Girls Kick It! Gweno (chicken) Project
To provide the girls and women with fitness programs and sustainable, income-generating opportunities through a co-operative poultry house.
About You
Contact Information
Title
Ms.
First name
Anna
Last name
Phillips
Your job title
Girls Kick It! Coordinator
Name of your organization
Global Youth Partnership for Africa
Organization type
NGO
Annual budget/currency
This field has not been completed
Location
Project Street Address
Paicho, Internally Displaced Persons Camp
Project City
Gulu
Project Province/State
Gulu
Project Postal/Zip Code
Uganda
Project Country
Uganda
Your idea
Choose your sport: (check all that apply)
Soccer/Football
If you chose "other" for Sport, please define in 1-2 words below
What approach does your initiative incorporate?
Capacity Building
Year the initiative began (yyyy)
2006
Paste your video code here:
If your project has a website, paste the web address here:
Plot your innovation within the discovery framework:
Barrier
Lack of parity in facilities, equipment and funding
Insight
Embed sports with other activities
This field has not been completed. (333 words or less)
Name Your Project
Girls Kick It! Gweno (chicken) Project
Describe Your Idea
To provide the girls and women with fitness programs and sustainable, income-generating opportunities through a co-operative poultry house.
Innovation
What is your signature innovation, your new idea, in one sentence?
To provide the girls and women with fitness programs and sustainable, income-generating opportunities through a co-operative poultry house.
How many people does your innovation serve or plan to serve? Exactly who will benefit?
Since 2006, our program has served more than 300 girls. Our focus demographic is girls between the ages of 10 and 24 who live in IDP camps in northern Uganda. Forty girls will directly benefit from the poultry house, and the revenues will grow the program to 160 new girls. The impacts will reach the larger community through inspiring diversification of business and thus spurring competition. Moreover, the community will be invited to participate in soccer tournaments and life skills trainings.
Do you have any existing partnerships? If so, please list and describe.
We have partnered with several organizations such as The Kids League-Uganda to support on-going efforts to build life skills for youth across the country. In addition, our staff has participated in workshops facilitated by the Care International Sports for Social Change Network, and interacted with key leadership from the Homeless World Cup that have helped GYPA to understand how to more effectively weave in soccer and education into our programs.
In which sector do these partners work? (Check all that apply)
Citizen sector (non profits, NGOs) .
How do you implement your innovation and apply it to the challenge/problem you are addressing?
Our implementation approach is two fold: 1) Through our umbrella organization, the Global Youth Partnership for Africa, we will provide budget oversight and management training needed for the poultry house; 2) Through our local soccer coaches we organize practices, trainings and tournaments that incorporate life skills and team-building. In addition, local leadership within the Paicho IDP Camps will follow-up on the impacts and outcomes of these efforts and report to GYPA Uganda staff.
Impact
Provide one sentence describing your impact/intended impact
Sport programs coupled with income-generating opportunities will empower the women of northern Uganda to improve their lives and their community.
What does impact/success look like? Please list any tangible measures of the impact of your innovation
Paicho IDP camp is home to more than 16,000 people who were forcibly relocated from surrounding villages. While we realize that not every person will be served directly by our programs, we believe through the girls and women involved in the programs the larger community will reap the benefits. As a result of our program: More girls and women would be trained as soccer and life skills coaches in Paicho and from nearby IDP camps; Members of Girls Kick It! would manage and maintain a poultry house and eventually train others; Income generated from the sale of chickens would enable team members to pay for items such as school fees for themselves or their children. These successes would continue to boost morale and enable new opportunities for the young girls and women to realize their dreams.
Additionally, the team has expressed a strong desire to set aside funds raised from the poultry farm to host the largest women’s soccer tournament in northern Uganda during the summer of 2009.
Is there a chance that your project could change policy (within an institution or government)?
Our efforts are grassroots by nature and we believe that change comes from the bottom-up. Our examples could serve as an example to primary and secondary schools in the northern region to bring our innovative approaches into their curriculum and/or for after school programming.
Aside from financial sustainability, how do you plan to grow the initiative or expand your intended impact?
The team conceptualized the poultry house and designed the building’s structure and constitution on the program. The team will ensure the sustainability and distribution of profit to its members. The Paicho team leader will provide bi-weekly updates and status reports to the Girls Kick It Program Director, who will visit the project monthly to evaluate progress. A portion of the profits will be set aside each month to provide for team activities, coaches salaries, equipment and tournament costs.
