Executive Leadership

Co-Founder and Executive Director, Open Goal Project

Background

When I stepped away from playing professional soccer in 2013, I moved back to my hometown Washington, DC and began my coaching career with local travel clubs. After noticing the lack of diversity, raw talent, and overall inclusivity within the DC club soccer landscape, I took action to recruit and integrate minority players from marginalized communities into the pay-to-play youth soccer system. The result was Open Goal Project, a 501c3 nonprofit organization that I co-founded in 2015 and for which I currently serve as Executive Director. For years, we have successfully supported players and families from inner city DC to play for local pay-to-play soccer clubs and worked to bridge the many existing gaps for Black and Latinx youth players in DC to play high-level youth soccer. Ultimately, our experience inspired me to start a free-to-play youth club for my hometown - District of Columbia Football Club. Our mission is:

To create opportunities for young players from low-income families and underserved communities to access high-level soccer and grow with the game, on and off the field, to provide resources that empower those players and families to navigate the costs and overcome hidden barriers associated with playing, and to use soccer as a vehicle for cultural enrichment, higher educational opportunities, and greater life experiences.

Maximizing player development pathways by creating opportunities and facilitating access for Black and Latinx players from marginalized communities is vital for MLS clubs and US Soccer to develop and produce the best players.

We have enough talented players in the US to be one of the top Men’s National Teams in the world and win the World Cup. The challenge for us as coaches and directors is broadening our scope of identification and creating appropriate pathways for players and families who can’t progress through traditional US youth soccer channels.

- Amir Lowery

Identifying Solutions to the Problem

The existing inequities within the US youth soccer ecosystem are well documented. Click the image below to read some media on solutions we have created to date.

Change Theory and Proof of Concept

Equitable Talent Development = Producing More Talented Players

Open Goal Project was created with a focus on positive youth development and community enrichment, with talent development as a secondary focus. Even so, when I started the organization in 2015, I was aware of - and prepared for - the potential for some of our top players to play in college and beyond.

Change Theory: Our theory of change is that players from marginalized communities can reach the highest levels of US soccer when provided with equitable opportunities for upward social mobility and equitable access to developmental resources. We believe that the entire US Soccer ecosystem would have a deeper talent pool and produce better players as a result of more equitable talent development.

Proof of Concept: We scouted Ariana (top left, playing for McLean ECNL and top right, celebrating a goal for James Madison University) from a local soccer field where she played pickup with older boys and her friends. Open Goal Project supported her journey from recreational soccer to club soccer in DC (winning a state cup title), to a top program in the region McLean ECNL, to college soccer at JMU - all simply by providing her with the adequate resources and support she needed to reach the next level.

Once the possibility for our best student-athletes to play in college became a reality, my goal as the Executive Director was to make sure that we opened as many doors as possible for the next young players in DC to have an opportunity to play club soccer and pursue their dreams to play in college. DCFC was created because a safe space for player development where our players and families can excel and thrive was vital to both advancing youth soccer and positive outcomes in my community. (Click the link below to learn more about our model.)

Our Strategic Plan

A Comprehensive Strategic Plan to Address the Inequities in US Youth Soccer