There has been a 400% increase in attendance of official Barça summer schools (FCB Camp) with respect to last year. More than 18,000 children are enjoying the summer camps organised by FC Barcelona.
The Barça model is expanding around the world, and the FCB Camps are the finest example of this
growing interest in learning more about the Barça model through hands-on experience.
Objectives of the campuses
The official FC Barcelona campuses offer the opportunity to
learn about football skills and tactics in accordance with the same methods that are used with the
Barça youth teams.
Children registering for the FCB Camps take part in parallel training, leisure and recreation
activities related with football and Barça.
The camps encourage coexistence between school age boys and girls from different origins,
cultures and concerns, but who all share the same passion for football and Barça.
The coaches do not only work on football issues, but also ensure the children get proper
hygiene and diet. One of the aims of these campuses is to transmit the same values that FC
Barcelona represents.
Official campuses
In Catalonia, Barça organises what are called Campus Sport (INEF
Barcelona,Reus, L’Atmella de Mar, Tona i Prades). Also in Mallorca.
In the rest of Spain, the campuses are located in Candás (Asturias), Quintanar de la Orden
(La Mancha), Fornelos de Montes (Galicia) and La Nucia (Alicante).
Barça also has international campuses in different countries: Guatemala, Costa Rica, Panama,
England (London), Luxemburg, Italy, Croatia, USA (Los Angeles and Miami), Japan, Korea and Ireland.
In the coming months, there will also be FCB Camps in Colombia, El Salvador, India, Vietnam,
Thailand, Singapore, Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia and other cities of the USA.
All campuses that have this logo on their websites are official FC Barcelona campuses. These
campuses are always redirected to an official address:
www.fcbcamp.cat
the name of the campus
The logo and official image of the campus is also a means of checking that the FCB Camp is
official and valid. There is also an email address that you can use if you have any doubts or
queries in relation to the official FC Barcelona campuses:
fcbescola.international@fcbarcelona.cat
Strategic locations
The choice of venues of FC Barcelona official campuses is based on strategic criteria.
The director general of FCB Escola, Xevi Marcé, understands that “we’d like to
get everywhere, but that’s impossible. Barça looks for strategic locations based on the
relevance of the places, the synergies with sponsors and also to promote the brand”.
Marcé highlights what is so unique about Barça’s camps: “we don’t sell the
brand, we control the sporting aspects and the values. From the moment the children arrive to the
moment they leave, we are not only interested in what they learn technically, but also the way they
behave, their habits, the way they deal with colleagues and monitors…
Marcé feels FCB Camps are “the extension of the values and football coaching used at La
Masia, we export them to the rest of the world by meticulously controlling things from Barcelona,
where FCB Escola has its headquarters”.
The youth coaching factory
Marcé and Jordi Rovira were the main men behind the creation of FCB Escola in 2003. The
School grew out of the Barça Social Tournament, which produced such players as Gerard Piqué and
Víctor Valdés.
In these eight years, 65 children have progressed from the FCB Escola to the club’s own
youth system. 14 coaches have also been promoted during this period, including most recently Jordi
Pérez, who after working at the FCB Escola is now the coach of Barça’s Benjamí D team.
Given all the above, Marcé is quite right to describe the FCB Escola as a ‘youth
coaching factory’.