Two new Playing for Purpose projects launch in Berlin  Two new Playing for Purpose projects launch in Berlin 

In partnership with Safe-Hub Berlin and HÁWAR.help e. V., we are adding two new projects to our Playing for Purpose program. These two Berlin-based organizations are focusing on creating more opportunities for young people who experience barriers created by social and economic conditions. Both initiatives use football to help young people build confidence, develop life skills, and feel more connected to their communities.

The Playing for Purpose program

Our Playing for Purpose program focuses on removing the barriers that keep youth from being and staying active, with particular attention to girls, young women, and young people in underserved areas across Europe and North America. The goal of the program is to support people who have limited opportunities to take part in regular sport activities due to structural factors such as financial constraints, discrimination, migration-related barriers, or limited availability of safe spaces. To achieve our goal, we partner with organizations like Safe-Hub Berlin and HÁWAR.help e. V. which focus on providing free, safer spaces to practice intentional sport based programming for participants from underserved communities.

The Projects Making an Impact in Berlin

Captains Committee by Safe-Hub Berlin (Berlin-Wedding)

At Safe-Hub Berlin, nearly 400 children and young people come together weekly to play, learn, and connect. The Captains Committee initiative builds on this environment by supporting participants who choose to take on leadership roles.

Through youth-led events, leadership workshops, and regular team meetings, young people practice communication, problem-solving, and decision-making in a familiar and trusted space. The project helps them gain confidence, feel ownership of their activities, and strengthen their sense of belonging in their neighborhood.

Building Youth Leadership Through Meaningful Participation

Beyond opening access to movement and physical activity for underserved children and youth, the Captains Committee project brings a powerful dimension of community engagement.

Captains step into meaningful leadership roles: representing their peers in decisionmaking, organising youthled events like Fair Play tournaments, and practising communication, conflict resolution and eventmanagement skills. Supported by Coaches and PlayMakers and guided through age-appropriate leadership workshops, even the youngest children begin to experience democratic principles firsthand - discovering that their voice matters, their choices have impact and they can help shape their community. At the adidas Foundation, community engagement is a strategic enabler guiding how we work across our programs and shaping the way we work with partners and communities. In this project, it comes to life in a particularly powerful way.

SCORING GIRLS* by HÁWAR.help (Berlin-Kreuzberg)

SCORING GIRLS* creates a supportive space where girls aged 8 to 18 can play football, learn, and build community. Through free weekly training sessions, empowerment workshops, holiday camps, and educational activities, the project helps participants strengthen resilience, teamwork, self-efficacy, and body positivity.

For many girls, this is their first chance to join an organized sport environment. By combining football with skills-based learning, SCORING GIRLS* encourages participants to explore their strengths and take an active role in shaping their place in the community.

Inclusive Spaces Where Girls Lead, Play, and Grow

Girls and young women across various settings have so much to gain from being active, yet many still face layered barriers that limit their ability to take part. Unequal access, cultural expectations and gender stereotypes intersect with factors like ethnicity, disability, economic background or migration experience and make participation even harder for many girls and young women. These obstacles don’t just restrict their opportunities to move and grow but they reinforce wider inequalities that follow them through life.

To change this, we need environments that genuinely center girls’ and young women’s needs and lived realities. That means removing structural barriers, challenging harmful norms and ensuring they feel more welcome, safer and supported in sport and physical activity.

To address inequality at its roots, Scoring Girls* is creating more inclusive spaces where girls and young women come together to play football and build confidence, agency and wellbeing. This is how movement becomes a catalyst for broader social change.

Supported by the adidas Stiftung

Both projects are supported through funding from the adidas Stiftung, which enables the partners Safe-Hub Berlin and HÁWAR.help e. V. to offer free, high-quality programming and expand access to safer, sport programming for young people in the Berlin districts of Wedding and Kreuzberg.