Location and general information
Conflict victimsContext
The Catalyst Foundation for Universal Education, Aurora, the Asian Football Development Project (AFDP) and the UEFA Foundation for Children are helping people displaced by the conflict in Syria, particularly children and teenagers living in the Azraq refugee camp.
Project content
The Association Football Development Programme Global (AFDP Global) intends to continue its ongoing project in the Azraq refugee camp to continue providing safe and supervised sports activities for Syrian children and teenagers. It will also train young Syrian adults as coaches and role models, developing their skills and ensuring proper supervision of the children taking part in the programme. The coaches will be taught English to develop their language skills and intercultural understanding so that they not only understand the game but can also communicate in a global language and in a multicultural environment.
The primary target group is children and teenagers (boys and girls) from 6 to 20.
The secondary target group comprises male and female adults, such as parents, who volunteer to be trained as coaches, team leaders and referees.
Objectives
- Engage Syrian children and teenagers (girls and boys) by organising football and other sports activities in an appropriate, safe and supervised environment where they can remain youngsters and have some fun. In addition to playing and spending time together, they learn football skills and assimilate fundamental values of sport such as respect, fair play, team spirit and solidarity, and are also taught about specific social issues.
- Train Syrian grassroots football coaches and referees, teaching them how to run coaching sessions but also give them the skills to organise a league and run football clubs. Specific classes focus on refereeing skills.
- Include a specific life-skills curriculum, based on the context and needs. The coaches learn how to utilise the values of sport to encourage the children’s personal development and raise their awareness of certain social issues. The curriculum uses a fun, educational approach to address social issues and to focus, in particular, on conflict resolution and raising awareness of the issue of early marriages, birth control, the importance of school, health, hygiene and well-being.
- Provide equipment and upgrade the football pitch into artificial turf, providing a reliable infrastructure and safe zone for the children to play in.
Project activities
To provide a safe environment for beneficiaries of the project, the UEFA foundation, in cooperation with AFDP Global and the Jordanian Football Association, contributed to the artificial-turf conversion of a small pitch for girls in 2018, with the financial support of LAY’S.
Two containers were sent from the Netherlands with artificial turf, construction material (including geotextiles, adhesive, tape, a tractor and other maintenance equipment), and pitch equipment such as goals and corner flags.
Solar-powered lighting was installed in 2020 to extend the availability of the pitch during the day.
Washing facilities will be added during 2021.
Expected results
- An average of 500 children and youngsters – boys and girls aged between 8 and 20 – regularly take part in the weekly sports activities and monthly football tournaments supervised by qualified educators, both male and female.
- Fair-play football tournaments will be held in the camp on the last Friday of every month.
- 18 male and female refugees will use sport, and football in particular, as a tool for social cohesion and conflict resolution, and will act as multipliers.
- Awareness of trauma recovery, sport as a tool for social cohesion, the disadvantages of early marriages, and conflict resolution will be increased significantly.
Partner
