Right To Play

• Right To Play
• Right To Play in Canada

Right To Play

Who We Are: Right To Play is an international humanitarian organization that uses sport and play programs to improve health, develop life skills, and foster peace for children and communities in some of the most disadvantaged areas of the world. The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child guides our work. Right To Play programs target the most marginalized individuals including girls, persons with disabilities, children affected by HIV and AIDS, street children, former child combatants and refugees.

Right To Play has been a pioneer in innovation for social change and has a track record for creating programs that are both sustainable and replicable.

What We Do: Working in both the humanitarian and development context, Right To Play trains local community leaders as Coaches to deliver our programs in 23 countries affected by war, poverty and disease in Africa, Asia, the Middle East, and South America. Our programs incorporate a unique methodology that uses sport and play as tools for learning in four development impact areas:

 

1. Basic Education and Child Development: Right To Play's sport and play programs foster the physical, cognitive and social development of children to teach important values and life skills.

 

2. Health Promotion and Disease Prevention: Right To Play's sport and play programs are used to educate and mobilize communities around national health and disease prevention priorities, including HIV and AIDS, malaria and immunization.

 

3. Conflict Resolution and Peace Building: Our programs are tools for teaching conflict resolution and peace building skills. Participation in regular activities facilitates the healing of communities and reintegration of children affected by war.

 

4. Community Development and Participation: In order to create change and have a sustainable impact, we work in partnership with local organizations to build community infrastructure through the engagement of local staff and local and international volunteers.

 

Our Guiding Principles: Right To Play programs are guided by the principles of inclusion and sustainability.

 

• Inclusion promotes the involvement of children and youth who may be marginalized for reasons of gender, disability, ethnicity, social background or religion. We believe that through well‐designed games and sports, attitudes contributing toward a child's exclusion from meaningful participation in society will change.

 

• Sustainability ensures our programs have a lasting impact and centres on building the capacity of individuals, communities and partner organizations to independently deliver, on an ongoing basis, learning objectives through regular sport and play activities.

 

A Global Leader in Sport for Development and Peace: Right To Play is committed to every child's right to play and takes an active role to facilitate research and promote advocacy in this area. Our aim is to engage and positively influence key decision‐makers from the development, sport, business, media and government sectors to ensure every child benefits from the positive power of sport and play.

 

 

Right To Play served as Secretariat to the Sport for Development and Peace International Working Group (SDP IWG) from 2004‐2008 - a high‐level policy initiative mobilizing 59 national governments and key stakeholders from UN agencies and civil society.

 

As Secretariat to the SDP IWG, Right To Play developed and launched policy recommendations for national governments on how to incorporate sport as a tool for development and peace into their national and international policies and programs. The recommendations were endorsed by 38 governments at the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympic Games, and on December 11th 2008, the recommendations were formally recognized by the United Nations in a resolution passed by the General Assembly.

 

Where We Work: Currently Right To Play programs are implemented in: Azerbaijan, Benin, Botswana, Burundi, China, Ethiopia, Ghana, Jordan, Kenya, Lebanon, Liberia, Mali, Mozambique, Pakistan, Palestinian territories (West Bank and Gaza), Peru, Rwanda, Sudan, Tanzania, Thailand, Uganda, United Arab Emirates and Zambia.

 

Right To Play is headquartered in Toronto, Canada, and has national offices in Canada, China, The Netherlands, Norway, Switzerland, United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom and the United States. The national offices raise funds, build awareness for Right To Play programs and advocate for Sport for Development.

 

From Sport to Social Innovation: Founded in 2000 by Johann Olav Koss, four‐time Olympic gold medalist and social entrepreneur, Right To Play stimulates and motivates local communities to engage in entrepreneurship, innovation and sustainable development practices.

Right To Play Canada

Right To Play is in more than 4, 500 Canadian schools including both elementary and secondary schools and both public and private or independent schools. There are also 14 Right To Play Clubs at Canadian universities across Canada, all helping to raise awareness and build support for their programs.

Right To Play is headquartered in Toronto, Canada which has a Canada-wide focus of building support networks and elevating awareness for Right To Play programs while advocating for Sport Development.

When introducing a program to Canadian schools, the main focus is to elevate the importance of sport and play and support healthy child development while addressing curriculum related to social responsibility and world affairs. Along the way students learn important lessons and messages that emphasize:  hope, respect, goal setting, global citizenry, leadership, teamwork, and the importance of active living , sport, & healthy play. The program also inspires and encourages children to be more physically active while promoting ideals of fair play and cooperation.

Surrey's 2010 Challenge for children brings Olympian presentations and leadership sessions to over 130 schools throughout Surrey and will include a "challenge" to the community and Surrey schools to work together leading up to the Games-time to "make a difference" for global citizenry.