A new Rafa Nadal Foundation Center for vulnerable children opens in Valencia

The Rafa Nadal Foundation announces the creation of a center in Valencia for children and teenagers who are in a vulnerable situation, where the organization is planning, in an initial phase, to assist 40 children from  Natzaret, a district with one of the highest rate of persons at risk of social exclusion. There they will be offered a complementary program to their school education.

The comprehensive program implemented in this center, which is located in facilities granted by the City Council, includes an educational and school support aspect as well as a sport one, where sports and games become instruments for social inclusion and ofr the promotion of attitudes and values such as companionship, responsibility, effort, equality, etc.

After months of conditioning work —a remodeling job done thanks to Marcapital sponsorship—, the activity of the center is expected to start at mid-November. There are two classroom-workshops where the educational activities will take place, and the sport practice will be carried out at the district’s sport center. Additionally, the facilities have a dining area where an afternoon snack will be given to the children daily.

Natzaret is an outlying district at the sea front in Valencia, and it is marked by physical isolation and a stigma related to drugs and debasement. Unemployment, low educational level and damage in houses and public areas are the main problems that Natzaret must face nowadays. This context makes life chances compromised for its habitants, especially for the youth.

Valencia’s will be the second Rafa Nadal Foundation Center, after the first center launched in Palma de Mallorca in 2014. “After five years of work and positive results, with more than 450 children assisted, it is time to go a step further and bring the experience to Valencia, where we have found a clear need especially in this district”, declares María Francisca Perelló, director of Strategy and Relations with Institutions.

Moreover, the tennis player’s organization is carrying out other projects focusing in the construction of equality of opportunities and reinforcement of personal and social development of children and young, both in Spain and India.