Faces of football with Petra Landers and the Sparkassenstiftung

On Wednesday, October 9, 2024, an all-day event took place at GISA as part of the AHK's “German Days”. This was in cooperation with the Sparkassenstiftung and “Faces of football e.V.”. The former German national soccer player Petra Landers has dedicated her social project to the promotion of girls' soccer in Africa: A total of 30 girls aged 7-12 took part in the workshop. Soccer meets the world of finance - Sparkassenstiftung supports this project and its employees provided information and inspiration on the subject of money/saving/etc. In addition to some pupils from our school, representatives from our partner NGO Universal Wonderful Street Academy and our neighboring school in Nima, the Youngsters, also took part.

The eventful day started early for 30 girls from three different schools. First, jerseys were distributed by Petra Landers from VFL Bochum. All the girls received a jersey, shorts and socks. Then it was time to get started. The first group of 15 players from the three schools started training at around 9 a.m., where many different games were played to motivate the girls and help them get to know each other. This was followed by various exercises with the ball. Meanwhile, the others took part in the savings bank program. There, the schoolgirls immersed themselves in the world of finance and cooperative banking and learned about the importance of saving.

After about an hour, the groups swapped. Around 11 a.m., both training sessions were over and all the girls were welcomed by Jennifer Amankwaa Sarpong GFA Womens Development Manager, who encouraged them in their vision to play soccer. Premier League player Elizabeth from the Lady Berrys also spoke briefly about how she got into soccer and what inspired her. A few photos were then taken before the tournament started. Two teams from each school, six teams in total, competed and played short seven minute games, each team against each other.

Lunch was served to all the players at around 1pm. This was donated by an initiative of Sparkassenstiftung employees and the caterer Northridge Café added drinks and a dessert. After a large portion of rice balls and groundnut soup, we were able to start the second part of the tournament with renewed energy. There were seven more games on the schedule.

The winners were the two Youngsters teams, who put in great performances with two draws and three wins. But the players from the other teams also excelled themselves and overcame emotional and physical challenges. At the end, there was an award ceremony where all the girls received a certificate, sweets and a medal. It was also a special highlight that they were allowed to keep the jerseys they had worn for the tournament.

It was a great event and a great opportunity to empower the girls in very different areas of life (soccer and finance). Many thanks to the Sparkassenstiftung for the interesting workshop and many thanks to Judith Doe and the girls from the Universal Wonderful Street Academy and to our neighbors Stephen Kofi Ampiah, Valentine Atiso, Raphael Agbanyoh und Jacob Mensah with the girls from the Youngsters.