By Navamita Mukherjee | Manager, Development and Communications
Last year, our girls from Government Kulsumpura High School participated in the under 14 Reliance Youth Foundation Tournament and qualified for the semi-final. Their talent was recognized at this tournament and they were given the opportunity to play at the School Football League (SFL) organized by Hyderabad Football Academy. The registration fee of Rs. 10,000 was waived off for the Kulsumpura teams as they were specially recognized and invited. The girls brought us pride by conquering the tournament with the 1st place trophy after competing against 5 international school teams! This is one of their biggest victories.
The football frenzy at Kulsumpura began as an extra-curricular activity for students to engage in and develop certain values and mindsets such as discipline, punctuality, regularity to school, amongst others.The frenzy was not limited to the Teach For India classrooms but also encouraged students from other classes to join in the fun of the sport. Little did we know that it would gain such impetus across international schools as well.
The challenges our girls faced in the run up to this tournament were many including lack of support from parents to play sports, lack of infrastructure and sports equipment, no sports shoes as they could not afford it, no coach who trained them every day, etc. And yet we saw them play with such high spirits with or without shoes, a coach or even a proper ground! The team members showed up every morning before school and even stayed back after school to train independently. They also trained during holidays and vacations to make the most of their time.The boys and the girls played with and against each other and relied mostly on peer learning to develop their skills. While we saw them competing with each other, we never witnessed a gender bias, in fact both boys and girls treated each other as competent sports persons.
These girls demonstrated immense resilience, determination and passion. This made 3 of our girls Pavani, Soumya and Anusha qualify for the National under 17 Telangana State Team.
Such accomplishments leaves us with immense hope and possibility of what a girl child is capable of doing when she is encouraged to pursue her dreams.
By Navamita Mukherjee | Manager, Development and Communications
By Navamita Mukherjee | Manager, Development and Communications
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