika was granted the 19th Football for Hope Centre (FFH) in Africa, as part of the official campaign of the World Cup in South Africa: “20 Centres for 2010” to create centres of education, public health and education across Africa.

“THE FOOTBall FOr HOPE CENTrE IS NOT ONly aBOuT SPOrT aND FOOTBall, PEOPlE GO THErE TO lEarN, TO rEaD, WrITE, THE MOTHErS lEarN HOW TO SEW IN ClaSSES”

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aNEra HOlD TWO DayS OF TOurNaMENTS TO CElEBraTE

On the 8th and 9th of March 2017 Beirut and Baalbek in the Bekaa Valley respectively provided the setting for football3 tournaments to mark International Women’s Day. ANERA teamed up with 16 other grassroots organisations to host the events that brought together over 300 participants each. It was a celebration of women with both genders involved and participating in mixed teams.

aN IMPOrTaNT Day FOr lEBaNON Heavily made-up and scantily dressed women seductively peer down from many of the billboards in the Lebanese capital. As elsewhere in the world, they are a testament not to sexual liberation but discrimination.

International Women’s Day celebrates that girls and women have other qualities and is an opportunity to call for further action in the name of gender equality. The main challenges Lebanon’s female population faces are gender-based violence and discriminatory laws. Cases are often regulated by religious courts, who, in the case of rape, regularly allow perpetrators to escape punishment by marrying their victims.

1Adding to the diversity of Lebanon’s native women is a large immigrant population of Palestinian refugees that have been living in the country for several decades and newcomers from Palestine and Syria, with over 50% of Syrian refugees who officially registered in the country being female. Referring to Lebanon’s long-standing Palestinian refugee population, Loubane Tay, Program Manager at ANERA, says “Marginalisation has been an issue for almost 70 years now. Palestinian refugees in Lebanon don’t have the right to work or own property so imagine what this means for women who are already discriminated against in a society that does not allow them to work, even if they get educated? So they are the victims of the system of cultural sensitivities that orbit their communities.”

As Maggie Forster Schmitz, ANERA’s Vice President of Philanthropy states: “Poverty, it is said, has a woman’s face. The same can be said for the world’s refugees and displaced. While men and women each make up half of the world’s refugees and displaced population, women (and girls) disproportionately bear the brunt of conflict and natural disaster.”

THE FIrST HalF: KICK-OFF 15:00, 8TH MarCH 2017, BEIruT

Released from the morning school shift, an excited group of children streamed into the sports hall of Omar Fakhouri school. Before they had even set foot on the pitch, the first question burning on their lips was: “Will I get a medal?” The team of organisers had come prepared – armed with a mountain of medals significantly outnumbering the participants. No one would go home empty handed on that day with medals awarded not for winning, but for taking part. The young footballers had been selected due to their vulnerable backgrounds, among them refugees from Palestine and Syria, as well as Lebanese children from disadvantaged families. For many of them, the tournament was the first time they had socialised with members of a different community. In the bustling city of Beirut, ethnic and social divides run deep. “People live separately, they don’t really mix,” says Loubane Tay, Program Manager at ANERA.

The only divide at the tournament was by age category: the event organisers determined that the 9-11 year olds would

compete in one group, the 12-15 year olds in another. The children and young teenagers then chose their own teams of 5-6 players, paying no heed to gender or background - to the astonishment of the adult onlookers. “No one expected that!” Loubane says remembering it as one of the defining moments of the tournament. Another surprise was that the children didn’t care about winning.

The coaches, on the other hand, did. Swept away by the emotion of the match, many momentarily let their football3 ideals slip, shouting peppered words of encouragement from the sidelines, before regaining their composure. All the while the young opponents kept their eyes on the prize – medals only granted to fair players – but, above all, simply had fun. At the end of the three hours a boys’ team won the tournament, but no one seemed to mind. They all took it in their stride and with an appropriate amount of team spirit.

INTErNaTIONal WOMEN’S Day GOES INTO EXTra TIME IN lEBaNON

IN FOCuS: MIDDlE EaST ANERA CELEBRATES INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S DAY

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2THE SECOND HalF: KICK-OFF 15:00, 9TH MarCH 2017, BaalBEK, BEKaa VallEy

The day after International Women’s Day, the festivities continued: 85 kilometres northeast of Beirut in the heart of Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley. A belated celebration, but this time, kick-off was punctual. While a few stragglers had slightly delayed the proceedings in Beirut, the team of organisers arrived at the pitch on the outskirts of Baalbek to find several hundred young football players pressed up against the gates, eager to be let inside the football club bearing the lyrical name of “Noujoum al Sham” – “Stars of the sun”. The pitch is located on the far side of Wavel, a Palestinian refugee camp whose first occupants found shelter in the former French army barracks during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war, never becoming Lebanese residents but carving out an existence as perpetual refugees. Today, over 8000 people still live here, many of them refugees by inheritance who never fled from anywhere. They have been joined in the area by more recent arrivals from Palestine and Syria. Among the 11-15 year olds attending the Women’s Day tournament were, however, not only refugees, but also local Lebanese citizens. According to Loubane Tay,

communities co-exist more easily here than in “cosmopolitan” Beirut. When it came to the tournament, both Baalbek and Beirut scored high in fair play. In Baalbek, a substantial amount of the pre-match discussion time was devoted to choreographing the celebration of goals: One team danced the traditional Lebanese “Dabke”, another preferring the “Macarena”, yet another formed a “train” and choo-chooed around the stadium. All teams celebrated when their opponents scored a goal. The entire complex shook when a mixed group of 4 boys and 2 girls emerged as the tournament champions, whose coach was also a young woman of 30 from the Bekaa Valley.

The animated commotion seeping through the fence enclosing the pitch had drawn a crowd. Over the course of the event, young people had begun flocking the see what on earth all the fuss was about. When the final whistle had been blown, announcing the official end of the event, the organisers decided to open the gates to the rest of the community: 100 more children spilled onto the pitch ending the day in an impromptu mass football game as the sun set on the “Stars of the Sun” stadium.

3THE THIrD HalF: POST MaTCH aNalySIS

The main goal of the double tournament in Beirut and Baalbek was to celebrate International Women’s Day by show-casing the strength of girls and young women through football, more specifically football3. As Loubane says, the event did just that: “We saw some girls who were really strong – it was lovely to observe!” For this reason, it served the overall purpose that it wasn’t a female-only tournament, but that many boys and young men also participated enthusiastically. Loubane explains further that ANERA and the collaborating initiatives also “wanted to show that both men and women can get hurt…it’s ok, as women have strong bodies, too!” To her relief, the event ended without casualties and literally proving women’s ‘ability’ to endure injury.

The main focus of ANERA’s football programmes for girls and young women is also to show the female participants themselves how strong

they are. Through football, they have gained confidence and a strong awareness of abilities to which they were previously completely oblivious. However, getting the girls involved in the first place is one of the greatest challenges of ANERA’s football programmes for girls. One of the methods to tackle these problems, has been to engage coaches from the local communities targeted, who are known and trusted by parents who then more willingly consent to their daughters taking part. For the girls, Loubane admits, the football programmes didn’t initially capture their interest because of the game itself, serving more as the perfect pretext to escape the confines of their homes. Eventually, football itself emerged as the girls’ main motivation.

