Rainy Season Tournament

PlayOnside arranges two yearly tournaments From July to September it is time for the Rainy Season Tournament. 2016 was the first time we arranged this competition with 17 teams from 7 different schools participating In 2017 we had 53 teams from 22 different schools – a massive increase, and a sign of the big steps PlayOnside has taken over the last year, and our ever-increasing popularity within the migrant communities. Growth in numbers is not necessarily a goal in itself, but now the schools are coming to us requesting to join, a big change from the way it used to be, where we approached the schools to convince them to join our program. With many new teams whom had never played football before, we used the weeks leading up to the tournament to arrange friendly games. This way the players and the coaches get used to the concept, and these games were important for the schools and children to get to know each other, and lowering the competitiveness. This was a very successful approach, and it had a very good effect on key elements as fair play, tolerance and respect during the Rainy Season Tournament.

Every weekend over 10 weeks, more than 700 children participated. Such a big event is a logistical challenge for a small organization like PlayOnside. In addition, with only two fields at our disposal, combined with the fact that the schools spread over a vast geographical area, the cost of transportation took a major chunk of our budgets. Regardless of the challenges during the tournament, we can look back at it now, and conclude it was a highly successful event, and that PlayOnside has matured a lot as an organization The feedback from the schools, teachers and players have been great, and we have systematically evaluated the feedback, to make further improvements for future events.

PlayOnside does not put a lot of emphasis on who wins. However, for the schools and players this is important. So our job is to facilitate for social inclusion, and emphasis and promote what we regard as the most important elements of a competition like this; Fair Play, tolerance, making new friends, showing respect for each other, and of course having a lot of fun along the way!

Mingalabar Mae Sot League 2017/18

Wherever you go in Mae Sot, you will hear the word Mingalabar! It is a Burmese greeting, meaning "Hello". In 2016/17, we arranged the first edition of this tournament, at the time the biggest event PlayOnside had ever organized The 2017/18 edition of the tournament had even more teams and more players from different schools. The tournament lasted from the end of November to the middle of February, with a magnificent closing ceremony 17 February.

Over the years, we have developed a close relationship with the different schools and the PlayOnside program and the PlayOnside philosophy is now an integral part of most of the migrant learning centers. Mutual respect and understanding between PlayOnside and the teachers and headmasters at the schools is important for us to succeed

A new element of this tournament was the PlayOnside life skill program. This time, the teams did not only get scores for how they performed on the field, but also how they behaved off the field. The idea before the start was to introduce different topics every week, but we saw after just one week that we needed to spend more time on the different topics

For the first couple of weeks the topic was environmental awareness Garbage pollution and plastic in particular is a major problem, not only in Thailand, but also in Southeast Asia in general. Its availability and lack of knowledge about its negative environmental effect if not disposed in a proper and safe way, is something we have worked a lot on. We always strive to find alternative solutions to one-time plastic. We spend time on educating the children on the differences between organic and non-organic waste, explaining how one could be a resource for the local communities, while the other is posing environmental hazards

The long-term focus on environmental awareness was a great improvement of our program, and we will continue to use the power of football to educate the players on different environmental topics in the future. Another aspect of the life skill curriculum was leadership. We discussed about what characterizes a good leader, what is positive leadership on the football field and what is the difference between leadership and management Most of the players got the opportunity to be a team captain, taking responsibility for their team and their teammates. That everyone can aspire to be a leader, and it is not only the oldest girls or boys who can captain the team was a revelation for many of the children.

Also for this tournament, we emphasized a lot on equal opportunities For PlayOnside, equal opportunity means equal opportunity to all the children to play, and not only the best ones. Sometimes, when there is a competition and a prize at the end for the winner, it is easy to forget that everybody should play, and it is not only about winning. For the schools whom have been a part of the PlayOnside program for a long time, this comes very natural For some of the new schools, we have to continue to work and promote the concept of equal opportunity to participate.

In general the introduction of the life skill curriculum was a great success, and we will over the coming tournaments continue to introduce new elements to the life-skill curriculum.

Because football is about so much more than just football!

Footsteps of the 21st Generation

“Jóvenes Emprendedores Sociales” (Young Social Entrepreneurs) is a Spanish educational project promoting students entrepreneurship and collaboration between students in Spain and students in the “developing world.”

PlayOnside selected nine local students from our program to participate. The objective is to create an organization addressing a challenge faced by the local community. The first step was to research and identify needs and present them to the rest of the group, before together selecting a project. Then the students had to create the NGO, the name and the logo and writing the statutes, doing research about the cost and sending the final proposal to their peers in Spain.

The role of the Spanish students is to create an NGO in Spain, and do fundraising activities, financing the local project here on the border The communication between the groups was by e-mail and Skype, a great opportunity for both groups to share their experiences, to learn from each other and to have the chance to meet students that live that far away.

The final project consist in a close collaboration between “21st Generation of Footsteps” (Mae Sot) and “Pasos Hacia Tailandia” (Spain) to provide stationary and equipment to two schools in Mae Sot Those schools are selected because they have a lack of financial support from other organizations. The project is still ongoing, and the implementation will be carried out in June 2018.