I always planned to get back to Zimbabwe. After graduating from college, I ended up teaching English there and playing for the same professional team my dad had coached when I was growing up. The HIV epidemic was raging at the time, but there was a lack of information; I lived there a whole year and never had a single conversation with anyone about HIV. I went to a lot of funerals for people I knew who had died of AIDS, but there was so much stigma that no one talked about it. At that time, life expectancy had gone from about 70 to less than 40. The people I knew were dying in their 20s.
I believed that HIV needed to be brought out of the shadows. I had this idea that soccer players’ popularity could help transmit information and inspire young people. So, during my medical school residency, some friends and I had a meeting around my dining room table and decided to form a non-profit. In 2003, after meeting with headmasters, teachers, soccer players, and community members in several focus groups in Zimbabwe, we designed our first curriculum, using soccer to talk about HIV prevention.
Now, after almost twenty years, Grassroot Soccer has grown into a large adolescent health organization that uses soccer as an educational tool in youth programs. While we initially focused on HIV prevention, we have expanded to include education about sexual and reproductive health, gender-based violence, pregnancy, and access to health services. We have a small support team in Hanover but have sites in Zimbabwe, Zambia, and South Africa, as well as partners across the continent.
The adolescent population in the communities we have partnered with is projected to double in the coming years, so we are looking for new ways to engage young people in health-related education. Even though 10 million young people have already graduated from our programs, we are trying to bring our work to 100 million people. I feel that the approaches and solutions that we have found are good ones. What keeps me going is that the need is so high, and the need is so compelling.
– Tommy Clark, Hanover, NH
