Philadelphia Community Empowerment Through Soccer

Community Youth Soccer and Enrichment - Recreational soccer leagues, teaching soccer basics with the goal of providing safe spaces, increased exercise, learning teamwork and cooperation, and informal mentoring; - Travel teams, where children take the next step in their competitive soccer journey, playing at a higher level and building strong ties with teammates and coaches over a longer timespan; - Drop-in year-round youth recreational soccer at many sites in the community, to provide easily accessible healthy, safe opportunities to learn soccer and benefit from interacting with caring adult mentors; - Participation in a variety of community events, where our coaches support community partners by bringing soccer balls, pop-up goals and free books, to enhance the festive nature of the gathering and get books into the hands of more children. - Tournaments and other one-time soccer and enrichment opportunities ranging from end-of season family celebrations to attending professional soccer games free of charge; - Distribution of grocery store cards, backpacks, shirts and other items to provide help for needy families, with the help of partner organizations. Health and social service representatives come to our Family Day events, and we give out thousands of free books to children and their families.

Violence Prevention Our violence prevention programs, mainly for teens and young adults, focuses on providing safe, healthy, positive alternatives to engaging in counterproductive behavior, on promoting pro-social activities, on anti- violence education, and on connecting participants to needed social services. They included: 1.Our Pick-Up Soccer For Peace and Friday Night Lights activities, take place when there are fewer positive options available to youth, and include discussions of alternatives to risky behaviors involving violence and drug use, incentives for pro-social engagement and the offer to connect participants with social services. 2. Our KSC Prep after-school teen program provided academic help and social and community engagement along with soccer. Teens participated in workshops, a career/college fair, and other activities, including a Black History Month writing activity. 3. KSCs Intervention & Prevention Coordinator facilitated connection to community resources for Friday Night Lights and KSC Prep enrollees and other club participants, some of which included getting behavioral health treatment. 4. Adult league teams offered a way for people over 18 to stay involved or get involved with the organization by participating in positive, affordable soccer that also had pro-social and anti-violence educational components

General Programs - Leadership, Empowerment and Enrichment Our soccer programs are a vehicle for and a gateway to a variety of leadership, civic engagement, academic and work development activities These include: - JumpStart, our summer youth employment program, which features job experience, combined with community service and school and career readiness training.

- Girls Empowerment, which gives girls leadership opportunities and supports them in leading civic engagement activities. - Youth Leadership Council, which gives our teenagers a vehicle for exercising leadership, giving KSC input into its future activities and direction, and leading community betterment projects of their choice. - SAVE - Soccer Athletes Value Education, which engages our youth and teenage participants in academic enrichment activities and

distributes thousands of curated, high-quality books to program participants and community partners. - Other enrichment activities, ranging from community betterment projects to the distribution of food vouchers, toys for the holidays, and school supplies.