All Gojal Women Volleyball Training Camp and Tournament 2018

Introduction & Objectives 

The all Gojal Women’s Volleyball Training Camp and the tournament were successfully conducted in Gojal Upper Hunza Gilgit Baltistan. It was a 7-day long training camp starting from 1st July to 7th July and was concluded on the 7th day with a brief tournament. Overall a total of 150 participated in the 7-day long training camp.

The targets of this training camp were young girls between the ages of 15 to 25 who showed interest in attending the camp. The reason for setting the aforementioned age criteria was to ensure maximum participation of girls who are about to start their career and who are looking for prospects in higher education, especially on a sports basis.

The project has three major plans of procedure:

Organizing groups of young girls in different villages through community meetings and visits.

1- The aim would be to help them establish sports clubs exclusively catering to the needs of young girls through which they can stay connected with each other and can be able to strengthen their capacities in the field of sports.

2- The next part of the project was organizing volleyball training camps in selected locations. The selected locations were (Gulmit and Moorkhun Gojal Hunza). We started working on some of the fundamental principles of volleyball and focused on developing skills and techniques among the participants.

3- The last part of the project comprised of a tournament in which teams representing different villages participated and competed for the victory. The idea was to instill in them the sense of competitiveness and coordination in pressure situations. It also encouraged the participants to partake in competitions at the district as well as at the regional level. A total number of 7 selected teams from their respective villages participated in the final event.

Project Impact & Success Stories

Introducing sports like volleyball for girls in such an area was itself a huge success for us. This was the first time that a mega event was organized for girls that had training sessions as well as a brief tournament for the participants.  There were girls in our group who were playing volleyball for the first time in their life and had never participated in such sessions. Initially, it was very challenging in the way that many questions were raised by parents and the community members on the idea of organizing outdoor events for girls.  But we didn’t stop there as the passion and spirit of the young girls gave us the much-needed motivation to move ahead and achieve our targets.  We were successful in establishing different groups in each village so they can form a club of their own where they can practice their game. A total number of 12 Women volleyball sports clubs are now formed in the whole region which we plan to affiliate with our club or different sporting bodies. Eventually, the positive response was shown by the community members for our contribution for young girls in the areas.  The project had a direct impact on the young girls of the region regardless of the ages. We were fascinated when we saw some handicapped and special children were also excited about being part of the training program.  We warmly welcomed all of them to be part of our event.

Equipment including (volleyball, volleyball nets) was handed over to each team to formally start their own clubs in each village and we will also be monitoring them in the future. Due to lack of equipment and facilities, some teams didn’t show up but we tried to reach the team and provide facilities to them so they can be part of such events with confidence in the future.

A session was conducted later with younger girls to brief them about the opportunities of getting admission in different universities of the country on sports basis. The main purpose was to provide them information about the opportunities available in the field of sports and how to use sports as a tool to pursue their education or career.

Project Challenges

While implementing our project in Gojal we faced some challenges that ranged from getting permission for implementing the project in the specific area. Many parallel events were already there we had to manage our event keeping in view the schedule of other events. For implementing our sports event we needed ground or an area that should be safe and secure for girls. There are schools and colleges which have free space for girls but were under the control of the government and other leading organizations. The most challenging time was when we couldn’t finalize our venue for the event due to space constraints as we had participants well over 100 in numbers so we had to manage all of the activities in that small area.

The second most challenging thing in this event was a higher number of younger girls who participated in this event.  The number of participants actually crossed our targets and criteria. We, therefore, changed our plan accordingly. There were only two coaches and the numbers of participants in (Gojal 2) were around 105 so we divided them into two groups for each trainer/ coach.  This way we tried to manage such a huge crowd in such a small area. It was an amazing experience of meeting young girls from different areas having a passion to play.

The future:

This project helped us a lot to fulfill our dreamwork which we always wanted to do. This project was a milestone that gave us lots of hopes to pursue this field. The initiative we took with the help of this project was giving a structure for women to engage in sports in the community. The purpose of developing a platform in the form of a volleyball club was to provide an environment where young athletes can improve their game of volleyball and maximize their opportunities to play at both the competitive level and at all levels and disciplines (as volleyball is a lifetime sport).

We expect that such initiatives will help young girls to prepare themselves for opportunities at regional as well as national and international levels. Many national universities offer admission in different departments on sports basis. Young girls from such marginalized communities will, therefore, exploit their skills to secure admissions in top national universities. Our success lies in their abilities to use their skills to enhance their careers in education as well as in getting successful in representing different national departments. With other such collaborations, we are hoping in the future to arrange similar events for the promotion of volleyball among young girls in different remote areas of Pakistan.