Jordan Soccer Sports Visitors Program

The Jordan Soccer Sports Visitors Program took place in December 2014. The program consisted 14 girls—members of Jordan’s U17 national women’s soccer team— who participated in a 10-day exchange designed to inspire more Jordanian women to become involved in sports and experience the benefits of participation: increased self-esteem, improved academics, and improved health.

Teaming up with the University of Tennessee’s Center for Sport, Peace, and Society as the cooperative partner, the U.S. State Department’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs and U.S. Embassy Amman created this program as a follow-on to the groundbreaking envoy program in April 2014 when former USWNT players Mary Harvey and Danielle Slayton traveled to Jordan.

During their visits to Washington, D.C., Boca Raton, FL, and Raleigh, NC, the delegation participated in soccer clinics with American peers and took part in sessions on Title IX, health, and peacebuilding while gaining exposure to the U.S. through the lens of women’s sports. Since the program coincided with the UN International Day of Persons with Disabilities and UN International Day of Human Rights, inclusion and the importance of human dignity for everyone served as prominent themes from start to finish.