Jean-Claude Munyezamu is a Rwandan Canadian who founded Umoja in 2010. Munyezamu came to Calgary in his early 20s after volunteering in refugee camps in Somalia and Sudan. He lived in Calgary Housing in Glenbrook and one morning he grabbed a soccer ball and started knocking on neighbours’ doors to get a soccer game started in the nearby green space.
That soccer seed then grew. Munyezamu started organizing soccer in the community and coaching some of the older kids who came out to play. From that small start, a single soccer ball and a green space, Munyezamu’s efforts evolved to become Umoja, an organization that runs programs that nurture leadership, learning, and belonging. These programs include soccer programs, Girls’ Leadership, Women’s Community Sewing, afterschool programs, and a food program.
Most of those programs are operated either on or close to Calgary Housing communities.
“When we work with [residents of] Calgary Housing, we meet them where they’re at,” says Megan Kimler, Youth Development and Volunteer Lead at Umoja.
They achieve this by running a culturally sensitive food program that delivers culturally-appropriate foods and staples that are otherwise not accessible to many families. The program offers doorstep delivery, so families can receive their food in a dignified manner.
“The program offers a lot of different flours and food that [families] might not be able to access from a food bank,” Kimler explains. We have dried lentils, pounded yam, cassava flour, things like that that.”
Drop-in soccer at the Marlborough community centre is one of Umoja’s most popular programs.
“We can get up to 100 kids coming to drop in every session. There’s a large number of families that live just across the street with kids, so it’s a great place for them to be because it’s so close,” Kimler says.
Youth indoor drop-in soccer at the Genesis Centre is also one of Umoja’s most highly attended programs.
“Our coaches are great at managing [the program]. A lot of the kids know our coaches and respect them,” Kimler explains.
Because the soccer programs are drop-in opportunities and summer camps, Umoja ensures that youth feel included and comfortable by removing barriers to participation.
Kimler leads the girls’ leadership program in the Calgary Housing community in Edgemont. The program empowers girls through mentorship, skills-building activities, and community engagement. The program is also expanding to Calgary Housing’s Temple location.
“There [is] a lot of richness and a lot of learning. They [are] having fun. They [haven’t] even realized they [are] learning all these new skills,” Kimler says about the leadership program activities.
Calgary Housing resident Reina was originally hired by Umoja to be a soccer coach. But her employment with the organization has since expanded. She now supports the Girls’ Leadership program and teaches sewing in the Women’s Community Sewing program. She took the initiative to support the program as she has a background in sewing. She currently runs her own clothing company.
Working for Umoja has allowed Reina to blossom and given her confidence to pursue her own entrepreneurial path.
“I felt like, before, I didn’t have a sense of community, or it was very hard to communicate with people,” she says.
Reina says she wishes that when she was growing up, she had a woman in the community to look up to. She is proud to be able to be that person to the young girls in her community.
“I like being that person that’s different,” she says.
