What's New

• Save Her Seat

  11 million girls around the world may never return to school after the pandemic is over, putting them at much greater risk of harmful practices like child marriage, early pregnancy and female genital mutilation. With #SaveHerSeat, Right To Play aims to save 50,000 school seats around the world, so girls can return to their classrooms and claim their rights and their futures.

• Empowering Girls Through Sport and Play in Senegal

  Superstar footballer Sadio Mané provides an assist as Global Ambassador to Right To Play, working to increase gender equity in Senegal by using the power of sport and play to help girls achieve their dreams.

• Keeping children learning and mentally strong

  Important new funding from the LEGO Foundation will support Right To Play’s COVID-19 response and recovery, to help ensure children continue to have access to high quality education that is safe, active, and engaging.

• 2020 Annual Report

  2020 was a year of significant milestones and challenges, from celebrating 20 years of protecting, educating, and empowering children to rise above adversity through the power of play, to adapting to the harsh realities of the COVID-19 pandemic. This is our year in review.

• From Struggle and Survival to Success for Refugee Children

  For 33 million children around the world fleeing war, natural disasters, famines, or epidemics, everyday acts of childhood like packing a backpack or running outside are instead acts of survival and struggle. But you can change their story.

• Honouring the Children of the former Kamloops Indian Residential School

  We are devastated at the recent news of the discovery of 215 First Nations children's bodies that were found buried at a former Kamloops Indian Residential School last week. As an ally organization, Right To Play stands in solidarity with the Tk'emlúps te Secwépemc First Nation and all other Indigenous communities in Canada.

• Palestinian Territories Emergency Appeal

  Children have been killed and schools damaged during the recent conflict in the Palestinian Territories. Donate today to help extremely vulnerable children recover from trauma and get back to school.

• P.O.W.E.R.: Games for Child Development and Learning

  The Play Opportunities for Wellness and Education Resource (P.O.W.E.R.) is a collection of 100 gender-responsive play-based learning activities created to support parents, teachers, and others to promote children's learning and development.

• Celebrating the Power of Sport

  Sport is more than a crowded arena, an ace, a goal, or a buzzer-beater. It’s helping to overcome trauma and heal from the realities of war. It’s giving a strong voice to those that were rarely heard before. It’s promoting health and preventing disease, teaching fair play, teamwork and peace.

• Advocating for girls’ right to education in Rwanda

  In Rwanda, it is common for the burden of household chores and other familial responsibilities to fall to the girls, leaving them with less time for school and play. We're working with the communities to change attitudes and make sure girls have every opportunity the boys do.

• Choose to challenge the rewind for girls

  Choose to challenge the rewind. 11.2 million girls could be out of school forever because of COVID-19, their educations cut short by child marriage, early pregnancy, and other social pressures. We can’t let girls’ hopes and dreams be permanently extinguished.

• Protecting, Educating, and Empowering Children during COVID-19: Q & A with Susan McIsaac, Right To Play’s new CEO

  A question and answer session with Susan McIsaac, Right To Play’s new CEO, about how we're supporting children to rise above the challenges impacting them.

• Keeping Girls in School

  Right To Play and Penny Appeal Canada are coming together to empower 16,000 at-risk girls in Pakistan to keep learning and complete their education.

• Creating lifelong learners using play

  By 2023, we will help over 3 million students in Ghana to stay in school and succeed by helping 75,000 teachers to incorporate learning through play into their lessons, all with the support of the LEGO Foundation.

• Right To Play International welcomes Susan McIsaac as new CEO

  Right To Play International is delighted to welcome Susan McIsaac as its new CEO. The accomplished nonprofit leader steps into the CEO position at the 20-year-old INGO as it strives to keep children safe and healthy, learning, and mentally strong in the face of COVID-19.

• Staying Strong Despite Crisis in Mali

  In Mali, COVID-19 has kept children out of school, and put them in even greater danger of permanently dropping out to become child labourers. Our work seeks to prevent that.

• Sadio Mané Joins Right To Play as Global Ambassador

  Star footballer, Sadio Mané will use his voice and profile to empower children through sport and education.

• HELP CHILDREN STAND UP TO CRISIS

  From COVID-19 and school closures to the Beirut Explosion, it has been a difficult time for children everywhere. But these kids refuse to let disasters, wars, inequality, and the pandemic determine and limit their futures.

