SCU Joins Global Peacebuilding Initiative Through Sport
Street Child United is proud to announce its participation in the 2025 Peacebuilding Academy – a six-month, virtual training programme led by Generations for Peace USA (GFP USA). Running from January to June 2025, this powerful initiative brings together youth-focused organisations from around the world to harness the transformative power of sport for peace and social development.
Why this matters for SCU
At SCU, we champion the rights of street-connected children, giving them a platform to be heard and to shape the future they deserve. But these children often face deep-rooted challenges — violence, exclusion, and systemic injustice. To tackle these head-on, we must evolve our methods and strengthen our approach.
The Peacebuilding Academy offers us exactly that opportunity.
Through this innovative programme, our staff and youth leaders are gaining cutting-edge tools for conflict analysis, community engagement, and inclusive programming. We’re learning how to integrate sport-based peacebuilding into our existing initiatives — making our work more impactful, sustainable, and responsive to community needs.
What is the Peacebuilding Academy?
The Peacebuilding Academy is a free, six-month virtual program designed for youth-serving organisations like SCU. Organised by GFP USA and backed by Laureus Sport for Good USA, Fight for Children, and The Gratitude Network, it equips participants with practical frameworks to use sport as a catalyst for peace.
The training is built around three core modules:
- – Identifying Community Needs
Introduction to Sport for Peace, community mapping, and needs assessments. - – Analysing Conflict
Peace and conflict theory, with tools to understand and address violence at all levels. - – Integrating Sport for Peace Designing, implementing, and evaluating sport-based peace programmes.
- Each organisation nominates two representatives – ideally a staff member and a youth leader – to complete self-paced coursework, engage in monthly calls, and collaborate on real-world assignments. The programme concludes with a final virtual showcase.
What we’ve learned so far...
Since joining the Peacebuilding Academy, SCU’s team has already explored:
- – The principles of Sport for Peace, highlighting facilitation over competition and play as a tool for healing and connection.
- – Techniques for community mapping and participatory engagement, ensuring that our programs reflect the lived experiences of street-connected children and their communities.
- – Approaches to community needs assessments, using focus groups, interviews, and participatory observation to inform our interventions.
- – Core concepts in peace and conflict theory, from identifying types of violence to strategies for systemic transformation.
Sport as a tool for change
Sport has a unique power to unite, heal, and empower — especially in communities where children are often marginalised and voiceless. Through structured games and activities, it creates safe, inclusive spaces where trust can grow, life skills can be nurtured, and leadership can flourish.
For SCU, this isn’t just about learning — it’s about action. It’s about applying these lessons to amplify our impact, strengthen our advocacy, and forge new partnerships with like-minded organisations around the globe.
Our journey with the Peacebuilding Academy is already helping us reimagine what’s possible for street-connected children. Together, with a global network of changemakers, SCU is building a future where every child has the right to play, learn, and lead — in peace.
