ABOUT US
James Shabangu
Dona’s Mates Youth Development Project is a James Shabangu initiative established to implement Activities and Life Skills programs that are aimed at teaching children, young people and the youth to live a positive lifestyle in their personal development using Sports, especially Football as a Tool. Our programs encourages mass participation, talent identification, educate, develop, encourage play, manage resources, ensure participation of children, young people, the youth and senior citizens.
Mass Participation / Everyone Plays: Put strategies, structure and systems in place to ensure that the maximum number of youngsters participates in all sporting activities and programs.
Accessibility: To ensure that the youth development programs are accessible to all the youth in our community regardless of the social background.
Equity: To ensure that the available resources are allocated and opportunities are created for all the youth in our community regardless of race, creed, religion, sexual orientation, and the differently capable.
Equality: We ensure all our participants are treated equally in terms of the constitution of the structure (Dona’s Mates Youth Development Project).
Accountability: We instill a sense of responsibility to him / her and the community in general.
Volunteerism: We have designed, developed and introduced volunteer programs for the youth and for those who have the willing and able to participate in youth development programs.
Fair Play: We train and educate the youth regarding the Laws of the Game, regulations and rules considering fairness, consistency, impartiality, respect etc.
Good Sportsmanship: We ensure that a positive environment based upon mutual respect is created, rather that promoting a win – at – all cost attitudes.
Positive Coaching: We train, educate and encourage our coaches and volunteers to make the necessary effort to be understanding and offer positive support to all our participants.
Citizenship: Through the youth development programs, we ensure that our participants respect authority, abide by the laws of the Land, volunteer for community services and protect the environment.
Pursuit Excellence: We have put strategies, structures and systems in place to make it possible for our participants with exceptional talent to reach the highest standard of excellence locally and internationally.
Continuous Learning: We have ongoing assessment of the strengths and weaknesses of our Development Programs with a view to capitalize on our strengths and to improve on our weaknesses.
We have campaigns programs to educate the youth on important matters such as: Doping control, HIV Prevention, Positive Life-Style, Substance Abuse, Violence Prevention, Alcohol Abuse, Early Pregnancy and Tobacco Abuse.
The Dona’s Mates Youth Development Project strive for the physical, emotional and mental well – being of all our participants in our institution including our senior citizens (Gogos) who are participating in a number of programs and events, e.g The City of Joburg, Active Aging, Cancer awareness campaign to mention but a few.
Dona's Mates Girls and Boys during the implementation of our daily activities are always having Fun during our training
sessions. Our Youth Coaches are doing a Fantastic Job in the implementation of our Life Skills development using Football as a Tool. It's such a pleasure working with young children as they are the stars of tomorrow.
Our Junior Boys Teams hard at Training. The Spirit is always
high in the structure with the participants looking full of smiles every time when training.
"With more support,
the Future of these
Young Stars of tomorrow
looks bright."
The Dona's Mates Football Players led by our Youth Coach Linda “Jordan Zwane are a always a marvel to watch when training. Our Youth Coach Linda “Jordan” Zwane is doing a Fantastic Job with the Junior players.
Dona’s Mates Youth Development Project prides itself as an Institution of Excellence when it comes to the implementation of Life and Social Skills using Sports as a Tool.
The Roles of a Youth Coach at Dona’s Mates Youth Development Project is more than teaching Football Skills and organizing a Team. The Youth Football Coach working with young people is helping them develop not just as Footballers but also as young people. The Youth Coach assumes many different roles as they work with children and youths. They are responsible for assessing the young person’s level of ability, providing instruction that helps them develop their skills, and providing motivation to them. They are a performance analyst, a teacher, a motivator.
The Youth Football Coach at Dona’s Mates Youth Development
Project is also responsible for the guidance of the children and
the youth in life and as well as their chosen sporting code. The
roles of the Youth Football Coach will therefore be many and
varied from assessor, teacher, motivator, friend, mentor,
facilitator, demonstrator, advisor, supporter, fact finder,
counsellor, organizer and planner.
Dona’s Mates Youth Development Project Training sessions are exciting and very interesting for our participants, our Youth Coaches ensures that all our participants enjoys and are having Fun at all times while at the same time teaching them the right values to be respectful, disciplined towards their personal development.
Dona’s Mates Youth Development Project is the Home of total
Football driven by our committed Youth Coaches.
Our Girls Education through Football Programme is going
very well and our Youth Coaches are doing a tremendous Job.
These are the moments we aim to sustain for many more
years to come while mentoring and nurturing future leaders of our community through our initiatives.
Dona’s Mates senior Girls when preparing for the City of Joburg Meyeral Cup which they eventually won for our
community
Dona’s Mates Junior Girls also enjoys their training session.
Dona’s Mates participants in their big numbers before our European Visitors.
Other Girls train with School Uniform due to lack of
training equipment.
"Training equipment are a great need"
Linda “Jordan Zwane teaching our Girls about Life and Social
Skills during one of their training sessions.
Leading from the front, James “Maradona” Shabangu, CEO & Founder, conducting his own training session with our senior Boys.