Girls need sports. Young women who play live better; many studies suggest that increasing girls’ participation in athletics has a direct and positive effect on their education, careers, and self-confidence.
Fewer girls around the world today are restricted to the “feminine” pursuits of painting and needlework than ever before. But even while more parents, educators, and community leaders are embracing the benefits of sports, girls are still six times more likely to drop out of a sport than boys.
That figure must change. And it might change faster than we could have ever anticipated, thanks to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who is working to harness the power of sports and international exchanges that empower girls around the world.
Last month, Clinton announced the launch of the Women’s World Cup Initiative: Empowering Women and Girls Through Sports, a joint initiative by the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs and the Secretary’s Office of Global Women’s Issues. Clinton’s official announcement kick-started the 40th anniversary celebration of Title IX, the 1972 U.S. law offering equal academic and athletic opportunity for both men and women.
“I am a huge supporter of Title IX, because I came of age before we had a Title IX,” said Secretary Clinton. “And I played sports of all kinds — not very well — so I have no illusions about what Title IX would have meant to me.
“But I loved sports, and I was raised in a very sports-oriented family. I was lucky enough to go to public schools in my town that had a lot of girl sports.
“It was quite surprising to me, as I learned more about what was available elsewhere, that there weren’t those same opportunities. I was delighted that, by the time my daughter came along, there were so many more ways that young women and girls could participate in sports in our country.”
The Women’s World Cup Initiative offers more ways for young women to be active members of the sporting community, especially in parts of the world where sports are a male-dominated affair. Its Sports Visitor Program invites teenage female soccer players and their coaches worldwide to participate in a ten-day exchange, giving them the chance to meet with the U.S. Women’s National Soccer Team as well as community organizations that provide sports opportunities for youth with disabilities and mentorships through a soccer and literacy initiative.
The Sports Envoy Programs, a partnership with U.S. Soccer, sends former professional players abroad to lead soccer clinics and engage young audiences through the power of sports. This year’s class included former Women’s National Team players Brianna Scurry and Amanda Cromwell.
A third empowerment program is the International Visitor Leadership Program, led by The Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs. This program already led a parallel 10-day international exchange for five sports management professionals, emphasizing the administration of global women’s and girls’ soccer programs. Participants exchanged best practices for managing sports and recreation programs as well as solutions to promote leadership, teamwork, respect, and self-awareness among adolescent girls.
There couldn’t be a better time to launch this initiative. Women’s soccer has sprinted into the mainstream media spotlight. The 2011 Women’s World Cup final earned the highest television rating for any soccer game on an ESPN network and was the sixth most-watched soccer telecast ever in the United States.
Complementing growing interest in the sport is a team of talented and charismatic footballing ambassadors including, of course, the United States’ Ali Krieger, Alex Morgan, Hope Solo, and former Changemakers judge Abby Wambach (who, at the age of four, was transferred to a boys’ youth team after scoring 27 goals in just three games).
While women’s soccer is getting unprecedented exposure in the United States, from Good Morning America to the season premiere of HBO's Entourage, it is quickly gaining international recognition with the help of superstars like Brazil’s Marta and Japan’s Homare Sawa.
“For me, sports is, in and of itself, terrific, but it's also a symbol for so much of what we want to see in the world,” Clinton said. “[Let’s] encourage even more people to get behind women and girls in sports and to give young women a chance to compete on the playing field, to discharge that incredible energy that they want to put into being the best they can be, and that we see more and more women around the world being given the opportunities to live up to their own God-given potential.”
To paraphrase the American sportswriter Grantland Rice, it is not whether you win or lose, but rather how you play the game of life. The Women’s World Cup Initiative gives young women around the world the opportunity to play the game the right way — training a generation of winners, both on and off the pitch, with the skills, talent, and heart to change their worlds.
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