The effect of the programmes doesn’t end with these girls, Loubane adds: “Through football3 young women also have a chance to challenge the established stereotypes – i.e. that football is a male sport – and simultaneously become agents of change within their communities.”

IN FOCuS: MIDDlE EaST ANERA CELEBRATES INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S DAY

““INTErNaTIONal WOMEN’S Day IS NOT ONly aBOuT CElEBraTING WOMEN aS aGENTS OF CHaNGE, BuT MOrE IMPOrTaNTly, raISING aWarENESS OF HOW MuCH MOrE NEEDS TO BE DONE TO CrEaTE EqualITy IN SOCIETIES ESPECIally THOSE THaT arE MarGINalIZED.” - lOuBaNE Tay, PrOGraM MaNaGEr aNEra

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Every year, the initiatives belonging to the Latin American network gather to share ideas, knowledge and exchange experiences. Another item on the agenda of the most recent conference from 8th – 10th November was revising the regional strategy. FOOTBALL4GOOD Magazine met streetfootballworld’s Regional Manager Natalia León in Bogotá after the event to discover the details.

Latin America is where streetfootballworld’s work first kicked off, leading to the organisation’s establishment in 2002. A vast and diverse region united by a passion for the beautiful game, the continent provides ripe ground for the many initiatives already harnessing the power of football to drive social change with many more following their lead.

10 Latin American countries and 22 local initiatives currently belong to the ever-growing streetfootballworld network. Delegates from 14 network member NGOs were present at the November conference. The meeting took place in the midst of demonstrations opposing Colombia’s No-Vote in the Peace Referendum

one month previously. “What a defining moment for us to meet and to bring all of these change-makers together from across the region,” Natalia León enthuses.

The meeting was not only an opportunity to define the future, but also to reflect on and learn from the achievements of the past year. In 2016, three Latin American organisations Fútbol con Corazón, Fútbol más and Rafa Márquez joined the streetfootballworld network in time to attend the November gathering. Together, they reached 32,000 participants through a number of local and regional programmes.

According to regional manager Natalia León: “2016 was one of our biggest and most positive years.” She says that it became clear that the network had reached a significant “level of maturity” in the way that they collaborated, but also in terms of their expertise on key topics, such as gender equality, youth development and leadership, as well as peace culture. “One of the biggest achievements of 2016 is that all of the network members put together a guide on youth leadership through football. We created our first

regional document where we put the power of football3 at the service of promoting youth leadership but also to certify young leaders of the region as coaches on football and leadership. The important part of this is that everyone who passes through that programme will get a certificate that allows them to enter the working market.” The methodology developed in the document was put into practice in 13 locations in the region simultaneously with local resources and the help of the FIFA Football for Hope programme.

“The youth leadership guide is the best showcase of the power of networking and of collective building. We brought one young leader of each organisation and one educator. We put together different generations of people, opened the space for young people to speak up and tell us what they wanted us to focus on.” The importance was laid on creating a project that corresponded to the needs and experiences of these young people and enabled them to speak up about them. “So 2016 was the year of Youth leadership in Latin America,” Natalia

says, “and we want what we created to be transported across the world with the support of streetfootballworld.” An example of how this was done is the Youth Leadership through Action workshop (adidas Exchange Programme) that took place in Mumbai in October of that year. “What we create in one region we want to use to have global impact,” Natalia explains.

Using local knowledge to achieve a global impact is an objective that will be carried forward with the current strategy spanning 2017-2019. Natalia stresses that the regional strategy meeting in November was also important to allow the individual network members to take a step back from their everyday obligations and challenges and to think about the common goal they are all working towards as a region. “Such a meeting provides a space where participants can feel that they have an extended team that is taking care of their interests, but also asks them to think collectively and not just about their own set-backs. What we want to think about is: How can we support each other and create a common voice?”

IN FOCuS: laTIN aMErICaLATIN AMERICA’S REGIONAL STRATEGY

GENDEr aWarENESS, VIOlENCE PrEVENTION & yOuTH EMPOWErMENT KEy PrIOrITIES FOr THE laTIN aMErICa rEGIONal STraTEGy 2017-2019

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yOuNG PEOPlE

THE aIM OF THE STraTEGy IS TWO-FOlD: FIrSTly, IT DETErMINES HOW THE NETWOrK MEMBErS WIll OPEraTE rEGIONally aND SECONDly, IT ESTaBlISHES WHICH SET OF TOPICS WIll BE aDDrESSED COllECTIVEly.

To increase trust between members and grow as a regional network, the participants of the conference determined to:

STrENGTHEN NETWOrK MEMBErS in their daily work by facilitating capacity development, securing funding for them from various sectors by engaging streetfootballworld’s unique network of global partners.

DEVElOP THE NETWOrK by finding new solutions through peer to peer exchange and seeking partnerships at a regional and global level to implement these plans in a sustainable way. The network is to be expanded with additional members to achieve increased social impact within the region with the further aim of positioning Latin America as a global leader in the field of football for good.

CHaNGE THE GaME by working together with the football industry in the development and implementation of their CSR strategies to promote the power of the game to transform lives and society.

The focus of the network members’ initiatives corresponds to the main challenges of the region. Though Latin America is a wide area to cover, there are a number of common and pervasive social issues. The main challenges faced here concern girls and women struggling against discrimination and patriarchal structures, marginalised and impoverished youth as well as violence in local communities.

IN FOCuS: laTIN aMErICaLATIN AMERICA’S REGIONAL STRATEGY

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GENDEr aWarENESS

“In Latin America women are being abused on a daily basis. 1 in 3 women has been the victim of gender-based violence. The cases of femicide - when a man kills his partner - in Argentina, Uruguay, Colombia, Ecuador and Peru are very high. It is also a region that has struggled a lot with machismo,” says Natalia. According to her, men currently occupy most positions of power across the region with women lacking possibilities to speak up.

To tackle this, the regional strategy focuses on working from the ground up and putting women on the pitch “which is a place in our communities that has historically belonged to men only,” Natalia asserts, “so we are not only claiming social spaces, but are showing that there is an opportunity for women to be not only part of physical spaces but of important spaces in terms of the communities.”

Gender awareness is the first goal to be attained on the road to gender equality. Before positive change can take effect, stigma must first be overcome. “We don’t do individual projects just with women,” Natalia states. The region’s programmes encourage men and women to work together as a team on the pitch. “When you put a man and a woman together on a team the relationship between them changes and they become a team and peers instead of interacting in a sexual way.” The aim is to change stigma around women in football and also to reduce school drop-out rates related to gender and to adolescent pregnancies.

yOuTH lEaDErSHIP

Youth Leadership is at the core of the Sustainable Development Goals “because in a couple of years,” Natalia reasons, “the majority of the world population will be young. We believe that we need to open spaces for youth not only to have a voice and be part of the main global discussions that will determine their future, but also in the necessity of giving them opportunities to become active leaders in their territories and to determine the changes that they want to see in the world. Instead of us focussing on what we feel they should be doing, we want to let them drive their own personal, local and community development.”

