We have programmes across three regions of sub-Saharan Africa: East, Southern and West Africa.
All of our programmes involve working with local partner organisations to support their football coaches and peer educators to deliver effective interactive football-based curricula with young people and Key Populations (those considered Most-At-Risk) in their communities. We have programmes supporting specific groups, such as Adolescent Girls and Young Women, prisoners or Young People Living With HIV. Other programmes focus on specific outcomes that are important to the local community’s response to HIV and Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights issues, such as encouraging young people to access voluntary HIV Testing and Counselling, or building resilience to harmful practices such as Child Marriage or Female Genital Mutilation.
Programme Structure
A typical TackleAfrica programme lasts between one and three years, with the structure roughly the same across all countries, but with the flexibility to adapt delivery as best suits the needs of our local partners and their communities. The TackleAfrica methodology of using tailored, interactive football drills is used across all our programmes but the content of each curriculum is designed specifically for the local need.
A typical structure of a TackleAfrica programme in your community consists of three “blocks” of sessions per year, comprising three training courses per year, thirty football sessions per year (three blocks of ten sessions) and three tournaments per year.
Example Block 1, roughly 14 weeks
- Week 1 – Training: 20 coaches attend a one week intensive training, Monday to Friday, full-time – a mix of classroom and field-based activities to learn the TackleAfrica methodology and relevant HIV/SRHR theory
- Weeks 2 to 6 – Delivery: coaches deliver five TackleAfrica football drills in the community over five weeks. Coaches normally work with between 20 to 30 players, primarily adolescents
- Week 7 – Refresher Day: all coaches come together for a Refresher Day for feedback and support
- Weeks 8 to 12 – Delivery: coaches deliver a further five TackleAfrica football drills in the community over five weeks
- Week 13 – Tournament: teams and the community come together for a one day football tournament where HIV/SRHR services, contraception and other services can be accessed in a youth-friendly, stigma free environment
- Week 14 – Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning: surveys, focus groups, analysis and preparation for next block
Block 2 – repeat as above
Block 3 – repeat as above and submit end of year report.
Our players
Coaches typically work with between 20 and 30 players each week, for thirty sessions a year. As a priority, coaches work with high risk groups in areas of the highest need in Sub-Saharan Africa, mostly Adolescent Girls and Young Women, Young People Living with HIV, prisoners and those living in slum or informal settlements or very rural areas with limited access to healthcare services. Most of our players are between 9 and 25 years old. Ideally, we want to reach young people before and as they become sexually active, giving young people the information, skills and confidence to take control of their Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights, and make safer, informed decisions.
Figures for April 2018 to end March 2019