National Pukyong University Students, 4th Year of Soccer Exchange with Local At-Risk Youth
University students and protected youth faced off in a soccer match.
Students from the National Pukyong National University (Acting President Lee Min-hee) have been maintaining exchanges for four years by playing soccer games with protected youth in the Busan area.
About 60 people, including PKNU Guardians student volunteers (student volunteer group) and faculty members, played a soccer match with about 50 youths belonging to Mansa Youth FC at the Spo1 Park soccer field on the 8th.
This event is part of the "Youth Hope Ladder PKNU Guardians - Harmony DAY" program, a project where student volunteers interact with protected youth through physical activities to help them grow healthily into socially talented individuals.
Mansa Youth FC is a soccer team where protected youth from the Youth Recovery Center under the Mansa Youth Association gather and engage in activities every Friday. Since 2021, the student volunteer group has held regular soccer exchange matches with Mansa Youth FC every autumn.
On this day as well, the student volunteer group brought various soccer equipment and snacks, divided into teams, and played soccer with them. Off the field, the student volunteers cheered for the players with the protected youth and mingled by providing mentoring counseling as university senior brothers and sisters.
Kim Seung-min, a senior student in the Department of Economics and a member of PKNU Guardians, said, "The time spent interacting and communicating with protected youth is rewarding, and it seems we have a positive influence on each other."
As an extension of the Harmony DAY program, National Pukyong National University plans to invite protected youth from the Mansa Youth Association to the school on the 30th to hold a sports event including soccer, dodgeball, relay races, and mentoring activities at the campus main athletic field.
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