Open Football Community

We have been keeping busy as always, both maintaining our ongoing projects and creating new ones. Our new project, Open Football Community (OFC), is in response to the needs of refugees as we try to deliver our core mission of compassion, dignity, and humanity. Open Football Community started in June 2022 and has been a huge success so far! Our long-time staff member, Nikos, was asked to team up with Sékou, a professional football player from Guinea, to help coach his team of 15 unaccompanied minors. Two months later, our team has now grown to over 70 minors from over 3 different countries.

Our program cultivates personal growth through sports by implementing our three pillars - community, skills, and mental health. Guided by these qualities, we provide a holistic opportunity to not only enhance football skills, but receive training to complete a referee/coach certification. We will support them academically as well as facilitate workshops conducted by mental health experts. Lastly, we strive to promote conversations between the Greek and refugee communities to fight stigma.

We have football training twice a week where we create a friendly environment around football. Our first tournament was held on July 30th, and we are excited to see the dedication and love for the game in these young athletes! We want to enhance football skills, techniques, and knowledge among our players as well as promote sportsmanship and teamwork to help develop hard- and soft-skills. It is further important to us to aim to reduce the stigma surrounding girls and women playing football.

As you might guess, we need funding to sustain this project. This month we are launching a crowdfunding campaign for Open Football Community through Go get funding!

Please consider donating

here or our website,

and share our call for support with your family, friends, and community!