No Barriers at Home: empowering young people through football
By Esther
Big Ideas is a community engagement company offering projects across London and the UK. Last year they launched No Barriers 2020, a youth led football project designed to run alongside the UEFA EURO 2020 tournament and empower young people to hold football tournaments that raised awareness of a barrier in their community. Since the COVID-19 lockdown No Barriers 2020 has been redesigned as No Barriers at Home - providing short videos and creative exercises for young people who are distance learning.
No Barriers at Home is supported by the Mayor of London and lets young people discover twelve inspirational footballers, past and present, who have challenged barriers in their lives including gender inequality, racism, mental health and disability. Using the accompanying worksheets, young people have been creating incredible creative responses to these Champions’ stories. From writing moving poems about London Champion Tyrone Mings’ childhood in a homeless shelter, and the racism he faced on the pitch in Bulgaria, to designing cross culture football shirts, the responses have been amazing! Young people can access the project directly on the Big Ideas site and teachers and parents can request the Learning Pack. One teacher working on the project said:
“I am delighted with the resources from No Barriers, they are excellent and are showing the students the other side of football, which they are shielded from. It also, I hope, will encourage them to follow their dreams.’
The project culminates in a Create Your Own Champion Challenge, asking young people to show the world who inspires them and makes a positive change to the people in their community. Big Ideas will be sharing all of the Champion Cards online and across social media between June 12 and July 12 (when the EUROs would have taken place). If you’d like to nominate your own Community Champion click here to find out more!
No Barriers is funded by the Greater London Authority and Football Association of Ireland.
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