To transform this into reality, the regional strategy promotes a strong focus on life skills programmes to instil young people with the confidence and ability to take leadership.

VIOlENCE PrEVENTION

“Across the region there are many forms of violence, there is political violence, social violence (gangs, gangsterism, guerrillas, in the case of Colombia), gender-based violence,” Natalia explains. The strategy focuses on creating safe spaces inside the communities. The form of peace culture in question is not about peace building, but rather about enabling young people to develop and play without risk of violence.

At the level of public debate, Natalia says that “as a collective we want to send strong messages. With one voice we will say that we won’t take more violence against our people. We want to live in peace and for all our peace efforts to be sustainable.”

But how do you build initiatives to successfully address each of these topics? One of the main tools to do so is the football3 methodology developed by streetfootballworld. As simple as it is effective, football3 is based on the principle that the basic values of fair play, gender equality, teamwork and respect are just as important as football skills.

Latin America is the birthplace of football3 and it continues to be the region with the highest rate of network members – all of them with the exception of two – employing this unique methodology developed by streetfootballworld.

“Football is something we live and breathe. The entire region reverberates with football,” Natalia enthuses. “Everyone has a football on their feet from the day they are born! Everyone,” she adds raising an eyebrow, “except the girls.” A fact that the Latin American network is changing with the help of football3: “The network members have systematised the methodology, they use it in different ways but all of them share a common DNA in that they use it to allow girls to play and to send the message about matters that are difficult to talk about without having this tool as an excuse.” This is a prominent point in the current strategy.

Permanent fixtures in the Latin American strategy to be continued in future are events, festivals, campaigns and maintaining a “community of practices”: Every two years a different member country hosts a festival to unite the entire network for a gathering of cultural exchange, the establishment of future objectives and the dissemination of the power of football. The event often coincides with a youth forum offering young leaders and disadvantaged children and youth training opportunities in football3 programmes.

NaTalIa lEóNrEGIONal MaNaGErlaTIN aMErICa

THE THrEE KEy GOalS FOr 2017-2019 HaVE BEEN DEFINED aS:

GENDEr aWarENESS, yOuTH lEaDErSHIP aND VIOlENCE PrEVENTION.

IN FOCuS: laTIN aMErICaLATIN AMERICA’S REGIONAL STRATEGY

““IT IS SO EMPOWErING TO BE a WOMaN PuTTING FOOTBall FOr GOOD ON THE aGENDa aND I THINK IT SENDS aN IMPOrTaNT MESSaGE.”

Colombian activist and change-maker, Natalia León, has devoted her career to using football as a vehicle for peace building among children and young people.

She experienced the transformative power of the game when working with forcibly displaced children in Altos de Cazucá, Soacha, one of the most violent communities in Colombia, as part of her degree studies in Childhood Education at the Universidad Javeriana in Bogotá. She joined “Fundación Tiempo de Juego” and used football to keep children off the streets.

In 2012 Natalia received a Masters’ degree in International Cooperation from the Universidad Autonoma de Barcelona in Spain. After her studies Natalia returned to Colombia. She has devised and implemented projects for German, Japanese, Canadian, Spanish and U.S. government organisations in numerous countries in the region and collaborated with the UNDP and the World Bank to establish football networks for underserved young people.

As Regional Manager for Latin America at streetfootballworld, Natalia is responsible for projects in over 10 countries, with 30 partners using the powerful tool of sport to promote gender equality, youth development and peace building in the region. At streetfootballworld, she has designed and initiated “Football for Peace and Reconciliation” in collaboration with the German Federal Foreign Office (AA) – a ground-breaking project that unites victims and demobilised guerrillas in Colombia, who subsequently play on the same team. FPR is the first project in over 60 years of conflict to bring together both sides, to reconcile and rebuild their communities and their country. The project has become a flagship for peace innovation in Columbia and will serve as a potent example of peace building worldwide.

In 2012 Natalia León won an International Award from The Center for Education Innovation and two national awards from the Presidential Agency of Poverty Reduction. She was voted one of the three most inspiring women working in Columbia’s social sector by Cromos Magazine in their “Inspiring Women’s Special” in 2014.

She particularly enjoys visiting the local projects, though the local children often don’t let her play. “I swear too much,” she confesses, “no one wants me on their team – you lose points if you swear!”

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lEVEllING THE PlayING

FIElDFrOM SHy

TO MIGHTylIKE KIMlEaNG CHHONraN, MaNy GIrlS IN CaMBODIa arE TOlD: “FOOTBall IS NOT GOOD FOr GIrlS.” TO STOP THEM FrOM lISTENING, SalT aCaDEMy DESIGNED THE “MIGHTy GIrlS” PrOGraMME. THE 19-yEar-OlD IS ONE THE yOuNG ParTICIPaNTS WHO IS NOW CHEErED ONTO THE PITCH.

NETWOrK MEMBErS’ STOrIES KIMLEANG: FROM SHY TO MIGHTY

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Before the playing field can be levelled, all sportspeople must be able to actually set foot on it. In many countries in the world, girls who wish to do so, first need to overcome a number of obstacles barring their way.

The first time Kimleang kicked a football she was ten years old. The boys in her neighbourhood asked her to join their game and she agreed. “They didn’t really want me to play,” she says, “I was a girl, it was strange! But they needed one more player.” So, gender stereotypes were cast aside while Kimleang and her new-found teammates collected plastic bags and bound them together with string into a football-shaped object. But the match was a one-off. Kimleang enjoyed the game “even though I wasn’t very good,” she admits. But football just wasn’t a game girls played, so she didn’t even consider it. Instead she took up dancing. “But my parents hated that, too,” she laughs.

They had other concerns. Financial hardship meant that the oldest of her four siblings had to work to support the family. To make matters worse, her father started drinking and often became violent. Kimleang’s mother bore the brunt of his alcohol-fuelled rage.

FOr MaNy WOMEN IN CaMBODIa DOMESTIC VIOlENCE IS a ParT OF EVEryDay lIFE. ONE IN FIVE HaVE EXPErIENCED aSSaulT aT THE HaNDS OF a ParTNEr aS NaTIONal STaTISTICS rEVEalED IN 2016.

According to a recent UNICEF report, 42 percent of adolescent women themselves believe that wife beating is justified. The subordination of women in Cambodian society is entrenched in a set of traditions and beliefs passed on from generation to generation. “Men are gold and women are

cloth” is a Khmer proverb that expresses how highly regarded the male gender is, while as a woman it is easy to become tarnished.

At school, children learn the traditional Khmer prose poems, Chbab Proh and Chbab Srey, which enforce strict codes of conduct for men and women. Girls and women are expected to be gentle, reserved and obedient. For many years, it was a belief Kimleang didn’t question. It was only when a school friend persuaded her to play football again and she rediscovered her passion for the game that Kimleang decided it could indeed also be a “girl thing”. She still wasn’t good, but she was hooked and begged her parents to allow her to play. She told them resolutely: “If you want me to stop dancing you must allow me to play football.” After three attempts, her parents relented. “They didn’t really allow me to play football, it was just a way to get me to stop dancing,” Kimleang admits. When neighbours started talking and relatives asked them why they allowed their daughter to play a “boy’s sport,” Kimleang’s parents asked her to give up her new hobby. “Football is not good for girls,” they said. “No girls play it.”

