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Tennis World Foundation, A MISSION BORN FROM THE HEART

Hi, my name is Federico Coppini, founder of the international Tennis World Publishing group. As you can hear from my accent, I am Italian … but I have fallen in love with Africa and spend most of time in a small city called Stellenbosch, just north of Cape Town, in South Africa.

During my time here, I have come to understand what devastating poverty looks like, and what touches me the most are the children in these poor communities. I knew that I had to do something, and started offering tennis coaching in the Kayamandi Township, which is a predominantly black and severely impoverished area.

The interest in my coaching started growing and I set out to try and understand why these children were so keen to join. What I realised was simply that playing tennis made them happy and they were drawn to me, as a safe and constructive adult influence in their lives.

This lead me to start the Tennis World Foundation, in order to reach more children in this way. What started off as me spending my spare time coaching vulnerable children, has grown into a formal foundation that uses tennis as a tool to reach and strengthen children emotionally, physically and mentally.

Have you ever asked yourself the question, ‘why do I love tennis?’
I have, and by asking this simple question, I came to the realisation, that picking up a racket gives me a rush of good feelings and a way to test and grow myself.



I also love the fact that I belong to a community of tennis players. This is exactly why the children in our programme love tennis.

Through tennis we are able to reach and offer traumatised children a way to process their feelings, achieve personal growth and most of all, to have a safe space where caring adults can help and guide them.

Children that live in dangerous places often join gangs as a way of to protect themselves. By being part of a tennis team, they can replace this need by joining a team of mates that understand each other, look out for each other and experience an alternative way of seeing themselves.

In a world where children have virtually no access to support, they come into our programme to find safety, belonging and caring adults. Our programme has been widely accepted and welcomed by schools and community care organisations, to such an extent, that I am here today to ask for your help, to make the foundations reach wider and deeper.



There is a saying in Africa that: “it take a village to raise a child” and today I am speaking to the global tennis ‘village’, asking for your support to help reach and contribute to raising children that are stronger and happier.

Currently with my own finances I have managed to help (with an annual program) 600 children.
My goal is to reach, at the end of 2020, three thousand children!

I need help from you ... I don't want to ask you for money, but simply using RAPUSIA
Use it and spread it to all your friends ...everywhere!

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