Sport Cambodia Project #34187

Empower 2,000 Cambodian Kids Through Sport

by Globalteer

Empower 2,000 Cambodian Kids Through Sport

Project Report | Jun 16, 2021
Making the Most of the Down Time

By Jenny Byrne | Fundraising & Communications Officer

Drop in workout sessions at Helping Hands

After a promising start to 2021, a new Covid-19 outbreak at the end of February caused further school shutdowns, so we’ve been unable to continue normal operations since then. That said, after more than a year of dealing with this, we’ve been learning how to be flexible and adapt to the “new normal”.

We don’t have to stop moving

During this last run of closures, Helping Hands School was authorized to allow small groups of children to visit us daily, to pick up schoolwork and fresh produce from our gardens. And since we were keeping them academically stimulated and well-fed, why not give them a quick workout too? Our football pitch is big enough for 20 students to run around while keeping a safe distance from each other (and we require everyone to use masks while onsite), so we’ve been able to run quick workout sessions and keep promoting the healthy habits we try to instill in the children during our regular sessions. These opportunities remind the kids (and us) that even though the world seems to have stopped moving, it doesn’t mean we have to!

Coaching the coaches

Although we can’t work with the children much, the team has been taking full advantage of this break in standard programming to work on their own skills. Jared, our Program Manager, has been working with the team on two key factors, to help improve the delivery of the program:

Coach Fitness: We want our coaches to be role models for the children, to help motivate them to keep going. Through PE sessions with Jared, the coaches can improve their own fitness, understand the exercises and drills more deeply and remember what it’s like to be on the receiving end of a coach’s instructions!
Curriculum and Lesson Plans: With unexpected time on their hands, the coaching team can delve into their usual lesson plans to really analyze what works and what doesn’t, and brainstorm ways to improve them. Jared is also taking this opportunity to teach the coaches a new sport: Ultimate Frisbee! Not only does ultimate frisbee involve new ways of engaging the body and mind, it comes with lessons about equity and peaceful conflict-resolution built-in.

All our coaches, teachers, and students are hoping to return to some form of normality soon. And when we do, the team will be ready with new lesson plans, a better understanding of the exercises and a whole new sport to teach!

As ever, the Globalteer Sports team and students are extremely grateful for your ongoing support, and we hope to see everyone out on the field soon!

Coach fitness is important too!

Learning new sports to teach the children

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Feb 23, 2021
New Year, New Connections

By Jenny Byrne | Fundraising & Communications Officer

Children learn the importance of warming up

Back in November, we were getting back into the swing of things, offering sports lessons and weekly football matches to the students at our Helping Hands School. They have been enjoying the variety of drills and games designed to help improve flexibility, strength and endurance, especially when they get to take the lead! Continuing the roller coaster, a new wave of Covid-19 cases prompted the government to shut the schools down again for December, but thankfully it didn’t last long this time! The program is back up and running, both at Helping Hands and, as of the beginning of February, in the wider area.

New Collaborations

We started 2021 with a welcome new arrival: our new Sports Project Manager, Jared Cahners. He’s well known as “the Frisbee Guy” in Siem Reap for organizing weekly ultimate frisbee games and he speaks Khmer (the local language), which makes him the perfect person for the job! Jared got stuck straight in, meeting with government schools to try to extend the reach of our program. We’ve got 6 primary schools onboard for this year and are working to get secondary schools involved soon. Physical education and sporting activities are not generally available through government schools, but with our team running regular sessions at different facilities, we will be able to promote healthy, active lifestyles and teach important skills to many more students.

Goals for Girls

Our Goals for Girls initiative, which promotes gender equality and female empowerment through sport, is also back up and running. From October, coaches were delivering sessions to 10 girls just from the Helping Hands School, but with other schools reopening, we have been inviting girls from the wider area to join and are already up to 15 participants. Through these workshops, we have witnessed these young women grow in confidence and start to use their voices. Several students have become outspoken with their opinions on gender roles, and have expressed a desire to achieve a higher level of education than that of their parents.

We couldn’t do this without your generosity, so thank you for your continued support. We’re excited to see how our projects and collaborations continue to grow over the coming months and to share more news soon!

Please keep in mind the upcoming Little-by-Little Campaign which will run from 8^th to 12^th March. GlobalGiving will 50% match every donation under $50 received during that week, and will also match any new recurring donations! We know times are hard, but if you do wish to donate, doing so between 8^th and 12^th March will help your generosity to go even further. Please share our project with friends and family, to help us to empower even more Cambodian children through sports.

Our "Goals for Girls" Team

Our new sports programme manager - Jared Cahners

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Oct 20, 2020
Back in Action

By Ruairidh Fraser | Project Intern

Stretching to prepare for the day's lesson!

HHC School Programme

We’re happy to report that we are now seeing some light at the end of this pandemic-shaped tunnel! As of September 7^th, almost 6 months after mandatory school closures brought Cambodian education to a nationwide halt, we have finally been permitted to resume most normal operations at our Helping Hands School, our first focal point for our Sports Programme, and we are proud to say that attendance was back up to 95% attendance from just two weeks after reopening.

The staff have wasted no time in resuming and expanding the sports programme at HHC. After six months of limited home-based, socially distanced learning, it is refreshing to see the courts once again filled with games, drills and matches. At present, the program’s main focus is on our ‘Goals for Girls’ initiative, which promotes women’s empowerment via sport. The program has been training twenty young women aged between 16-19 as coaches and referees, placing them in positions of leadership and responsibility that defy conventional gender roles in Cambodia. As the country emerges from virus restrictions, they’ll soon be able to put their skills to use, organizing and managing larger matches amongst the wider community.

Looking Forward

Whilst uncertainty for the future remains, we are deeply proud that the commitment to sports education shown by our students, their families, and community leaders, has risen above the turmoil and doubt sewn by the Covid-19 pandemic. Whatever the coming months may bring, sports will be a positive force, be that by via lifelong lessons in teamwork and leadership or by simply providing some relief from the ever-changing stresses of rural life in Cambodia.

And as always, thank you for your continued, invaluable support. If you would like to donate, and we hope you do, please visit our page! You can also subscribe to our newsletter for regular Globalteer updates regarding this and all of our other projects!

Football drills!

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