Indochina Starfish Foundation of Cambodia Accredited by Coaches Across Continents
CAC has worked alongside ISF staff, coaches and young leaders since 2013. We have seen first-hand their growth when it comes to integrating play-based activities with key social and educational learning methodologies. Many ISF coaches have joined the CAC team over the years to facilitate Purposeful Play trainings for other leaders in communities beyond the ISF home in Phnom Penh. And after several years of learning and evolving together in partnership we are delighted to present ISF as a CAC accredited organization in using Purposeful Play and Education Outside the Classroom to achieve the UN Sustainable Development Goals.
Niñas Sin Miedo: the first CAC Accredited Organization of 2021
Based in Soacha and Bogotá, Colombia, Niñas Sin Miedo (NSM) is a female-led organization serving girls and young women from underserved communities. Using the bicycle as their central tool, they provide opportunities for girls to learn and express their voices, their ideas and their power. They focus on supporting the girls to address specific challenges and issues like sexual and reproductive health and rights, and they provide endless opportunities for the girls to play and take ownership of their learning and development.
We have partnered with NSM since 2017 and it has been a privilege to witness and support their evolution. They are one of the most socially-conscious organizations in the world and our global network has the honor of learning and sharing with these incredible women. One of the NSM coordinators was a Michael Johnson Young Leader in 2018 and then later traveled alongside CAC to deliver on-field Education Outside the Classroom trainings all over Colombia.
On this International Women’s Day 2021, there are few groups who embody the #ChooseToChallenge theme like Niñas Sin Miedo. We are thrilled to announce Niñas Sin Miedo as an accredited organization in using Purposeful Play to achieve the UN Sustainable Development Goals.
Sport for Gender Equality With GIZ
CAC is pleased to announce that we are partnering with Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) to deliver a curriculum and training of teachers on the subject of ‘Sport for Gender Equality’. Over the coming months we will be designing specific Sport for Gender Equality curriculum, running online teacher trainings for sport for development instructors in the GIZ network and providing feedback and evaluations to assess the impact of the project. In particular this will focus on GIZ priority countries including Colombia, Western Balkans, Uganda, Morocco, and Indonesia. It is an honour to be working officially with GIZ having had many interactions with them and their sport for development experts in the past.
About GIZ
GIZ work to shape a future worth living around the world. This is GIZ’s vision and long-term goal.
GIZ provides tailor-made, cost-efficient and effective services for sustainable development.
About Coaches Across Continents (CAC) and Creating Legacies 17 (CL17) Influence
Coaches Across Continents is a global collaboration of communities, organizations, and coaches on six continents that impact the UN SDGs and the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.
CL17 Influence, a division of CAC, advises governments, confederations, global NGOs, policy makers, and key donors to create their global legacies, design policies, and address the UN SDGs.
CAC Accredits 2 More Organizations
September 10, 2019. Coaches Across Continents is proud to announce two more organizations who have been accredited in Purposeful Play. GOALS Haiti and Slum Soccer (India) have demonstrated organizational growth and capacity-building through partnership with CAC to create legacies of social change based on the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals through Purposeful Play. They are being recognized as model organizations within CAC’s global partnership network; a network that covers 60 countries, impacting over 16 million children. They join ACER (Brasil), GOALS Armenia, and training4changeS (South Africa) as the only CAC Accredited organizations globally.
80% of CAC’s accredited organizations are shortlisted for the 2019 Beyond Sport Awards
In January, 2019 Coaches Across Continents launched the world’s first-ever Organizational Accreditation Program in Purposeful Play and Education Outside the Classroom. For accreditation, these groups engaged with their CAC Process Consultants to develop their organizations through our 28 Strategic Resources that include: Creating a Theory of Change Model, Designing a Women’s Rights Policy, Monitoring & Evaluation Process Consultancy, Child and Community-Based Protection Training, and more. Becoming an accredited organization improves that organizations ability to create sustainable change based on the UNSDGs, find and secure funding and award opportunities, enhance brand reputation, and more. Accredited partners will receive additional support from Coaches Across Continents including substantial joint-funding opportunities, educational travel and leadership development, global recognition, and high-level networking.
