A teenage girl named Sirenie entered a football field in Burundi during a period when her community thought that girls should not participate in sports. She received criticism. She felt disheartened. Nevertheless, she continued to play. Other girls gradually followed. Burundi is not a country that is often featured in Western news cycles, so it’s a minor story in the geography of global crises, but it’s precisely the kind of story that Right To Play has been quietly producing for 25 years, in places that most aid organizations find difficult to reach and that most headlines choose to ignore.
The idea behind Right To Play, which was established in 2000, is almost too straightforward to be taken seriously: play is a child’s right, not a luxury, and thoughtful, organized play can be a real means of promoting health, education, and peace in some of the most challenging settings on earth. The organization currently serves over a million children each year in 19 countries, including Ghana, the Palestinian Territories, Liberia, and Lebanon. It conducts weekly sessions before and after school, trains local educators and community members as program coaches, and collaborates closely with Ministries of Education to integrate its methodology into national teacher training programs. The final section is important. Right To Play isn’t just showing up with a program and walking away. It’s creating something enduring.
| Detail | Information |
|---|---|
| Organization Name | Right To Play (RTP) |
| Founded | 2000 |
| Headquarters | International (global operations) |
| U.S. Affiliate | Right To Play USA — righttoplayusa.org |
| Operating Countries | Benin, Burundi, Canada, China, Ethiopia, Ghana, Jordan, Lebanon, Liberia, Mali, Mozambique, Pakistan, Rwanda, Tanzania, Thailand, Palestinian Territories, Uganda, USA |
| Children Reached Per Year | Over 1 million |
| Age Range Served | Early Childhood through Secondary School (Pre-primary to Grade 12) |
| Core Mission | Use sports and play to educate and empower children affected by poverty, conflict, and disease |
| Core Vision | A healthy and safe world through the power of sports and play |
| Key Methodology | Reflect-Connect-Apply — used at the end of every game-based program |
| Program Focus Areas | Education Quality (ages 2–14), Health Practices (ages 6–18), Peaceful Communities (ages 10–18) |
| Legal Foundation | Article 31, UN Convention on the Rights of the Child |
| Key Competencies Developed | Self-efficacy, teamwork, empathy, critical thinking, conflict resolution, civic engagement |
| Notable Recognition | Profiled by Harvard’s Global Education Innovation Initiative |
| Current Crisis Response | Children’s Emergency Fund — Middle East (Lebanon and Palestinian Territories) |
Reflect-Connect-Apply is the methodology that is used at the conclusion of each game. Students reflect on what transpired during the exercise, relate it to a personal experience, and then consider how they might use the knowledge they gained in the future. This structured debriefing, which sounds on paper like something from a corporate leadership seminar, is being used with 14-year-olds in the Palestinian Territories and 10-year-olds in Uganda to help them develop skills in empathy, self-control, and conflict resolution that their circumstances might otherwise have completely taken away. Harvard’s Global Education Innovation Initiative has taken notice of the strategy and documented Right To Play’s work as one of the more rigorous instances of play-based learning at scale.
Article 31 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, which acknowledges every child’s right to play, rest, and leisure, serves as the legal cornerstone. In situations where children are displaced, hungry, living in the midst of ongoing conflict, or just too impoverished to access areas where play can occur safely, it has proven to be very challenging to enforce this provision, despite its seemingly straightforward language. The claim made by Right To Play, which is now supported by 25 years of field experience, is that play cannot be restored after a crisis has been resolved. It helps kids get through the actual crisis. Mamerte, a 14-year-old who was uprooted from her family and stigmatized due to her disability, is now doing exceptionally well in school and fighting for children’s rights in her neighborhood. Despite the play-based program, that trajectory did not occur. Through it, it took place.
Observing this work in so many different settings gives me the impression that the US has been slow to fully consider what Right To Play stands for. For decades, American education policy has revolved around discussions about achievement gaps, curriculum reform, and standardized testing, treating play—especially in early childhood—as something that must be defended rather than something that is effective. A completely different perspective is provided by Right To Play’s model, which has been refined in rural communities and conflict areas across four continents: play as serious pedagogy, as health intervention, as peace infrastructure. It remains to be seen if that reframing becomes popular in American policy discussions or school districts. However, it’s possible that the evidence is now just too strong to be ignored.
