School is not a game, especially if you were raised in an African household. True story: in middle school, I came home with a 95% on my math test and my parents asked me where the other 5% was. Tough love is the theme when it came to academics in my house. Interestingly enough, for my Nigerian parents, and many families in Africa, education is life or death. With high unemployment rates and poverty plaguing several regions in the continent, most people don’t bank on any “safety nets” (trust funds, birthday money from grandma and grandpa) to bail them out during hard times. There is simply no room for error when it comes to millions of these individuals. When you do the math, this leaves many kids with the smallest opportunity for leisure and extracurricular activities. And that’s not okay.
This complex obstacle is what makes us take problem-solving to the next level. Here’s our blueprint: All We Are aims to provide relief and an outlet for kids to just be, kids. We allow students to kick back and enjoy access to soccer equipment and gear to show off their talent on the field. This allows students to blow off steam from their academic pressure while gifting them with a chance to receive an academic scholarship. With high poverty and unemployment, we don’t want to risk having any of our kids in Uganda turn to unhealthy alternatives. Role models, teachers, and especially coaches yield tremendous influence over these children. So, we’re channeling that impact into something productive that just so happens to be fun. Here’s your chance to impact someone’s life:
Collect: Dig through your basement and garage (fight off the dust bunnies if you have to) and pull out some of your old soccer equipment
Send: No excuses, we have members from All We Are all over the U.S. to help you find the right shipping location near you to reach us
Identify: We do our homework and find out which organizations are traveling to developing nations that can take our gear
Play: Once the gear arrives it goes straight to the kids. We then give guidance on how to set up camps and tournaments.
Let’s make a difference.