By then, Kimleang had already met members of the Sport and Leadership Training Academy (SALT), who were keen for her to join the Mighty Girls programme. She turned to them for help and they sat down with her parents to explain the opportunities of football and the programme to them. They may not have been fully convinced, but they agreed. Kimleang had the permission she needed.

Every morning, Kimleang now gets up at 5am to travel across Cambodia’s second largest city, Battambang, to the Mighty Girls home where most of the girls live. Many of them come from other provinces, but as Kimleang’s family lives in Battambang, she doesn’t need to board. Together with her fellow “Mighty Girls”, she has breakfast and changes into her uniform before they walk to the academy. Each day is a mixture of classes in different academic subjects and football training. “Except on Mondays,” Kimleang laughs, “then we have gymnastics.”

aFTEr THrEE aTTEMPTS, HEr ParENTS rElENTED. “THEy DIDN’T rEally allOW ME TO Play FOOTBall, IT WaS JuST a Way TO GET ME TO STOP DaNCING,” KIMlEaNG aDMITS.

NETWOrK MEMBErS’ STOrIES KIMLEANG: FROM SHY TO MIGHTY

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“I WaNT TO STuDy ENGlISH lITEraTurE aND MaNaGEMENT. I WISH THaT I CaN STuDy IN THE uS aND THEN COME BaCK aND WOrK HErE aT SalT.”

Kimleang enjoys the combination of studies and sports and feels that they complement each other well, learning important lessons both on and off the pitch: “I don’t think just working in a class is enough. Sometimes you need to learn by doing activities, like football. Football has taught me a lot of things related to life…about teamwork, specific goals there are to be achieved…and to never give up. Sometimes when you are learning you don’t see the goal and you give up half way. But with the Mighty Girls team, even when we do give up, someone calls out to you and encourages you. It has shown me: we can and need to achieve the goal together.”

The “Mighty Girls” programme was initiated in 2010 and has grown steadily with every year. Today, girls aged 14-20 receive special support in both education and football. The programme targets girls from disadvantaged backgrounds and works towards three main goals: To provide a “safety net” for individuals at risk of human trafficking, to support girls’ education and to promote gender equality. The programme offers participants opportunities they would otherwise not have, teaches them important life skills and builds their confidence.

Samy Seng, accountant, live-in “house mother” at SALT Academy and herself a former Mighty Girl, remembers when she first met Kimleang: “She was shy and lacked self-confidence when she joined the programme as a 14-year old.” Something that is difficult to imagine for Etienne Delaune, who works at SALT as Development Manager and has only known Kimleang for just under a year. Though it still took some time for her to overcome the gender divide and talk to him openly, he describes her as “much more outspoken and confident than your average Cambodian girl.” Kimleang has retained her modesty and starts giggling when asked to describe herself. So, Etienne volunteers his view of her:

“She’s definitely confident, a smart girl, a very hard worker, tough at the surface but very nice and gentle inside.” Samy adds: “She has flourished into a strong vocal advocate for girls’ rights and has become the Mighty Girls’ team captain.”

The Mighty Girls include some of the most promising female football players in the country and form the core of the Cambodian National Women’s team. Another aim of the Mighty Girls programme is to develop its participants into young leaders and encourage them to pass on their own experiences. At the end of each day, Kimleang and her teammates travel to communities around Battambang to give football training sessions. Kimleang’s team has won the championship title in the province for the past two consecutive years. When her parents saw them together and heard the young players greeting Kimleang with emphatic cries of “Teacher! Teacher!” they couldn’t hide their surprise. The experience made them trust the academy and understand what the programme has done for her, says Kimleang. Whenever people now ask them “Why are you letting your daughter play football?” they answer proudly that it has turned her into a role model. Kimleang has her own way of dealing with the criticism she still often has to face.

When people confront her and say: “You are a girl, you should think about your beauty. If you play football you will get dark skin and big muscles,” she asks them confidently: “Do I really look bad as a girl? Do you think my shape is bad?”

This coming October, Kimleang will graduate. Her plans for the future are clear: “I want to study English Literature and Management. I wish that I can study in the US. Firstly, because I like learning English and secondly, because women’s football is really big. I would love to play football there for my university and then come back and work here at SALT.” She also dreams of working for the Cambodian Football Federation one day – “but it is really hard to get in to,” she admits. After winning the National Championship with the Mighty Girls team last year, she has already achieved one goal that previously seemed impossible to even aim for.

NETWOrK MEMBErS’ STOrIES KIMLEANG: FROM SHY TO MIGHTY

“ THE “MIGHTy GIrlS” PrOGraMME WaS INITIaTED IN 2010 aND HaS GrOWN STEaDIly WITH EVEry yEar. TODay, GIrlS aGED 14-20 rECEIVE SPECIal SuPPOrT IN BOTH EDuCaTION aND FOOTBall.

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DaVID OSOrIOWE MEET WITH DaVID OSOrIO, yOuNG lEaDEr FrOM TIEMPO DE JuEGO, ONE aMONG THE MIllIONS OF VICTIMS OF FOrCED DISPlaCEMENT IN COlOMBIa, HaVING MOVED FrOM SONSON IN MEDEllíN TO alTOS DE CaZuCá, BOGOTá aT THE aGE OF 12. BuT DaVID’S STOry IS NOT a SaD ONE. IT IS ONE OF PErSEVEraNCE, COMMITMENT aND SElF-CONFIDENCE. IN HIS OWN WOrDS: “THE MOST IMPOrTaNT aND ESSENTIal THING IN lIFE IS TO BElIEVE THaT yOu CaN aCHIEVE yOur DrEaMS.”

PErSEVEraNCE, COMMITMENT aND SElF-CONFIDENCE THE STOry OF

NETWOrK MEMBErS’ STOrIES DAVID OSORIO: PERSEVERANCE, COMMITMENT AND SELF-CONFIDENCE

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“FOOTBall HaS THE POWEr TO SParK STrONG EMOTIONS IN PEOPlE. IT DOESN’T MaTTEr WHETHEr yOu rEally uNDErSTaND THE GaME Or NOT. FOOTBall HaS THE POTENTIal TO BrING JOy TO THEIr lIVES.”

Raised by his grandmother until the age of 12, David acknowledges the importance that football played in his life since a very young age. His first football memory dates back to 2001. At the age of 7, he experienced the euphoria of his country when, for the first time in history, Colombia won the “Copa America”. At the time, he didn’t truly understand what Colombia had exactly won or the importance of such an event for a country sinking into violence and in the grip of drug cartels. But he certainly understood that football had a strong ability to unite people.

According to David: “Football has the power to spark strong emotions in people. It doesn’t matter whether you really understand the game or not. Football does not only bring people together, it also has the potential to bring joy to their lives.”

In the first years of the new millennium, football became an important means of “escape” for David and many young people living in Colombia. While the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) were recruiting young civilians, David found respite from the poisonous environment of conflict by playing for hours on end in the streets of Sonson.