• Right To Play and the Liverpool FC Foundation Are Working Side by Side to Transform Children's Lives

  Right To Play and the Liverpool Football Club Foundation are taking their partnership to a new level, working Side by Side to use the power of sport and play to empower vulnerable children in Bangkok, Liverpool, and beyond.

• CEO Kevin Frey leaving Right To Play to head up UN-led global partnership

  Right To Play’s CEO, Kevin Frey, will leave the organization at the end of December after a five-year tenure. Nonprofit leader and current Chief Philanthropy Officer Susan McIsaac has been appointed as new CEO.

• Putting children first during COVID-19

  Amid COVID-19, Right To Play has been taking action to keep children healthy and safe, learning, and mentally strong. We are using the power of play to protect, educate, and empower children to rise above adversity, and help their communities build back stronger.

• Right To Play welcomes Dag Skattum as the new Chair of its International Board of Directors

  Right To Play is proud to announce Dag Skattum as the new Chair of the organization’s International Board of Directors.

• Keeping Kids Healthy

  Teachers in Ghana and Mozambique are using tippy-taps to teach children proper handwashing amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

• The Beirut Crisis: Helping Children Cope

  In the wake of the Beirut explosion, we are providing immediate and holistic support for children so that they can recover from the disaster’s social and emotional effects.

• Harnessing Technology to Empower Children

  Microsoft has not only helped Right To Play streamline organizational operations, but since 2015 they have been a key supporter of our PLAY program, Promoting Life-skills in Aboriginal Youth.

• Keeping Kids Learning During School Closures

  Keeping children learning amid COVID-19 school closures has been an enormous challenge all around the world. We're reaching millions with daily TV broadcasts in Mozambique that provide play-based lessons while children are home.

• Rising Up to Save Lives and Empower Children with Disabilities

  A child in Ethiopia dies from waterborne diseases almost every hour. Teaching children about water safety is critical to save lives and reduce the number of children who become seriously ill from preventable waterborne diseases.

• Right to Play partners with DevResults to better measure and communicate impact

  Measuring results is critical to future success, and DevResults is helping Right To Play do just that, to maximize our positive impact on children in 14 countries around the world.

• Rising Up Against the Mistreatment of Girls

  Girls in Mali and Tanzania are fighting back against a surge in abuse in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.

• Broadcasting Hope

  How Girls Are Fighting For Their Rights in Rural Tanzania Using the Radio

• Keeping Kids Physically Active in Jordan

  At the start of quarantine, Right To Play collaborated with the Jordanian Ministry of Education to create a series of exercise videos for children to help keep them active and boost their emotional resilience during challenging times.

• Right To Play Program Results and Outlook (2017-2019)

  Over the last 3 years we have continued to expand our programs to reach more children in 15 countries, creating new opportunities through play for those in vulnerable situations to experience quality education and acquire the life skills they need to succeed.

• Canada’s Vital Role in Getting Refugee Children Back into School

  The heads of Right To Play and CODE are urging the Canadian government to support education for the world’s most marginalized children.

• Celebrating 20 years of impact

  Right To Play is celebrating its 20th anniversary of using the power of play to protect, educate and empower children around the world.

• Rising Up Against Displacement

  There are millions of displaced children worldwide. We work to ensure that they have access to a quality education.

• 2019 Annual Report

  Our Annual Report is a celebration of the inspiring children in our programs who continue to rise above of difficult circumstances and of the many incredible partners who are dedicated to creating transformational change in their lives.

• “I felt there was a new world opening for me”: In conversation with Aissa Traore and the Brookings Institution’s Rebecca Winthrop

  We spoke to Aissa and Rebecca Winthrop, Senior Fellow and Co-Director of the Center for Universal Education at the Brookings Institution and Right To Play Board Member, about the barriers girls face in accessing a quality education and how to dismantle them, the effects of the COVID crisis, and the transformative effect of education on a girl’s life and future.

• We Rise Against Child Labour

  Child labour is one of the most pressing issues Right To Play works on. It sits at the intersection of poverty, diminished expectations, and systemic failures that come together to limit children’s futures and endanger their lives.

• How We're Responding To COVID-19

  The children we work with are some of the most vulnerable in the world and are particularly susceptible to the effects of a crisis like COVID-19.

