Real Madrid trains Polish unemployed teachers to become football and basketball coaches

“They Play, We Teach” is a project that will give a hundred jobless people, most of them teachers, a chance to qualify – free of charge – as instructors and second-class coaches of football and basketball. 

Co-hosted by coaches from the Real Madrid Foundation, the trainings conclude with a five-day study visit to Spain’s capital city. The first group of twenty Poles has already left for Madrid and will stay there on 9-13 December. The participants will watch Spanish coaches in action.
“’They Play, We Teach’ is another stage of international cooperation between the Lodz-based Foundation for Education and Sports Development and the Real Madrid Foundation. The Real Madrid Foundation has seconded its top specialists for the project,” said Dominik Kropidłowski, President of the Foundation for Education and Sports Development.
The first group of trainees have already received diplomas at the Santiago Bernabéu Stadium in Madrid. The presentation was attended by Poland’s Ambassador to Spain Tomasz Arabski and Emilio Butragueño, Real Madrid’s Director for Institutional Relations. The latter used to be a top player for the club and Spain’s national representation.
“For the participants, the project is an opportunity not only to gain considerable experience, but also to see for themselves what the coaching in the world’s largest football club looks like,” added Kropidłowski.
The training is part of “They Play, We Teach. Programme for mobilizing to professional activity by providing instructor/second-class coach training, in cooperation with the Real Madrid Foundation.” Co-funded by the EU, the project is implemented by the Foundation for Education and Sports Development (FREIS) in Lodz. The programme’s total value is 1.8 million zloty.

Set up in 2011 as a non-profit outfit, the Foundation for Education and Sports Development promotes physical activity, outdoor sports and broadly defined school and out-of-school education. Together with the Real Madrid Foundation, the Lodz-based organization expands a Polish network of the Real Madrid Foundation’s Social Schools of Community Integration. At the schools, children and young people, including from families with financial or care problems, can take part in free courses taught by coaches who have been trained by the Spanish club’s experts.