In 2006, fearing that David could be recruited by FARC, his family decided that it was best for him to travel to Bogotá where he could live with an older brother. David, then only 12 years old, had to find his way to the Colombian capital unaccompanied. He says that this is one of the experiences that made him mature at a very young age and transition to adult life faster than other children his age. David says that he skipped many steps of his childhood, having to work to earn his keep since the young age of 10. Premature adulthood also lead him to consume drugs in his early youth. Looking for a way to escape from a life that was not as easy as it would have been for other children and a social context where it was not difficult to procure and consume drugs. But his foray into substance abuse is a very

short chapter in David’s life. There was a drug more addictive than narcotics: football. It was the sport that made him realise that he had to take action and account for his life and also enabled him to do so.

At the age of 13, only one year after moving to Bogotá, he joined Fundación Tiempo de Juego. At this time, as he describes, Tiempo de Juego was still a project in the making. The organisation was established by Andrés Wiesner to offer the forcibly displaced communities of Altos de Cazucá, one of the capital’s most dangerous neighbourhoods, a safe space to play, in order to prevent drug consumption, early pregnancies and youth from joining the FARC. Today, Tiempo de Juego does much more than that and has aided thousands of participants over the past 11 years with a broad spectrum of programmes.

David Osorio grew up with Tiempo de Juego. And Tiempo de Juego grew up with him. In many ways, the personal development of David and that of the organisation are intertwined. He was part of the initial group of young people to attend the first sessions of Andrés Wiesner with limited resources. As he says: “We only had 3 footballs and we were around 40 kids.” One year after participating in the sessions, he was a member of the first group of young leaders that began to support Tiempo de Juego’s programme and train other children of Altos de Cazucá. This is how Tiempo de Juego was born, as a community initiative that started engaging young people who became young leaders and role models for other children. David soon became a living example of Tiempo de Juego’s positive impact and supported their programmes from being a young leader to a football coordinator and a community operator. He witnessed the growth of Tiempo de Juego and the organisation’s most important milestones:

“The programme was growing very fast and after four years, we inaugurated our headquarters. This was the first time I realised that small initiatives can make great changes and have a significant impact on people’s lives. I understood that the most important and essential thing in life is to believe that dreams are possible with hard work and perseverance.”

“TO My SurPrISE, aN EVENT THEN TOOK PlaCE aND THE DIrECTOr OF aDIDaS IN COlOMBIa CallED ME ON STaGE TO OFFEr ME a GraNT TO STuDy FOr a PrOFESSIONal CarEEr aT a uNIVErSITy OF My CHOICE IN COlOMBIa.”

But David’s dream did not stop there. His wish had always been to go to university and, as he repeatedly told his peers at Tiempo de Juego, he would one day make it come true. At the time, he was studying for his high school qualification in the evenings while working during the days and supporting Tiempo de Juego on the weekends. This was David’s life until December of 2013. One day, shortly after he graduated from high school, a great surprise awaited him. He describes this day as one of the happiest of his life:

“It was a Saturday in December 2013. I was running a football training session with a group of young people when I saw a car coming to the training centre. Suddenly, a group of people started putting up a big tent and preparing what looked like an event. I asked the people around, as I had no idea of what was happening. To my surprise, an event then took place and the director of adidas in Colombia called me on stage to offer me a grant to study for a professional career at a

university of my choice in Colombia.”

This happened only ten days after David graduated from high school. Years later, David learned that adidas had asked Tiempo de Juego to recommend one young leader to whom to grant the payment of a university education. Tiempo de Juego chose David to acknowledge his support and personal development and realise his most important dream: studying at university. David was supported during the next year by adidas to finance the beginning of his university studies, but the grant also opened the doors to a number of opportunities to go to seminars, meet new people and travel.

He decided to study at Santo Tomas University in Bogotá. The life experience he had already gained enabled him to look at things from a very different perspective than his university peers, who came from a very different background. He soon understood that he had been very privileged to receive the grant and was keen to pass this opportunity on to other young leaders from Altos de Cazucá. Only two weeks after starting his bachelor degree course, he sat down with the Director of Bachelor Studies to propose and design a seminar that would enable other youth to experience university life, at least for a short period.

NETWOrK MEMBErS’ STOrIES DAVID OSORIO: PERSEVERANCE, COMMITMENT AND SELF-CONFIDENCE

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“NETWOrK MEMBErS’ STOrIES DAVID OSORIO: PERSEVERANCE, COMMITMENT AND SELF-CONFIDENCE

After months of hard work and discussions with the university, David presented a proposal to adidas. The university would let him use the campus for free but he needed funding support for the transportation of the youth and to pay the professors. This is how David, with the support of the university, Tiempo de Juego and adidas made it possible for 35 young leaders from Tiempo de Juego to attend a 15-day seminar at the university. The seminar was focused on sports management, well-being and sports training. This was a once-in-a-life-time experience for these young people who, at the age of 15, experienced university life first-hand. As David recalls, “I was very satisfied to have enabled young people, who don’t have the chance to go to university, to have this experience even for a short period of time.” After the success of the programme and given the great impact that the grant had on the life of David Osorio and other young people who benefit from his initiative, adidas decided to sponsor two more young leaders with a grant the following year.

In addition to his initiative at the University of Santo Tomas, in 2015 David lead the project Dejando Rastro, which was funded by Sony through the “Future Goals” grant, with the main aim of promoting social cohesion and community participation through arts, music and football. The project engaged 50 young people, boys and girls, who took part in weekly classes of rap, break dance, graffiti and DJ-ing, as well as football3 training. The idea was to use additional tools that young people can understand, such as music, dance and visual arts, in order to promote similar values to those which Tiempo de Juego are trying to spread on the pitch.

If there is one thing David understood through his personal story, it is that dreams never end and that there is always a reward for hard work and commitment. One year before finishing his studies, the university offered him the chance to apply to an exchange programme with the University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria in Spain. He was chosen among many students due to his commitment and study records. But he lacked the financial resources to do it, “The grant I had from adidas was only to study in Bogotá. I didn’t have the funds to travel to Spain. So I asked adidas to advance the grant of the whole remaining year and I also started a campaign to raise the money for my trip with the support of Tiempo de Juego.”

This is how David managed to raise the sum needed to travel to Spain and gain a second degree at the university of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria. He will finish his studies in Spain in June 2017. His dream is be the technical football director for a football club. He has realised how important the personal development of football players is and would, therefore, like to introduce further education on values to the football industry. He believes that even professional players can benefit from football3. He is also certain that, with his support, many young people from disadvantaged communities can accomplish their dreams of becoming professional footballers. “If I manage to have a relevant position in a football club, I can go back to my community and support the youth with their nutrition, their training, their decisions, and give them opportunities, make a difference for them.”

““IF I MaNaGE TO HaVE a rElEVaNT POSITION IN a FOOTBall CluB, I CaN GO BaCK TO My COMMuNITy aND SuPPOrT THE yOuTH WITH THEIr NuTrITION, THEIr TraINING, THEIr DECISIONS aND GIVE THEM OPPOrTuNITIES, MaKE a DIFFErENCE FOr THEM.”

