Girls Take To Becoming Young Football Leaders With Swaggarlicious Ltd
Swaggarlicious Ltd, a football and education based organisation, has partnered with United Learning to deliver The FA’s Junior Football Leaders course on Monday April 13th, to young girls at Paddington Academy in London.
The organisation was formed by qualified Headteacher, Manisha Tailor, who embarked upon a career change to follow her passion for football and now finds herself in various roles within the game.
“Strong, positive female role models play an important part in helping to encourage girls and women to aspire to be the best they can be, as players, coaches or administrators and managers and having Manisha as one of our education workers is important on imparting that message.” (Steve Goodsell, Show Racism the Red Card – South East Regional Manager)
As an Asian female challenging stereotypes is at the forefront of her vision.
“There is still a huge under-representation of females in the game, especially those from Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic backgrounds. Having female role models at that level that young people can aspire to is vital. Grassroots and working with schools is very important to me and this is where we can really engage with young girls to form a love for the game, regardless of their background. Not all girls will want to play football, however this course provides them with varied skill-set, using football as the medium, that they can then transfer into their everyday lives. Through Junior Football Leaders I focus on a holistic learning model which I adopted from being a teacher. It is imperative young people learn that knowledge and skills are interchangeable. If they are taught in isolation, their thoughts will be isolated too. Funding by United Learning has been instrumental in ensuring we are able to qualify a number of girls as Junior Football Leaders.” (CEO Swaggarlicious Ltd, Manisha Tailor)
Projects like this that target female only groups are vital to encouraging and inspiring others.
“As a huge lover of the game if I had the opportunity to play, commentate, report or even referee, that would be my dream job! Unfortunately, for many women, especially Asian women like me it remains just that as we continue to break through the defensive walls of equality and diversity within football. It is absolutely vital that more female role models are encouraged to create and develop new initiatives so that they can help inspire and positively influence a generation of young females, especially Asian females that can help diversify the game. This is vital for the future prospects of girls and young women looking to pursue a career in sport”. (Suzi Mann, BBC Broadcaster).
United Learning, sponsors of the project, recognise the need to engage girls in sport as one of their key strategic priorities.
“United Learning is a national group of state academies and independent schools. The PE/sport network have targeted engaging girls in sport as one of our key priorities for this academic year, so we are glad to be able to partner with Manisha and her company, Swaggarlicious Ltd, on this particular programme. Whether as participants, leaders, coaches or officials, we want girls to feel empowered and confident to make sport a part of their lives. We know that active young people achieve better at school and make significant contributions to their communities, so this investment in sport in central to our core ambition to bring about ‘the best in everyone’.” (Shaun Dowling, Head of Sport – United Learning)
