Young leaders hold charity run to aid the poverty-stricken

By playing sports and having fun, money is raised to benefit those less foutunate.

Young students and teachers from the al-Rasheed Modern School and the al-Jazeera School organized their first charity run in Yemen for Sport Relief 2008, in cooperation with the British Council. The run took place last Thursday at the al-Thawrah Stadium in Sana’a.  

The event, organized by the young members of Dreams & Teams, allowed every student in the school run for charity and enjoy their day. Each student collected sponsorship donations from friends and family to take part in the event. Tea, coffee and healthy energy-boosting snacks were also sold to raise some extra cash.

“I am impressed to see that the young leaders of Dreams & Teams have organized this event in order to help their fellow poor students, and I am so happy just to see how excited they are,” said Sorrel Roberts, Assistant to the Development Director of Sport Relief UK. Roberts said also that she is very happy to see how enthusiastic these young leaders from Dreams & Teams are for this project.

One leader of Dreams & Teams, Amer al-Kahli, said that this is what they learned from  training they were given British Council training workshop of Dreams & Teams. The race was started by four famous football players in Yemen: Adnan Taher, Ali Anono, Mo’adh Abdul-Khaleq and Esam al-Dhebhani, all who play for the national team.

Deputy Head of Mission at the British Embassy, Chris Chutes, started the race with teachers from the two schools. He said that he is very happy and impressed to see such young students organizing an event like this to support poor students.

It’s great to see these young leaders in Yemen working together with Sport Relief.

The girls started their own race, too, and nominated Elizabeth White, Director of the British Council, to start the girls’ race. The charity run started at 11 am with two rounds in the stadium route. School principals and teachers were involved, along with the 1500 students taking part.

All the money raised will be spent by Yemeni charities chosen by the young people and their schools, with the money going to help people living incredibly tough lives in this country and in very poor countries around the Arab world.

Al-Jazeera children’s channel, al-Saeeda channel, al-Thawra newspaper, 26 September Newspaper, Yemen Observer newspaper, Yemen Times and Najah magazine were there to cover the event.  Elizabeth White, Director of the British Council, said, “It’s great to see these young leaders in Yemen working together with Sport Relief. Every year in the UK at this time of year, they organize the Sport Relief Mile Run with 200 events across the country. Anyone can join in to raise money for poor or vulnerable people in the UK and across the world. Yemen was the only country in the Arab world chosen to take part in Sport Relief this year.  The whole event was organized by the school students who trained as leaders under Dreams & Teams. I think this event was a memorable two days, and I’m happy to have been there.” 

The charity run took place under the auspices of the Ministry of Youth and Sport and a representative from Sport Relief in the UK attended the event. 

The schools chose Sport Relief UK and Dreams & Teams as their charaties. It is the intention of Sport Relief UK to use the power and passion of sports to change lives for the better. By playing sports and having fun, money is able to be raised to benefit those less fortunate. Sport Relief is an initiative of Comic Relief, registered with the Charity Commission. Dreams & Teams, launched in 2001, has involved over 10,000 young people and has partners in 20 countries. The organization aims to develop leadership skills and cross-cultural awareness of young people through sports and international education links. 

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