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WOMEN TaKING THE PITCH IN WarTIME ENGlaND

NOWaDayS, THErE IS aN uNDENIaBlE DISCrEPaNCy BETWEEN COVEraGE aND EarNINGS OF FEMalE aND MalE FOOTBallErS all OVEr THE WOrlD.

Despite demanding schedules for both male and female players, the recognition of women’s tournaments remains significantly less than that of men’s. However, what many football fans are unaware of is that only one century ago, during and immediately after World War I, the situation for men and women’s football was reversed in England. In fact, women’s teams throughout the country enjoyed considerably large crowds and societal support until the Football Association essentially banned women’s football in 1921 – a year in which women’s football was all the rage.

HOW IT HaPPENEDWith the start of World War I, the men of Britain were sent to the front lines in droves, and the English men’s football league was suspended for the year of 1914-15 by the Football Association. Consequentially, as the men poured out of England’s work force, women poured into the country’s munitions factories – and onto its football pitches. Welfare officers, responsible for the health of women in the factories, suggested sport, especially football, as a means of escaping the horrors of war while keeping fit. As such, of the 900,000 women who had come to work in the munitions factories, around 150 teams were established across England, each representing their own factory.

At first, women’s teams played against each other, as well as against teams of wounded soldiers with ticket profits going towards charities for local hospitals, ex-servicemen, and needy children. While the matches did, over the years, generate what would today be 14 million pounds in charity, crowds began attending less for altruistic reasons and more out of sincere awe at the level of skill the women had developed. They had come to appreciate the beautiful game being executed by teams of competitive, speedy, and skilful women.

THE TEaM TO WaTCH Of the 150 teams that formed between 1914 and 1921, one team’s success and grit stood out – the Dick, Kerr ladies of Preston. Achieving national fame and even traveling to the US, where they beat a number of men’s teams, the Dick, Kerr ladies came to attract large crowds of fans. Their most noted match took place on Boxing Day of 1920, when 53,000 fans filled up Everton’s Goodison Park and the Dick, Kerr team defended their reputation as one of the best teams in England, defeating St. Helen’s women’s team 4-0. With 14,000 eager spectators being locked out of the stadium due to over-capacity, the women’s football league was no second-best sporting event. It was the sporting event.

Among the team, one woman of 6 feet whose shot once broke the arm of a male keeper she had been training with had gained unprecedented popularity in England’s sphere of female athletes. Lily Parr, the Brit who has scored the most goals in a life time, male or female, is on record for having hit the net over 1,000 times between the years of 1920 and 1951 with her Dick, Kerr teammates.

But with the end of World War I and the return of England’s men from the front lines, the success of England’s women’s football league was coming to be thought of as counter to women’s societal roles. In an attempt to divert attention from the women’s league back towards the reforming of the men’s league, and so as to initiate the return to England’s more traditional understanding of gender roles, the FA banned the use of its fields for women’s teams.

This directly limited the number of spectators who could attend each match, slowly but surely leading to a dwindling attendance rate and overall interest. While some teams, such as the Dick, Kerr ladies, persisted playing through the ban, others weakened and vanished without the societal or institutional support that had enabled them to rise from the beginning. Just like that, the success of England’s women’s football league was substantial yet short-lived.

In 1971, after having already done considerable damage to the existence of women’s football in England, the ban was finally lifted in response to football’s increasing popularity among girls and women in the 1960s. Since then, women in England and around the world have clearly begun to take the field once again, and with force. Originally off to a comparatively slow restart in the 1970s, England’s women’s league has regained momentum with over 1 million viewers now tuning in to the FA women’s cup final each year. With regard to international football, 83,000 spectators filled the Wembley Stadium in 2012 to view the World Cup final between USA and Japan’s women’s teams – a testament to the regrowth in popularity of women’s football on a global scale. Equally noteworthy was the National Football Museum’s decision to officially recognize Lily Parr’s status as Britain’s highest scorer in 2002 – 24 years after her death. With institutions stepping back on board, and with society trending towards doing the same, we’re excited to see how women’s football continues to develop over the years.

FOOTBall FOr GOOD IN HISTOryWOMEN TAKING THE PITCH IN WARTIME ENGLAND

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INTErVIEW WITH PHOTOGraPHEr

DaNa röSIGEr

lOOKING aT THE WOrlD THrOuGH a DIFFErENT lENS, DaNa röSIGEr SEEKS TO CrEaTE aN IMaGE OF FOOTBall BEyOND THE PHOTOFlaSH CElEBrITy PHOTOGraPHy OF STaDIuM STarS. HEr CHaMPIONS arE THE yOuNG GIrlS aND BOyS ON THE PITCHES OF GraSSrOOTS OrGaNISaTIONS all OVEr THE WOrlD. SHE SHOWCaSES THE PEOPlE THaT SOCIal IMPaCT PrOGraMMES arE rEaCHING aND GIVES THEIr STOrIES a FaCE.

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How did your interest in football and photography get started?

Photography was always a passion of mine. I started when I was 12 years old with an old reflex camera. I was always focusing on people. Regarding football, the German national team had won the World Cup in 1990, right when the wall had come down.

At the time, my father was working in advertising for football, and as I looked closer into his work, I developed a passion for it. I had spent the years following the fall of the wall travelling around the world. I was discovering new people and countries, and I realized that everywhere I went, football was a way to connect with people.

Once, in Myanmar, I even had this experience where we wanted to go out and asked for some advice on where to go. A lady suggested we go to a movie and, on our walk there, we ended up in an animal barn where over 200 monks were watching a football match between Manchester City and Manchester United. I was the only woman, and it turned into this memory that still gives me goosebumps because, even when you travel to the smallest cracks of the world, football is following you.

It kept happening – whenever I would travel, I would bring things from Germany, usually football related, and as soon as I began interacting with people from other places, football became our common language.

How did you come to get involved with streetfootballworld?

I had originally heard of streetfootballworld through friends. I reached out to get a better idea of what they were planning to do back in 2008 and 2009. At the time, they were opening their first Football for Hope Centre in Khayelitsha and they asked me if I wanted to help document its opening. I thought it would be a good idea because, well, I love football, and I was interested in what streetfootballworld was doing and how they were building up their organisation. So I said yeah, why not? Before that, I was doing photography mostly as a personal hobby on my journeys and I was often focusing on football.

So I went to Khayelitsha and it was interesting to see how the whole programme was set up. I got to know the kids, and actually there was one moment that has really been burned into my memory.

IN-DEPTH INTErVIEWDANA RÖSIGER: FOOTBALL FOR GOOD AND PHOTOGRAPHY

There was this one day that we took an excursion to the Cape of Good Hope. Although there are not many pictures of me in front of the camera, one of the girls participating told me that she wanted to take a picture with me and we did. The same evening, we organised an event for all these kids so that they could connect and tell their stories.

So the girl who had asked me to take a picture with her told her story, and it was incredible. She had said, “I am here because “Grassroot Soccer” saved my life. I was raped, I have Aids, and I am from an abusive family, so I actually wanted to end my life. But when I got to know this organisation, I realised it was my new home. I know that I won’t have a long life, but I do want to use the time that I do have

left in the best possible way. I want to play football, and I want to share my passion and experiences with others.” When I heard her say that, I knew that I wanted to help share these stories with larger audiences.

