spirit sports

Living in a Garbage Dump
"It was during a sponsored rugby union visit to Cambodia that I saw children living in squalor on the Stung Meanchey Municipal Waste Dump in Cambodia's capital, Phnom Penh. Despite the terrible conditions these children were living in, they still had hope and happiness in their eyes," says Greening.
Greening was inspired to get involved when he saw the difference sports could make to them. Two boys who had grown up on the dump, and had then been given assistance from a volunteer, were now representing Cambodia on the national rugby team. He quickly realised his expertise could go a long way towards helping these children.
Greening says, "In most cases, sport is last on the list in terms of a charity's funding and objectives. Knowing that sports have excellent therapeutic value, I also believe that the ethics learnt on a sports field - responsibility, leadership, and teamwork - are transferable to any environment. We established this charity to provide an opportunity for children to gain some therapy through various sports, and gain self-confidence."
Kick a Ball
Thus came about the Sporting Chance Foundation to improve the lives of underprivileged children - whether they're inner city kids from London, or child prostitutes in Vietnam. As long as they want to kick a ball, the charity aims to always be there to kick it back. "Sporting Chance Foundation established itself by providing the necessities to make this transformation - food, shelter and clothing," Greening explains, "and we have endeavoured to provide each child with a set of characteristics that will last them a lifetime."
Jonny Wilkinson Steps Up
Calling upon high-profile friends, Greening gained support from sport and media personalities, including England rugby World Cup heroes Jonny Wilkinson and Jason Leonard, Joel Stransky, leading musician Heidi Range from the Sugababes, TV and radio presenter Dave Berry, and ESPN STAR Sports presenter Charlie Webster. Each has pledged to dedicate their time and expertise to ensure the charity reaches as many children as possible.
To maximise the impact of the Sporting Chance Foundation, Greening ensures that the charity works alongside existing non-government organisations (NGOs). The charity will help supply funding and sporting equipment to orphanages, and work directly with specific NGOs to improve the lives of the children in their programmes.
Greening says, "The charity presently works with three NGOs. Two are based in Phnom Penh and the third is an international charity, Touraid, based out of the UK. Touraid funds children from less developed countries to travel and play sport abroad. The alliance with Touraid gives children from Sporting Chance Foundation the opportunity to experience new regions of the world and learn about different cultures."
Down in the Dumps
Funding from Sporting Chance not only supports their own projects; if they see an NGO with a suitable cause, they will also help. On a recent trip to Phnom Penh, Sporting Chance Foundation met up with two other NGOs: Friends and the Sunrise orphanage. Both had shelters set up to help the city's street children. Friends, an inner city shelter, has been incredibly successful at taking boys and girls off the streets; however, the children had nowhere safe to run around. Sporting Chance Foundation proposed a sports hall and playground within the shelter's walls.
Sunrise, based just outside the city, has a small soccer field, but the girls at the shelter have no sporting outlet. Sporting Chance Foundation drew up plans to build a multi-purpose playing surface for the children to enjoy tennis, badminton, volleyball and netball. This is just the start of their work in Phnom Penh; they will continue to look for more worthwhile projects in the city.
Developing Coaches
Presently, the foundation uses outside help with its construction projects and coaching, but its aim is to make the charity 100 percent self-sufficient. Greening's goal is that children coached in his programmes will go on to be coaches for the next generation of young sportsmen and women.
Currently, Sporting Chance Foundation helps 2,000 children a day, ranging from infants with HIV to children orphaned by landmines, dysfunctional families or drug abuse. As funds increase, the charity hopes to sponsor children through the local public school. Ultimately it aims to establish its own centre in Phnom Penh near the school with dorms, a canteen, a sports field and sporting facilities.
Through Joel Stransky and Heidi Range, Sporting Chance Foundation is beginning to use the Cambodian template to help an orphanage in the townships of South Africa.
An All-Star Team
Through his contacts in the rugby world, Greening is also in the process of putting together an all-star rugby team to play in Dubai, Hong Kong and Bangkok to raise funds and increase overall awareness of the charity. Two young boys from Cambodia will be invited to join the team for the tour.
"The Foundation's aim is to ultimately help children in every corner of the world. As a charity that works to a 'non-compete' principle, Sporting Chance Foundation openly invites other charities to give a helping hand, resulting in a bigger impact towards helping those in need," concludes Greening.
Greening is currently living and working in Singapore with Standard Chartered Bank as Associate Director, Global Clients Relations & Entertainment for Wholesale Bank, along with continuing Standard Chartered's commitment to youth sport and especially Greening's sport of rugby.

