Pro Sport Development celebrates International Day of Sport for Development & Peace 2017 in Bhubaneswar

PSD held interactive workshops in celebration of IDSDP 2017 at three of its Community Sports Program centres in Bhubaneswar, Odisha from 3 to 6 April, 2017. The workshops saw the participation of 69 children (58% girls), aged 9-14 years old.

The workshops were conducted by PSD’s trainers, and consisted of classroom sessions and continuous cricket tournaments. The classroom sessions involved interactive activities aimed to educate the students about IDSDP. These activities  informed the children about why the day is celebrated, along with the students learning about three of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals for 2030:

• Goal 3 - Good Health & Well Being
• Goal 4 - Quality Education
• Goal 5 – Gender Equality

The trainers informed the children about the three goals and asked them to think of how sport can be used to achieve them. The children were given the opportunity to express their thoughts about one of the SDGs by drawing a picture about how the goal can be achieved through sport.

A few of the students were then asked to show their drawing to the class and explain why they had chosen that goal and what their picture showed. Arpita Barik, a 12-year-old girl from Vivekananda Siksha Kendra School said:

I have drawn boys and girls playing cricket together as boys think girls cannot play cricket and I want to prove them wrong.

As a practical element to the workshop, continuous cricket tournaments were played at the each schools. One of the tournaments involved teams from Vivekananda Siksha Kendra School (VSK) & Bhaktakabi Madhusudan School (BMS) competing against each other. This was great for the children to meet peers of their age and celebrate the sustainable development goals by playing sport. Mrs. Namita Sahoo, principal at Bhaktakabi Madhusudan Upper School said “It is fantastic for our students to visit another school to play sport and for them to make new friends.” The final saw Team Lion from BMS beat Team Tiger from VSK 57-42 in what was a very competitive and good-spirited match.

Overall, the workshops gave the opportunity for students from different schools to learn about and display together the values of IDSDP.