In cooperation with the Nike Foundation, Partners and its affiliate in Brazil, Instituto Companheiros das Americas, are implementing the A Ganar-inspired Vencedoras (meaning "winners" in Portuguese) in Brazil.  Vencedoras will provide employment and entrepreneurship training to over 1400 adolescent girls/young women in three Brazilian states between 2008 – 2011.  Vencedoras participants apply the lessons they learn on the playing field into valuable and marketable job skills. They also complete vocational technical and entrepreneurship training, take part in an internship, are mentored by local business leaders and complete a service learning project.  The program is part of the Nike Foundation’s efforts to demonstrate why and how to invest in adolescent girls/young women under a worldwide campaign known as “The Girl Effect”. The Nike Foundation will invest $2 million over three years in Vencedoras. 

The Nike Foundation is a non-profit organization supported by Nike, Inc. that is dedicated to investing in adolescent girls as the most powerful force of change in the developing world. Since 2004, the Foundation has focused exclusively on building the case for investment in girls. Its unique portfolio funds new approaches, creates funding pipelines, nurtures models for scale and replication, makes girls a priority of institution and proves the girl effect. The Nike Foundation leverages the Nike brand’s drive for innovation and positive change, and its ability to inspire both.

“Global research and experience show that investing in girls may be the most powerful missing piece to the poverty alleviation puzzle,” said Maria Eitel, president of the Nike Foundation. “We are excited to continue this investment through Vencedoras.”

Read about the first Vencedoras graduation...