Faith and Action: Born to Succeed

The project aims to tackle the low number of Muslim women and girls in sport, in order to bring equality through the arena of sport. This is done through the provision of a suitable environment in which they could train and compete against women and girls of the same and different faiths. The project includes:

  • Regular structured basketball and Futsal training sessions and competitive opportunities in an all-female environment
  • A schools outreach programme focussed around Futsal to engage young Muslim girls
  • Research into Muslim women’s participation in sport across England, in particular barriers that prevent such women from participating at all levels of sport, and recommendations for ways to engage them
  • Support to volunteers to become coaches and referees
Project detailsProject duration: 01 August 2009 - 01 August 2012
Organisation: 
Muslim Women’s Sports Foundation
Project name: 
Faith and Action: Born to Succeed
AudienceMuslim
Age group: 
16 - 24
Age group: 
25 - 40
Age group: 
41+
Innovation
The project is unique as it is the first project to is focus specifically on delivering activity for Muslim women.
Recruitment and promotion
We recruited participants through schools, word of mouth and the media.
Location
Regional
How was your project delivered?Basketball, football
Funding
Our project is reliant on funding from the Football Foundation and Nike Player Panel.
Partnership
Partners include Sporting Equals, the Prince’s Trust, Elite Youth, Islamic Societies, Asian Football Network, Harrow and Brent Council, BBC One Extra and many sporting organisations including England Basketball and The Football Association. The chair of the MWSF was voted one of the top 20 most influential Muslim women in the UK by the Times and sits on the FA’s Advisory Group for Race Equality, the FA’s Asian and Muslim Women’s Support group, and John Mann’s (MP) Tackling Islamophobia and Anti-Semitism taskforce. The MWSF have also been recognised by winning the 2008 Mosaic Award, Nike Player Panel Award and 2009 Muslim News Award for Excellence for Sport.
Themes

Growing participation

The Faith and Action: Born to Succeed project was specifically introduced to tackle the low number of Muslim women and girls in sport, in order to bring equality through the arena of sport.  Part of the project is to research Muslim women’s participation in sport across England, in particular barriers that prevent such women from participating at all levels of sport, and recommendations for ways to engage them.

Confidence and self-esteem

The project aims to help MWSF build an organisational infrastructure that has the scope to change attitudes about, and the understanding of, what sport can provide Muslim women and support other organisations to deliver appropriate coaching sessions for such target audiences.

Key links: 
Muslim Women's Sport Foundation