FIFA Foundation Executive Chairman Mauricio Macri and the President of the Republic of Paraguay Santiago Peña have officially launched the Digital Education Programme (DEP) in the South American country at a special event on the outskirts of the capital Asunción.

Established in 2023, the FIFA Foundation DEP’s main goal is to help youngsters improve their digital and personal skills and promote social inclusion by combining football and technology. The initial phase was aimed at reaching primary school students across four countries: Belize, Bhutan, Mauritania and Paraguay.

Working in collaboration with the local FIFA Member Associations and Ministries of Education, the FIFA Foundation has raised those targets. When the programme was first mooted in Paraguay in September 2024, the goal was to reach 10,000 pupils in vulnerable communities across the country. Now, by providing additional funding over the next three years, the Digital Education Programme will benefit some 30,000 pupils in 100 Paraguayan schools.

“I could go into greater detail about the more than 70 hours of in-person training given to teachers in Belize, or about the laptops, or the robotics kits and projectors donated to schools across the whole country, but no number speaks as loudly as the motivation of Breanna, Daniela, Dayna, Floyd, who are among the more than 200 teachers that we’ve been working with for over three years to close the digital divide that affects thousands of boys and girls,” explained Mr Macri in a speech to the 75th FIFA Congress in Paraguay shortly before the official launch ceremony.

“We’ve brought football and technology into the classroom as educational tools, and that’s how we’ve managed the digital education which promotes the holistic development of students. We implemented it with you, the federations and the governments, because we believed that these abilities were vital to reduce inequality in future generations. We will reach 100 schools here in Paraguay, and we will integrate Guaraní [the second official language of Paraguay, alongside Spanish] into the teaching programme, and just like in Mauritania and in Bhutan, we will triple the number of impacted kids compared to what was promised originally, impacting the lives of hundreds of teachers, and at least 120,000 students.”

Mr Macri and President Peña were joined by Paraguay’s Minister for Education and Science Luis Ramírez and Paraguayan Football Association President Robert Harrison as they interacted with pupils from the Escuela Básica No. 269 Julio Correa.

The 20 primary school students – aged between 10 and 12 and accompanied by two teachers – had enjoyed a two-day introduction to the programme with a Spanish-speaking electronics engineer and three facilitators, a pedagogical provider selected to support implementation in Paraguay.

The activities focused on developing a broad range of skills from physical to socio-emotional and intellectual, and were centred on a pair of Paraguayan jaguars, Purumi and Jaguake, who dream of becoming legendary goalkeepers.

“There is an extraordinary synthesis (between football and learning),” said Mr Ramírez. “Football is passion, it’s motivation, it makes a child want to be here. And today, technology is a means of co-existence, because today we are entering a digital co-existence.”

“It’s a different way to learn,” added Mr Harrison. “We have to understand that technology and robotics go hand in hand with learning, and above all that children today work completely differently.”

The project will also adapt educational resources into Spanish and Guaraní, both of which are widely spoken across Paraguay. One of the top free online learn-to-code platforms, Microsoft MakeCode has been translated into Guaraní to facilitate students’ access to it, with students already benefitting from it during the workshops.

“I’m absolutely delighted. You really get excited seeing these fantastic children,” said Mr Peña. “I said it at the opening of the FIFA Congress that although a lot of people think that it’s only football, it’s so much more than football.”

With the pilot phase now well underway, the FIFA Foundation is already taking the project to the next level. Earlier this year, the World Football Remission Fund Board approved additional funding of USD 20 million for the roll-out of Phase 2 with the goal of reaching at least 100,000 school pupils in another 10 locations worldwide.