FCBARCELONA.CAT

01.03.2010 11:20

FCB Foundation in Mali

www.fcbarcelona.cat

The FC Barcelona Foundation has held a sports training programme in Mali with the main aim of promoting the equality of the sexes through sport.

The FC Barcelona Foundation held the Sports Solidarity Conference (SSC) from 22nd to 26th February in Bamako, the capital of Mali. This is the first time the initiative has been tried in Mali and only the third in Africa since 2006, following on from Morocco and Senegal. The SSC is a programme for the training of sports instructors in order to enable them to use sport as a vehicle for education and social coexistence.

53 teachers and instructors

The theory classes were held in the classrooms of the XICS centre in Bamako, and were given by former Barça defender Julio Alberto Moreno, Cati Gómez from the University of Vic and sports instructor Hervé Blanchard. The course was attended by 53 people, most of them teachers or instructors from the XICS centre, the local schools in the Téléphone Sans Fils district –one of the poorest in the city – and the Salesian Père Michel centre, with which the Foundation cooperates. There were also two teachers from each of the XICS centres in Morocco and Burkina Faso.

120 children aged 8 to 16

The practical sessions were held on the pitches of the Père Michel centre and were enjoyed by 120 children (60 boys and 60 girls). The main objectives of the programme are the teaching of training methods, the equality of the sexes in sport in Africa, where girls are often excluded from sports by cultural attitudes, and the forging of closer links between the local schools and the Foundation’s XICS centre.