Interview

RISE project
Interview with the Romanian NGO - Policy Center for Roma and Minorities -
in the field of Roma Inclusion through Sports
[Asociatia LECS]
Context
RISE (Roma Inclusion through Sport in Europe) is a joint initiative of 5 European sport
and youth organisations from Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Slovakia and Macedonia
to tackle discrimination, social exclusion and marginalisation of Roma youngsters
through the development and implementation of sport-based educational activities.
RISE project
General aims of the project

• To promote social inclusion, equal learning and sporting opportunities for
underprivileged youth, especially Roma youngsters through innovative grassroots
sport-based cooperation;
• to collect, classify and promote European a good practice database in the field of
social inclusion through sport and to develop an educational manual about Roma
inclusion through sports.
RISE interview guiding questions

RISE project
1. Background of the initiative:
[Asociatia LECS] Please introduce the program briefly: how did it start, what are the
main objectives, who are the target groups?
[Policy Center for Roma and Minorities] Policy Center for Roma and Minorities
(PCRM) is a non-governmental, non-profit organization founded in 2008 in Romania,
which acts to empower Roma and other ethnic minorities so that they become active
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citizens of the society they live in and to stimulate the majority to actively participate
in the social inclusion process.
Since 2008, PCRM has supported the Roma community either through direct
intervention (especially through sport activities and alternative education programs
for Roma and non-Roma children in poor communities), or by creating opportunities
for dialogue and sensitization of public opinion on topics such as diversity vs.
discrimination, respect vs. racism, and social inclusion vs. exclusion. In 2010, we
initiated the Alternative Education Club, a comprehensive educational program
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dedicated to the Roma and non-Roma children in one of the most marginalized areas
of Bucharest. The main innovative aspect of our project is our use of sports as a
gateway to traditional education activities and ultimately, to a better future. This
approach was dictated by the needs of the children, who showed us the way forward
when they showed little motivation for remedial education courses but
overwhelming interest in sports activities. We learned early on that the children
would not embark on their educational journey without first gaining the self-esteem,
motivation, discipline, teamwork, and conflict resolution skills that only sports can
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build. Thus, the children guided us to turn our initial concept on its head and use
sports as a tool for promoting education rather than an add-on activity.
In the past 10 years, more than 400 Roma and non-Roma children from marginalized
areas of Bucharest benefited from our program and 50% of them were also actively
engaged in the football empowerment program. The ages of the children we work
with are 6 to 16. We chose this age range having in mind the most blatant indicator
of potential disengagement in the community - the school dropout rate. We
approximate that, when we first set up the Alternative Education Club in Ferentari,
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less than 25% of the children who had enrolled in school at the age of 6, finished
middle school by the age of 16.
2. Sports utilized and soft skills developed

[Asociatia LECS] What kind of sports do you use in your program and why? What are
the soft/hard skills that these sports and sport-based activities are able to develop?
Is it a multi-sport or mono-sport initiative?
RISE project
[Policy Center for Roma and Minorities] Although we started with basketball, it was
obvious from an early beginning that the children in the community we work with
had an interest in football more than any other sport. Thus, our basketball sessions
transformed into football sessions - every Saturday in the schoolyard. Eventually, as
our relationship with the children grew, we started redirecting them to attending the
Alternative Education Club. Back then, a lot of the children coming to football had
never been enrolled in school or had dropped out early on. Through the Alternative
Education Club they found a way back to school. The staff working at the club helped
them get re-enrolled and keeping up with school work. At the same time, their efforts
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were rewarded through being allowed attendance to more interesting afterschool

activities. Our sports portfolio was extended to street dance and volleyball.
Streetdance, in particular, was very popular amongst the children and teenagers in
the community.
The context was a wonderful way of keeping the children off the streets and away
from drug consumption/trafficking which is a real and visible threat in the
community.
RISE project
We believe that our work, on and off the football pith, focused on developing the
following skills: goal setting, adaptability, self-confidence, willingness to learn, self-
motivation, concentration, communication, reliability, self-control, social sensitivity,
teamwork, conflict resolution, decision making, problem-solving, resilience, self-
organization, self-reflection.
3. Categorization
[Asociatia LECS] Would you categorize your initiative as Plus Sport or Sport Plus
programme?
RISE project
- Plus Sport programmes. Programmes in which sport is used as a ‘fly paper’ to

attract Roma youngsters to programmes in which much of the socio-economic
developmental work is undertaken via a range of non-sporting activities and
the skills-development focus is emphasised in all activities.
- Sport Plus coaching. The use of sport to establish positive social relationships
and develop social skills of Roma youngsters. A Sport Plus approach uses sport
to attract participants, via sport programmes in which sport is viewed as the
activity-based learning medium. However, sport is complemented by other,
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more formal, educational components to ensure the achievement of desired

