GAM3

What is GAM3's vision?
GAM3’s vision is to make urban sports and urban culture available to everyone in order to empower youth and prevent conflict and marginalization on a local and global level.

GAM3 (pronounced “game”) was founded in 2002. The many projects are directed by a volunteer governing body as the highest authority and are headquartered in Copenhagen with six dedicated employees to run the operation on a daily basis.

The Danish activities are in 2011 executed by a numerous group of basketball and soccer coaches as well as dance and street fit instructors – and more than 100 volunteers. The activities in Lebanon are executed locally and directed by a volunteer governing body. In 2007 GAM3 became Official NBA Cares Community Partner.

What is GAM3?
GAM3 is the quintessence of urban culture. The program is a fusion of different urban sports, dance, urban culture and an effort to integrate minority youth in the community. Spelled with a backwards ‘E’ – which alludes to its 3-on-3 street basketball tournament format and also lends the project an air of urban hipness – GAM3 organizes community practices for kids in housing development projects in Denmark and Lebanon.

Towards the end of the summer the activities in each country culminate with the GAM3 Finals which consist of a major street basketball tournament in the heart of the capital featuring professional basketball players, Slam Dunk Contests, 7-2-smoke Breakdance Battles and renowned Hip Hop DJs and rappers from around the world. The outdoor tournament in Copenhagen is Scandinavia’s largest with more than 100 participating teams. It is also the official Danish Championship in street basketball.

How do we work?
Seeing how marginalized youth from ethnic minorities could be brought together with Danish youth and find common grounds around basketball and dance, GAM3 turned to the idea of using sports as a vehicle for social change.

Through the experiences from working with kids who hadn’t already found their way to organized sport clubs, an interest to increase the development aspects of the activities grew.

A result of this work is an English and Arabic basketball compendium that introduces three levels of empowerment (individual, social, and community) with a series of 13 corresponding Training Themes (leadership, trust, democracy etc.). The drills each target one or more of the Training Themes making it easy for the coach to build trust or creativity depending on the needs of the local context.

Where do we work?
Denmark and Lebanon.