• Children’s Mental Health Must Be a Priority As We Fight This Pandemic

  The world’s most vulnerable children need support to stay mentally healthy if they are to resume and rebuild their lives.

• A Message of Hope from Malual Bol Kiir

  Right To Play alumnus Malual Bol Kiir, who fled war in South Sudan as a child and found his way to peace through the #PowerofPlay, has a message of hope for children in Right To Play programs today. For two decades, we've empowered a generation of children using play and sport to create peace in troubled places.

• What are the impacts on children when their schools close?

  As the global COVID-19 pandemic continues to spread, one of the concerning effects is how much more difficult it will become for children to access the educational opportunities they need to develop and thrive.

• Government of Canada announces new collaboration with Right To Play in Senegal

  Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced a new collaboration between the Government of Canada and Right To Play that will create a landmark new program in Senegal.

• Rising Leaders: Right To Play Thailand Works with ASEAN

  Right To Play Thailand held an intensive one-week workshop in Bangkok with youth leaders to demonstrate how sports and play can unlock the power and potential of young people.

• Right To Play Joins IOC and UNHCR to Pledge Support for Refugees Using the Power of Sport

  Right To Play joins the International Olympic Committee and UNHCR to pledge support for refugees ahead of first-ever Global Refugee Forum.

• Right To Play CEO, Kevin Frey visits programming in Lebanon

  Kevin Frey visits Syrian refugee children and their families in Lebanon.

• Right To Play and The Silkroad Ensemble Team Up to Empower Vulnerable Youth to Rise

  Lebanese, Syrian and Palestinian youth perform alongside Yo-Yo Ma and other world-renowned musicians in Qasqas, Beirut.

• 2018 Annual Report Released

  Find out how we helped protect, educate and empower 2.3 million children around the world each year.

• Right To Play and Liverpool FC Foundation team up in a global partnership to transform children’s lives

  Liverpool FC Foundation, the official charity of Liverpool Football Club, is joining Right To Play in a partnership to transform the lives of vulnerable children around the world.

• Our Culture Code

  We're always inspired by the children in our programs. They accept everyone, make things happen, display courage, demonstrate care and are playful, every single day. So we've modeled our Culture Code after them.

• Right To Play’s “We Rise” Videos Win Global Awards

  Right To Play’s “We Rise” video campaign swept The One Show Awards in New York, one of the world's most prestigious international advertising honors.

• WATCH A CLASSROOM TRANSFORM INTO AN INTERACTIVE LEARNING ENVIRONMENT

  Right To Play Palestinian Territories where activities, free play, sports, creative play and teacher-student interaction are the name of the game.

• Inspiring a New Generation to Rise

  FIFA World Cup winner, Jérôme Boateng shared fun and inspiration with the children in our programs in Accra, Ghana.

• Right To Play and the Olympic Refuge Foundation Come Together

  Right To Play and the Olympic Refuge Foundation join forces to help refugee and host community children and youth living in Jordan rise above social and cultural differences.

• Thinking and Playing Outside the Refugee Camp Box

  Meet Htoo Htoo, a 12-year-old Karen refugee from Myanmar who recently left Thailand's Umpiem Refugee Camp for the very first time to attend a Play Day with other refugee and host city children.

• Watch Carlos Lima's and Jazmin Sawyers Experiences In The Field!

  Handballer Carlos Lima and athletics ace Jazmin Sawyers capture their play-based trips to Tanzania and Thailand on video.

• On the Ground With Our CEO Kevin Frey

  Right To Play CEO Kevin Frey met the 752 children in our Jam Suka Child Protection programs who are rising above challenges like child labour.

• Right To Play's San Francisco Sports Quiz Raises Funds to Help Children Rise

  Right To Play USA's first-ever Sports Quiz in San Francisco this past week brought together guests, athlete supporters and board members to raise funds supporting our work to benefit 2 million children in our programs across 15 countries and 52 refugee camps!

• Partners in Equality

  Right To Play Lebanon is increasing awareness about gender equality.

• Our Ambassador Nico Hulkenberg visits our programs in Thailand

  Right To Play Germany's Formula 1 ambassador Nico Hulkenberg got a lesson in confidence, communication and team building, thanks to the children in our programs in Thailand.

• Right To Play helps secure a huge win for millions of girls at the G7

  A message from our CEO Kevin Frey at the G7 Summit