Slum Soccer has been a CAC-partner since 2011 where they have grown from impacting 500 disadvantaged youth in Nagpur to directly impacting 90,000 youth nationwide. Some of their most recent initiatives involve leading the Education and Sport sector by designing curriculums and programs to teach children about various aspects of Menstrual Health, along with LGBTQI related topics supported by Streetfootballworld’s Common Goal initiative. Slum Soccer was named the first-ever FIFA For Diversity Award winner in 2016 and are shortlisted this year for a Beyond Sport award in UNSDG#3: Good Health and Well-Being for their Shakti Girls initiative.
GOALS Haiti advances youth leadership through soccer and education to create stronger, healthier communities in rural Haiti. They are shortlisted for this year’s Beyond Sport Awards UNSDG#3: Good Health and Well-Being for their Aktive Jèn Yo program that utilizes soccer in Haiti to engage youth and their families in programs that emphasize education, health and the environment to improve their quality of life on a daily basis, and are a prior winner at Beyond Sport (2016).
Congratulations!
To learn more about Coaches Across Continents Accreditation Program: Click Here
To partner with Coaches Across Continents or support an organizations’ accreditation,
Creating Child Protection Globally
September 3, 2019. CAC has launched a three-month campaign working with our community partners in 60+ countries to create internationally approved Child Protection Policies that are child-, coach-, and organization-friendly.
- Education: Informing stakeholders based on the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child
- Child Safe: Having children understand their rights by playing CAC Purposeful Play games, understanding who they can talk to, and providing services for the child should any breach of their rights occur
- Coach Safe: Training practitioners on best practices for safe coaching
- Organization Safe: Developing procedures and policies that guide the entire organizations, from preventative measures to protect children to reporting procedures if violations occur
- Community Safe: Engaging key stakeholders on Child Safety and Protection measures and bringing CAC’s Theory of Change and the communities’ new and improved Child Protection to life
On Universal Children’s Day, November 20th, the CAC network will celebrate the culture change in global Child Protection that moves communities from simply having a child protection policy document to having communities who have comprehensive and friendly practices engaging all stakeholders to protect children as part of CAC’s Community Empowerment to Ensure All Human Rights.
“We are proud that CAC is leading Child Protection globally.”
– Nick Gates, CAC Founder
CAC is a pioneering member for the International Safeguards for Children in Sport, has published papers on Child Protection and Peace and Child Rights, is on three UNICEF working groups for Child Protection, and is currently working with governments and NGOs on 6 continents to develop stronger child protection policies, procedures, and cultures.
Partnerships for the GOALS
The CAC team have been in Armenia this last week, working in Partnership with the Kansas National Guard and GOALS Armenia. Using our #PurposefulPlay curriculum, we delivered a 3 day summer camp high up on the beautiful mountains of Yenokavan, in Northern Armenia for local children of military families. Our Goal for this was to focus on UNSDG #5 Gender Equality whilst also introducing #EducationOutsideTheClassroom to young people who had never experienced it before. There were 44 children in attendance with an ideal 50/50 split of girls and boys.
The summer camp was a lot of fun and using the amazing story of Brazilian international football player and role model Marta, we were able to have in-depth conversations about the harmful impact of gender roles and we also had discussions about how we can be more inclusive in our schools and communities.
The brilliant GOALS Armenia facilitators played many games from our ASK For Choice curriculum, creating fun and safe environment where the participants could share their thoughts and feelings. We also introduced a lot of team-building activities, with one participant stating “I made many friends thanks to this camp and have gained a lot of skills like how to build my confidence and work as a team.”
The Kansas National Guard were also a major part of this camp – the 4 officers played a game with the children so they could learn more about life in the army in America, and also through this game their stereotypes were challenged when they learned the officer ‘in charge’ was the female officer. A special thanks to Major Solander for not only playing a major part in helping make this camp possible, but for sharing her inspiring story of being a female in the military and the challenges she faced.
This camp was a massive success, mostly down to the fact we had three organisations, from different countries and different backgrounds, coming together to put on a world class camp for the children and young people of Armenia. This was UNSDG #17 in action.
