More than 65 Nike employees volunteered while employees helped escort learners from their schools to the Nike Football Training Centre to coordinate games, activities and serve lunch to participants.
Learners from Batsogile, Lulama, Motjoli, Nkholi and Welizibuko primary schools and their educators joined together with several Nike athletes, including; Comrades Ultra Marathon winner Charne Bosman, South African footballer Amanda Dlamini, Alyssa Conley, Linique Prinsloo and Geraldine Pillay.
The athletes partook in football and running-inspired games as well as life coaching in order to inspire students to live more physically active lives.
“Winning the Comrades Marathon was a big dream come true for me, but it took me 24 years to achieve my dream, and you must never give up on your dreams. I want to inspire learners to believe in themselves, never give up and stay active. Get involved in as many school programmes and running activities, so that one day we can have many more running champions,” says Bosman
Building on its partnership on Alex Butterflies in 2013, Nike is now working with the Gauteng Department of Education and Sportstec Foundations to train and support primary school teachers in Soweto to provide curriculum-based Physical Education (PE) and provide extra-curricular sport activities for the local primary schools.
The objective is to make PE and sport self-sustaining in the schools, with an emphasis on creating more PE and school sport opportunities overall. The programme has so far been implemented at 17 primary schools, with 121 teachers trained and 5 100 learners reached.
“Our partnership with the Gauteng Department of Education has enabled us to build on a legacy of development work that we began in Alexandra three years ago, and bring it to Soweto where we are equipping schools with a training programme to bring PE and sport to their students,” says Nike Africa general manager, George Camara.
The Soweto Active Schools programme is the latest community investment by Nike to encourage kids to get and stay active.
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