What's been happening?

 “Being child all about
                 fun & laughter” 

 
Recent crime statistics are out and as always, the Cape
Flats is leading the pack. Drug related crimes are sky high;
as an example; Manenberg had 1556 drug related crimes,
which is up by 406 since last year. Some of you may be
unaware that Heideveld falls under the Manenberg police
station and these figures are only reported crimes.  

Where are we going? It is scary but Mario's Football Academy is certainly
creating hope and light for a better future. We believe we
are spot on with our approach.  
   
 
 Life Skills

We are using gardening as
one of our life skills
components.  Planting trees
symbolizes new life. 
Gardening teaches
responsibility, a skill which
we believe our members
needs to learn, in order to
achieve their goals in life.



  
Sports 

We have had exceptional accomplishments, both on the soccer
field and on the rope skipping pitch.  Our teams are positioned
fairly high on the logs, let’s hope they bring some medals home...

Our rope skipping team participated in the Western Province
Trials, held at the Western Cape Sports School in Kuils River.
They really made us proud, winning 1st, 2nd and 3rd place.

 
 Education

Working with Woodlands Primary,
Heideveld's local school,
has opened our eyes to a new level of
thinking.  It is tiring and one does
become despondent as it is really the
responsibility of the government to
look after the schools. The reality is
that we cannot wait for the government
as the need is too great!

With the help of JDI and
The Backpack, we managed
to upgrade one of the toilets.
The school has 463 learners
and only 3 toilets in working
order.  We have refurbished seven
classrooms that have been
vandalized in the past. We
converted some of these
rooms into a small indoor
gym, a study room and an
art room, to be used by both
Mario's Football Academy and the school.

A little story 

The boy in the picture
comes from a very
difficult background. 
Just to give you an idea,
several of his family
members have been in
jail.  He would have
followed the same path,
as these were his only role
models.  No one really
cares about the little
ones who smells and begs
for food and we always
blame it on the parents.
Yes, we can blame the
parents but who says
they had good parenting
themselves? Makes you
think… 

With the help of JDI, we
managed to enroll him
in a crèche and now he
has seen a different
environment.  He is
developing and he could
not have done it without
an opportunity, this is what we are
trying to give more children
in Mario's Football Academy,
an opportunity to develop into
healthy happy human beings.      

READ MORE ABOUT MARIO'S FOOTBALL ACADEMY HERE:
website