South Africa - Manenberg

Champions Playground

The first Champions Playground will be achieved in Manenberg, township of Cape Town, in South Africa, and it will be inaugurate during the FIFA World Cup in 2010. It is a very special project, born thanks to the cooperation among Champions for Children Foundation, the Nelson Mandela Foundation, the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore and the University of the Western Cape.

Champions Playground is based on an educational model that provides opportunities for children from vulnerable areas to develop their own abilities through sports and creative activities. The Champions Playground’s methodology can be adapted to specific local circumstances with the assistance of local institutions and used in different countries all over the world.  Training of the operators is an essential aspect in guaranteeing the replication and sustainability of the project.

The Champions Playground will consist of a multi-functional sports complex, covered and uncovered, where the children, accompanied by teachers, educators and trainers, will have a chance to cultivate their own potential. Sports can be a highly efficient tool for stimulating self-discovery and cooperative interaction with others by serving as a means for personal growth and, more generally, a vehicle for cultivating humanity.  

In anticipation of the FIFA World Cup in 2010, the government of South Africa has invested approximately 1.45 billion Euros in local infrastructure (roads, stadiums, hotels, etc.).  Nevertheless, South Africa still faces many open questions:  first and foremost is the growing disparity between the rich and the poor. The poverty, instability and marginalization being experienced by the so-called “street boys” represent critical risk factors in their growth and development. The absence of positive stimuli or prospects, furthermore, makes them even more vulnerable and exposed to social instability and criminality.

To intervene in this situation, where youths live in unstable and vulnerable conditions with great resilience, means to think up opportunities that permit them to develop the types of personal and social resources that have never been stimulated before, in many cases, and that promise to equip them with better ways to integrate themselves. The potential of sports in the context of development, indeed, goes beyond the improvement of motor skills by expressing direct effects on processes of individual and social development. That is the reason why Champions for Children Foundation want to built the Champions Playground.

Sports activities represent a “school of life” where a type of dialog can be found that is accessible to everyone for measuring up against the rules, learning to face defeats and relating better with others.