This Entry is about (Issues)
Sustainability
How is your initiative financed (or how do you expect your initiative will be financed)?
To date, our initiative is financed through the fundraising efforts of the Global Youth Partnership for Africa in the United States. The funds have been raised through a variety of ways that include: university events, small fundraisers, letter-writing campaigns and media and news articles that have attracted interest from new friends and donors. However, we realize this is not a sustainable approach since we believe that in order for this program to be truly long-term and sustainable, the local community must take real ownership of the funds generated. Therefore, while GYPA will continue to raise awareness and funds as needed, our intention is to raise enough seed funds so that they program gets up on its own two feet.
Financing source
Annual budget
Out annual budget is: under $5,000
Annual revenue generated
Annual revenue generated: $0
Number of staff (full-time, part-time, volunteers)
GYPA Staff (USA) 2
GYPA Staff (Israel) 1
GYPA Staff (Uganda) 3
Part-time 3
What are the main barriers to financing your initiative, and how do you plan to address these barriers?
Main barriers are new donor sources and not yet able to identify local funding sources in Uganda. It is often difficult to raise funds for projects that are in remote regions outside of the scope and focus of foundations and international NGOs. We plan to address these barriers through: expanding our income generating program and thus, reducing dependency on outside donors, and two, through establishing relationships with local small businesses and markets who are looking to purchase poultry.
What are the major challenges with regards to partnerships?
This field has not been completed. (500 characters or less)
The Story
What stage is your project?
Idea phase .
What was the motivation or defining moment that led to create this innovation? Tell us the story.
Girls Kick It! has been running for over 2 years and has thus far created two girls’ soccer teams in Northern Uganda, as well as a team in Namuwongo, a community of displaced persons living in the capital city of Kampala. Girls Kick It has reached more than three hundred girls; providing them with athletic games, team leadership building activities and weekly soccer practice. GYPA has organized a mixed gender team to represent Uganda at the annual Homeless World Cup that took place in Cape Town in 2006 and Denmark in 2007. GYPA has organized its first all female delegation to the upcoming Women’s Homeless World Cup in Australia.
I have seen the powerful impact that sports can have in the lives of women who have suffered devastating atrocities. Girls are now stepping on to soccer fields that they had learned were only for men, and using soccer to push their minds and bodies further than anyone expected either to go. Now I hope to take the program a step further by giving these women the tools and skills to tangibly improve their lives and the lives of their children. This poultry house will teach them finite business skills and provide them with the much-needed funds for their and their children’s school fees. This program will not be a handout, but a mechanism that these female athletes will control. Girls Kick It! is now seeking to make program community sustained rather than dependent on donations. This would allow tremendous community growth and gender empowerment.
Please tell us about the social innovator behind this initiative
Anna Phillips is a graduate of the George Washington University. She is a Fulbright Scholar in Uganda and Founder and Coordinator of Girls Kick It! Defying the odds, Anna was the first girl wrestler on her middle and later high school teams, determined to prove to herself and to her community that girls can excel in a “boy’s game.” Anna knew that strong female athletes often nurture strong women leaders, and women leaders can encourage girls to become stronger women on and off the field.
(Optional) To be eligible for an additional prize, please select age range
18 – 22
 | 176 weeks agoRenata Affonso said: Anna, There is a lot of demand for free range eggs & chickens plus organic food from european markets. Although built for the local ... about this Competition Entry. - read more > |
| 176 weeks agoziba cranmer said: Hi Anna, Check out the following site: www.gamechangers.architectureforhumanity.org - if you have a vision for how to "change the game" ... about this Competition Entry. - read more > |
| 177 weeks agoAnna Phillips said: Great to hear from you Kevin! The teams here are getting stronger everyday and looking forward to their first tournament in 2009 next ... about this Competition Entry. - read more > |
| 177 weeks agoAnna Phillips said: Thank for your comment Holly! Sustainability is the key to successful and long-term programs in rural Africa. The community needs to ... about this Competition Entry. - read more > |
| 177 weeks agoKevin Carroll said: Hello Anna! Since I'm familiar with your outstanding work in Uganda, I'm not surprised to see another fascinating approach from you to ... about this Competition Entry. - read more > |
| 177 weeks agoHolly Ramer said: Hi Anna, I love this idea. I specifically drawn to it as it attempts to make the program self sustaining. How do you choose the ... about this Competition Entry. - read more > |
| 181 weeks agoAnna Phillips submitted this idea. |