learning outcomes.
[Policy Center for Roma and Minorities] In the beginning, we used sport to establish
positive social relationships and develop social skills with our beneficiaries. We see
sports programs as an activity-based learning medium and our sports program can
stand alone. There are beneficiaries who attend solely the sports program. However,
sport is complemented by other, more formal, educational components to ensure the
achievement of desired learning outcomes. If, for example we work with a child who
has dropped out of school, after he enrolls in the football program, and once we
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know we have built a bond with that child, we direct him to the Alternative Education
Club and help him get re-enrolled in school. This has often been the case. On the
other hand, if a child is already doing well in school, he/she can choose to stay in the
sports program only or get help on specific topics. All of this considered, we believe
our program is Sport Plus.
4. Impact / Outcome
[Asociatia LECS] What is the impact of the initiative and activities on the target
groups and How do you measure this impact?
RISE project
[Policy Center for Roma and Minorities] We measure the impact of the sports
program on 3 main axes: attitude towards school, motivation and behavior. We look
at the program as a way to help children regain confidence in themselves and
authorities. At the beginning of the school year, we apply a self - questionnaire and a
questionnaire to which instructors (and teachers that have worked with the student)
answer. The questionnaire measures the above-mentioned aspects. Besides this, in
the Alternative Education Club, we apply, together with the educational assistants, a
questionnaire measuring vulnerability score, educational needs, empathy score for
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each of the children attending activities. These help us offer a completely

personalized, holistic, needs-based intervention.
[Asociatia LECS] Does the project has an impact on the target groups’ employability
levels or social integration?
[Policy Center for Roma and Minorities] We believe employability and social
integration are strongly connected to several life skills that we look to improve
through the program (setting goals, being adaptable, having the willingness to learn
new things, being able to focus, being able to communicate efficiently, even with
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people who you don’t like, being reliable, practicing self-control, social sensitivity,
teamwork, etc.).
When it comes to social integration, we strive to bring trust back to the community.
Most people living in Ferentari have often been let down or overlooked by
authorities. We work to help them regain trust and fight through the red tape.
Birocracy is challenging for all of us, but being a minority, having little to no
education, sometimes being unable to read and write, these leave you out of the loop
altogether. The Alternative Education Club, The Sports Program, and The Mothers
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Club (a program addressed to parents in the community) are aimed at helping

address these issues.
In addition, during this last year, we have added a series of workshops of vocational
counseling addressed particularly to children enrolled in the sports programs.
5. Cooperation / Partners
[Asociatia LECS] Are there partners involved in this initiative? Where is the funding
coming from?
RISE project
[Policy Center for Roma and Minorities] Please add few words
6. Challenges and opportunities

[Asociatia LECS] What challenges emerged during the implementation of these
program? How were they addressed and What do you consider as a major
opportunity for your initiative?
[Policy Center for Roma and Minorities] Having worked in the community since
2010, The Alternative Education Club and the programs developed by Policy Center
for Roma and Minorities had gained a lot of visibility outside of the community and a
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lot of trust inside the community. For several years, one of the programs, The
Mothers’ Club was battling authorities and helping adults have a voice in decision
making on a local level. In addition to this, Valeriu Nicolae had been building a large
volunteer community, which he had mobilized to cover basic needs for many families
in the community. We believe this has been viewed as a threat by the political class.
In the autumn of 2019, in the midst of a political fight and with no proper
justification, we were forced to leave both schools we were working in (link to article)
to make room for a project with public funding, run by local authorities exclusively in
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the school we had developed programs. This was both a major setback and a great
opportunity.
After a long search for a new space and a lot of effort put into redirecting funds, we
have set up a new space for the Alternative Education Club. The change had turned
into a great opportunity. The new space allowed us to work with children from all
over the community and its compartmentalization allowed for classes to happen
simultaneously with several groups of children. In schools, we, of course, had
limitations regarding hours, which no longer applied in the new space.
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However, together with the space we had created in schools, we lost access to the
schoolyards - the spaces we were using to meet children at weekends. This was very
difficult to recover from. Although we continued training and meeting with the
children we were already working with, this has been limited by the availability of a
rented football pitch and the availability of responsible adults - needed to accompany
the teens from one part of the city to another. Limitations in time and space have
been difficult. We are currently working with Valeriu Nicolae and Casa Buna in
creating a space for football practice inside the community.
RISE project
7 Lessons learned
[Asociatia LECS] What are the key messages and lessons learned from this program?
[Policy Center for Roma and Minorities] Children can and want to change their
community for the better.
8 Anything else
RISE project
[Asociatia LECS] Is there anything else you want to share with us? Or What else can
you share about your experience in working with Roma youngsters?
9 The end of the interview

RISE project
[Asociatia LECS] At the end of our interview I kindly ask your permission to feature
this initiative and also your organisation as a best practice in our educational manual.
Also if you agree we would like to use also your logo.
[Asociatia LECS] Thank you very much for your time and your valuable answers
provided during our interview and at the end of our project, we will share with you
the content of the educational manual before publishing it. Also, we’ll update you
RISE project
about the outcomes of our international project: Roma Inclusion through Sport in
Europe and we’ll send you the manual once it has been finalized.

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RISE project

General aims of the project

RISE interview guiding questions

1. Background of the initiative:

2. Sports utilized and soft skills developed

were rewarded through being allowed attendance to more interesting afterschool

- Plus Sport programmes. Programmes in which sport is used as a ‘fly paper’ to

more formal, educational components to ensure the achievement of desired

each of the children attending activities. These help us offer a completely

Club (a program addressed to parents in the community) are aimed at helping

6. Challenges and opportunities

9 The end of the interview

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