A school girl who came up with a plan to create a soccer team for her village school has been presented with a Certificate of Enterprise from her head teacher. Jennifer Douglas Abubabkar Sangweni, 15, came up with a plan to get her school involved in soccer. The small, poor village has very few facilities and there are not enough funds to purchase equipment for physical games like soccer.

Jennifer decided that she would approach a teacher and ask if she could set up a team. The head master was told and he came up with a suggestion to encourage such ideas. He told Jennifer that he would arrange for school funds to be released so that they could mark out a soccer pitch on the playing field.

We asked Jennifer for her thoughts and she smiled, telling us “I was really excited that my head teacher agreed. He even said he would paint a pitch for us and give us goals to use.”

Her proud parents beamed with joy, saying, “We have been so proud because she is only 15 and she has come up with this idea to bring the children of the community together. This soccer team means that we can play other schools in the district and have our own little soccer league. It helps all the children to get to know each other and we are very happy that she came up with such a good idea.”

Her father added “I have two daughters and I am pleased that one of them likes soccer. I watched the games on TV and it is great to see that the children in the village like to play soccer in a more controlled environment instead of just knocking the ball about. She has shown that she has strong qualities and we are very proud.”