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Many institutions of higher learning are offering Sports Management courses to their students. Organization is a skill that is learnt from birth. However you can perfect it through a formal education. Well managed sporting events are what draw people's interest in those particular sports.
The sports management degree programmes offered in many colleges and universities are meant to help you unique sporting events' organization skills. Many of these sources go by different names, but the underlying basics are the same. For instance, Sarlem University offers a Sports Management course under the faculty of Bachelor of Science in Business Administration. In Ashford University, they offer a BA degree in Sports and Recreation Management. The Grand Canyon University has a Sports Management option in their Bachelor of Science in Business Administration degree program.
These sports management courses equip you with general management and leadership skills. They also help you learn how to plan and develop sales and marketing strategies for a particular sporting event. You also learn much about advertising and event promotion, facility management, public relations, recruitment, coaching practices and sports administration. Some of the courses also give you an overview of the legal aspects of certain sports as well as basic health and safety measures for a sports team.
You have to have a passion for sports in order to excel in these sports organization and management courses. You must also be involved in a certain sport or two in order to have a practical understanding of the course.
If you can not find the sports management course being offered in a campus near you, you can look up some online institutions that offer the same degree. Make sure that the online institutions that you are planning to apply to be fully accredited. This will save you from losing money and vital information to internet conmen. The Columbia Southern University also offers a similar concentration course in their BS in Business administration program.

Author - Pankaj Gupta
If you want to pursue a career in sports organization, then Sports Management Degree are great alternative to learn all the managerial skills for sports handling.

As their children grow up, every set of parents has a different idea as to what should be the main focus of their upbringing and how they should spend their free time, especially when it comes to extra-curricular activities.  Some parents place a huge emphasis on academics and want their children doing extra reading or working with a tutor.  Other parents are heavily into sports and want their children to focus on sports.  Some parents simply want their children to be children and don't push them in any particular direction at all.
In most cases, schools give children at least some opportunity to participate in a team sport.  Along with the team sports that are taught during physical education classes, there are usually a few varsity sports teams that will represent the school while competing against other schools in the area.  In addition to this, most communities have a few organized sports leagues that children can be active in.
In my opinion, participation in team sports is vital to healthy social, physical and emotional development.  Participating in a sports team exposes children to a range of challenges in a team environment where they are forced to work with others, rely on others at times and also to encourage or root for others on their team.  All of this leads to the development of a cooperative mindset.  Now although all of this sounds ideal, I am aware that it does not always work out this way.  Some times a child might be a 'ball hog' and refuse to pass the ball, or want to score all of the goals themselves.  But with time, even this child learns at some point that they must work with others if they want to see true success.
Some kids just love sports and have a natural tendency towards them.  There is very little that a parent could do to stop a child like this from participating in sports.  Other children are quite nonchalant about sports, and some children even hate sports.  A variety of factors can influence the way that children feel about sports.  Sometimes they are shy or insecure about the abilities yet with a little encouragement they will get out there and do fine.  At times, a child may have a physical attribute that they are conscious or overly conscious about that stops them from doing a sporting activity they would love.  I encourage parents to find at least one team sport that their children can become involved in.  Not all team sports have to be high impact activities or 'popular' sports.  A swim team is great for a child that is not boisterous or overly physical.  Some schools have sailing as an extra curricular activity which again falls outside of the typical team sport.
I believe that team sports teach children not only how to compete, but how to compete fairly within structured boundaries.  This is an important life lesson and the skills and the disciplines that they learn in sports will definitely last them a lifetime.  Team sports will teach children how to communicate, since most team sports require children not only to talk to each other while the activity is taking place but also how to plan strategies for an upcoming event and how to debrief or review things that have happened in a game.  Perhaps most importantly, team sports teach children how to succeed and how to fail since inevitably throughout each season of their sport their team will do both.  With every win and loss, children learn coping skills.  These again are important skills to develop in a child and they will last them throughout life.

Susan Roberts writes freelance for a number of different companies including KS Child Locate on locate child mobile [http://www.kschildlocate.co.uk/how-we-can-help/locate-child-mobile/]. She has many years experience working with teens and families and also publishes on HubPages on subjects such as "My Childhood and my Children's Childhood".