Was that the first time you really understood the impact that football can have on people’s lives?

In the context of social change, yes. I had known that football impacted millions of lives, often even from an early age, and I always saw it as a door towards connecting with other people from around the world. So I knew it as a way of connecting through a beautiful sport, but I hadn’t fully realized the social impact and the social dimension of football – not as a life-changing activity for

disadvantaged communities. Not until I started working with streetfootballworld.

So initially, football captured your attention as a universal interest for people from different places. But was there another reason, something that had to do with you being a photographer or a footballer yourself?

Well, I was handballer. I played handball growing up rather than football. And I also didn’t think much about photography when I first started being interested in football. What really attracted me to the sport was the passion, the way it brought people together both on and off the field. It can unite people from all places – I noticed this before joining streetfootballworld, and I loved it.

““I HaD KNOWN THaT FOOTBall IMPaCTED MIllIONS OF lIVES, OFTEN EVEN FrOM aN Early aGE, aND I alWayS SaW IT aS a DOOr TOWarDS CONNECTING WITH OTHEr PEOPlE FrOM arOuND THE WOrlD.”

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Did you ever feel like football was more of a “man’s” sport?

It was always more a man thing which was a bit sad. But I was really passionate about what the field could achieve in terms of impacting people’s lives.

Not long after I started working with you guys, I began to look more into DISCOVER FOOTBALL and gender equality in sports, and it gave me new insight into the awesome things that are happening in women’s football.

In any case, though, football has been a male-dominated sphere, and at the time, it didn’t bother me much. I liked the game, I liked how it was connecting people. I just wished that the money being generated would have been spent differently.

After the Football for Hope Event in Khayelitsha gave you new insight into football for good, how did you continue getting involved?

I started doing more research into the field and, as I was working at the time, I couldn’t contribute as much time to photography as I would have liked. But then I met with DISCOVER FOOTBALL, and in 2010 they gave me the opportunity to focus on female-specific issues. This enabled me to meet several women with remarkable stories that I was able to document along the way.

Yet during that time, my work was more about focusing on documenting football events for streetfootballworld and DISCOVER FOOTBALL rather than people’s personal stories. But over the years, while working for both organizations, I adjusted my approach. I began focusing on the stories that I really wanted to share. I saw that football can help people with difficult backgrounds, for example, women who had used football to overcome extreme difficulties that stemmed from their gender or background.

But I also saw that football was helping people with all types of problems. For example, I met a boy from Poland through streetfootballworld who was struggling with family issues and personal problems and couldn’t gain access to a proper education. Even with issues like that, football was able to help get him back on track. Speaking to these people, I knew that I had to help get their stories out. Documenting the festivals was not enough anymore. I wanted to

showcase the people that the programmes were reaching. Even if we can only highlight the experiences of 10 people from a group of 400, those 10 people, whether they’re from South America or Europe or Africa – they make a difference. Over time, if you share enough of their stories, they begin to have an impact on their audiences. They lead to financial and social engagement from people who would have otherwise not known of the struggles many people face. If you report on these kinds of experiences, maybe people who do earn enough money would rather spend their extra earnings towards social development rather than personal leisure. But only if these stories are being told.

Of course, people know that these organisations exist. But they don’t always know exactly what they’re doing – they can’t imagine the actual impact these organisations have on the lives of individuals. But if you provide them with a face and a story – even if it is a painful story – you can create a bridge between two different worlds.

You were at the FFH Festivals in 2010, 2011, 2014 and 2016…Your evolution as a photographer… what has changed since you started until now?

My photography style has changed in response to the situations that I am photographing. An example of how my photography and football for good come together can actually be told through Artur – the Polish boy I mentioned earlier. I first met him in Serbia in 2011. He was a participant in one of streetfootballworld’s festivals. I saw him again last year in Lyon and, in those five years, it was clear that he had gone through some very positive changes. He had grown from a shy, thin boy into someone with confidence, strong, and healthy. So, through my photography, I was trying to get beyond his mask. I wanted to see closer into his soul, to see who he really was, where he came from, and how football has helped him, all through my photos. So, in a way, my style of photography has adapted to my subjects and my desire to tell their stories.

So how can photography tangibly help make a difference in the field of football for good?

It’s about building connections through photography that would otherwise be difficult to relate to for people of different circumstances. When people see particularly relatable images, emotions are elicited.

““I SaW THaT FOOTBall CaN HElP PEOPlE WITH DIFFICulT BaCKGrOuNDS, FOr EXaMPlE, WOMEN WHO HaD uSED FOOTBall TO OVErCOME EXTrEME DIFFICulTIES THaT STEMMED FrOM THEIr GENDEr Or BaCKGrOuND.”

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If you photograph someone from a disadvantaged community who is playing football or cheering on a favourite team, it’s likely that someone from a well-to-do community who also takes an interest in football will be able to relate to and sympathize with the person within that photograph. This reaction helps organisations like streetfootballworld gain more visibility, more attention, and more supporters. It helps them grow.

So, with photography, I am seeking to highlight the alternative dimension of football.

I am seeking to provoke the questions regarding the fact that while Messi gets paid millions of Euros, there is someone around the world with a similar passion and potential who will never have access to the same resources or opportunities.

So I’m trying to create an image of football that isn’t related to Messi or Villa or the top known names from the industry, but rather faces with new stories who also possess a sort of talent and passion, and whose lives and communities have been changed through football. These stories usually get some sort of reaction from their audiences.

And I know that there is still a long way to go. But this is the starting point. I will keep helping to provide this sort of content to support both streetfootballworld, as well as the kids who take part in these programmes. For example, I am following a few young individuals from streetfootballworld’s network simply because I am impressed with their work and I want a closer look at how they are developing.

Do you think that photography can help to change a community as a whole? Can the photos themselves initiate a change in mentality and behaviour in a community?

In a way. You can always use photography as a means of confronting participants with their background and their reality. You can even use photography as a tool that enables members of a community to document their own lives and communities, perhaps allowing them to view their circumstances from an alternative perspective, through a new lense.

What are the topics that you find more interesting, or the topics that concern you more than others? Why?

There are two areas that interest me the most. The first is festivals and events. When I do festivals and events, most of the time or often I focus only on 3 or 4 characters. Of course, I document the whole festival, but for myself, I identify 3 or 4 people that impress me and focus on their experience. From there, I like to focus on these few people and get to understand more precisely the experiences that led them to grow into the exceptional people they’ve become.

IN-DEPTH INTErVIEWINTErVIEW WITH PHOTOGraPHEr DaNa rOESIGEr

The second area that interests me is regarding history. I’ve always been interested in history – particularly in the Arabic region. And as I began researching football and gender equality, as well as the upcoming World Cup in Qatar, the region was of increasing importance to me. I want to continue looking into the region and the ways in which it confronts gender equality, and I haven’t decided which country would allow me to best explore that yet. I need to better understand the laws regarding photography in some of the countries, but in any case, I would really like to see where women stand today in that region. I’m interested in the amount of access women have to playing football in this region, and if and how the sport has been able to empower them.

What interests you most about the gender equality in the Middle East?

I am interested in better understanding the particular challenges women face, but also in the strength that the women of this region must harbour.

Even in the midst of political and social chaos, they continue to fight for their right to play and their right to speak up openly as women.

I want to look behind the curtain about what this entails and to see how things are evolving over time.

Looks like you’ve chosen a complex combination. Football is, as we stated, quite male-dominated. And being a woman in the Middle East presents challenges that don’t necessarily surface in the “West.” Have you faced any difficulties being a female photographer during your trips through the Middle East?

I actually haven’t had any negative experiences being a female photographer in that region. But it may be because I am focusing on football for good. I’m not competing with many men because most male photographers are focused on the professional industry. I’ve actually noticed that more women focus on football for good rather than professional football. But regarding the Middle East, it is a complicated region. But I appreciate the culture and I wanted to crack it for myself. I want to show through my photographs that change is indeed possible.

What was your experience as a photographer taking the photos of the girls in Za’atari refugee camp?

My overall experience in the Za’atari camp was very positive. In this case, being a woman was immensely helpful. The women and girls trusted me more than if I were a man, and the boundaries vanished when I would explain to them, from the beginning, that I was there to help them get their stories out. When I told them that I was hoping to help gain more visibility for them and their communities, they were on board. I also sent them my material, and they really love that.

IN-DEPTH INTErVIEWDANA RÖSIGER: FOOTBALL FOR GOOD AND PHOTOGRAPHY

““I’M TryING TO CrEaTE aN IMaGE OF FOOTBall THaT ISN’T rElaTED TO MESSI Or VIlla Or THE TOP KNOWN NaMES FrOM THE INDuSTry, BuT raTHEr FaCES WITH NEW STOrIES WHO alSO POSSESS a SOrT OF TalENT aND PaSSION, aND WHOSE lIVES aND COMMuNITIES HaVE BEEN CHaNGED THrOuGH FOOTBall.”

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What are the moments you cherish the most from your travels?

It’s an incredible experience for me because I get to meet these young girls and hear their stories. There was this one girl – she was so cute, they all were – and she was telling me about how she remembers her days back in Syria, and how she wants to become a national footballer and a teacher so that she can teach other girls to be strong and proud of themselves.

It makes me want to just go back with this girl to her home and document where she grew up, where she comes from, and to follow her all the way through and really show how she managed to manifest her dream.

So through my interactions with the girls in the Za’atari camp, I really became engaged and interested in the lives of these young individuals. Of course, you can’t be a part of everyone’s life that you meet, but it goes back to why I like to focus on 3-4 individuals. It lets me showcase what is special about their experiences, and what it means to be a leader, and I want to portray the lives of these kinds of people in order to give my audience the courage to emulate them in one way or another.

Do you feel that, seeing as there is an overdose of imagery online, photography has lost its message in the crowd of photos being circulated on a daily basis?

It is overwhelming, I have to admit. Of course, I have my certain interests and my specific area of photography, so I’m not competing with all photographers who are looking to make a living from their work. But sometimes, simply taking photos and uploading them somewhere isn’t enough to get organisations or participants the visibility that they need. Photos alone aren’t enough – there needs to be a story behind them, in combination with a request or a call to action for the audience. So the type of creations that I do are not necessarily in conflict with the millions of images floating around cyberspace.

Do you have a highlight story or anecdote – a moment of satisfaction that photography has contributed to your life?

There have been many, but meeting Artur, the Polish boy I mentioned, made me really happy. When I came to Lyon last year and saw him again after 5 years, and seeing what a positive force football had been for him, it was a great feeling. I saw how he grew into a leader and being able to speak with him about the steps he had taken over the years made me so happy. We exchanged words on what he had been up to, and I gave him my perspective about his growth, and it was amazing! I saw him and my heart was laughing all over!

Is there anything else that you would like to highlight?

Even though I never played football, I’ve always had a passion for the sport. It has always had a special place in my heart. I’ve come in contact with it both through the camera lens, as well as through my travels. Considering the fact that, currently, the world is really quite packed with new events every day, I think we are living in the perfect time to showcase the power that football has. It can really change everyone’s life – whether it’s a young girl or older woman. So with all the craziness going on, football can help us make the change that is direly needed at this point in time.

IN-DEPTH INTErVIEWDANA RÖSIGER: FOOTBALL FOR GOOD AND PHOTOGRAPHY

“I THINK WE arE lIVING IN THE PErFECT TIME TO SHOWCaSE THE POWEr THaT FOOTBall HaS. IT CaN rEally CHaNGE EVEryONE’S lIFE – WHETHEr IT’S a yOuNG GIrl Or aN OlDEr WOMaN. SO WITH all THE CraZINESS GOING ON, FOOTBall CaN HElP uS MaKE THE CHaNGE THaT IS DIrEly NEEDED aT THIS POINT IN TIME.

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EaST aFrICa MEETING 2017

COMING SOON EAST AFRICA MEETING 2017

SIXTH aNNual EaST aFrICa MEETING HOSTED By NETWOrK MEMBEr SPOrT THE BrIDGE IN aDDIS aBaBa, ETHIOPIa FrOM 23rD -25TH aPrIl. NETWOrK MEMBErS aND lOCal SPOrT FOr GOOD OrGaNISaTIONS WIll MaP OuT PrOJECTS FOr PEaCE aND rECONCIlIaTION IN THE rEGION

The sixth annual East Africa Meeting will be hosted by Ethiopian network member Sport the Bridge in Addis Ababa, 23rd – 25th April. The annual gathering brings together football for good leaders from 17 streetfootballworld world network members in Kenya, Rwanda, Burundi, Tanzania, DRC, South Sudan, Ethiopia and Uganda. The meeting will build on outcomes from previous regional networking events and pave the way to implementing joint projects aimed at peace and reconciliation in the region.

THE OBJECTIVES OF THIS MEETING INCluDE:

1. Review and adapt the current 2012-2016 strategic plan which provides a framework for network development and will guide the process of cooperation between network members for the following five years.

2. Provide further guidance to the regional Young Leaders Work Plan which will be presented by Youth Council Member Anthony Gitei from TYSA that sets in motion a regional youth leadership plan building on initial discussions at festival16 in France and the previous East Africa Festival held in Rwanda.

3. Discuss location and preparations for the annual East Africa Festival scheduled for December 2017.

The organisations that have been invited to the event include: IDYDC and Jambo Bukoba (Tanzania); Mathare Youth Sports Association, Society Empowerment Project; Transforming Young Stars of Africa; Horn of Africa Development Initiative, Caroline for Kibera, Vijana Amani Pamoja and Moving the Goalposts Kilifi (Kenya); South Sudan Youth Sports Association (South Sudan); The Kids League, Soccer Without Borders and Youth Environment Service (Uganda); Jeunes pour la Paix (Democratic Republic of Congo), Esperance (Rwanda) and Giriyuga (Burundi). Additionally, leading sport for good organisations that collaborate with the network members in the region are scheduled to attend.

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