For some, running up and down a soccer field with cleats clogged with blades of emerald green grass and dirt; vertical stripped alternating colored socks; mid-calf length shorts and a brightly hued short sleeve shirt is simply a way to have fun.
For those in developing countries that use the SOCCKET ball, it’s more than just play time. It’s an opportunity to create power and kick-start global change.
In 2008, junior year Harvard University social science students Jessica O. Matthews and Julia Silverman created the SOCCKET ball for an engineering class called “Idea Translation Lab.” The SOCCKET — a 17 ounce soccer ball — harnesses energy when kicked. After 30 minutes of motion, the ball can light a small LED lamp for up to 30 minutes. It may also be used to charge such items as a cell phone, mini refrigerator or water purifier.
“‘Green’ is good business. As soon as people start seeing that, this means long-term economic and environmental sustainability. The global community will start to wholly embrace the concept. Yet global change also needs to come with investment,” Matthews, who comes from a Nigerian family, told AFKInsider via e-mail.
Although the creators of the ball lacked engineering experience, Matthews and Silverman had a desire to take the ball beyond the walls of their Ivy-league classroom and offer it to the world. In May 2011, Matthews and Silverman continued their mission by founding Uncharted Play which is a “new kind of social enterprise that would show the world that doing good and doing good business need not be mutually exclusive,” the company site said.
A half-an-hour of light or goofing around with a ball may not seem like much to some, but it can greatly impact a child who may lack electricity in their home. Many children in developing countries study at night crouched under street lamps, or they inhale harmful fumes in their homes while using a kerosene lamp.
According to the International Energy Agency: “over 1.3 billion people are without access to electricity. More than 95 percent of these people are either in sub-Saharan Africa or developing Asia and 84 percent are in rural areas,” an energy poverty statement said.
During a distribution trip in Puebla, Mexico, Matthews recalls meeting a 7-year-old boy named Gustavo Martinez, his parents, eight siblings and three cousins. The family survived on the parents’ weekly salary of only four dollars. Energy deprived, the Martinez family did not have electricity or running water.
“The children love to play fütbol.They spend a lot of time in the field after school, once they have done their chores at home. Then with the light of the SOCCKET ball, Gustavo and his siblings can complete their homework, his mother can cook and make tortillas, and they can have dinner all together,” Matthews said.
Gustavo, who plays soccer after school, told Matthews: “I have a lot of fun with the SOCCKET ball and at night we have some light so I don’t feel afraid anymore.”
Though kid-friendly, the SOCCKET ball wasn’t created just to improve the lives of children — it helps working women as well. Yohualichan women in Mexico who sew and sell blouses have found a use for the energy producing SOCCKET ball.
“It’s a traditional art craft of the region. The SOCCKET ball helps them to stay later sewing and [making] more blouses that they can sell in Cuetzalan, increasing their hours of productivity and their earning potential,” Matthews added.
To coincide with the 2010 World Cup in South Africa, a prototype was created and released. The ball has been piloted and will be distributed in El Salvador, Brazil, Liberia, South Africa, Spain, and Nigeria. In the works is expansion of availability in Haiti, Benin, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica in 2014.
The SOCCKET ball even caught the attention of former United States President Bill Clinton at the 2011 Clinton Global Initiative.
He said, “it is an idea for clean energy that hardly anybody on the planet has thought of.”
Clinton referred to it as, “extraordinary — kick a ball, turn on a light.”
This summer, President Obama was pictured with Matthews and several others while bouncing the ball on his head at the Ubongo Power Plant in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. President Obama visited the East African country to discuss a new initiative called Power Africa. With the help of a $2 million dollar launch campaign by the U.S. African Development Foundation and GE Africa, the Power Africa initiative led by President Obama hopes to increase the supply of electricity to rural areas in Africa in three years.
These program benchmarks fall in line with Uncharted Play’s future innovations and offerings.
“I would like to address more social causes — like water and food insecurities — through play and I would like to continue to harness the potential of green technologies,” Matthews added.
“We have a few high level goals this year. The first is to further develop a socially responsible company and brand that encompasses the concept of sustainable play. As we collect user data from the distribution of SOCCKETs, we will be able to truly understand the value of play in the developed and developing world. Our second goal is to launch three more energy harnessing play products,” she said.
The company is in the process of developing a jump rope, skateboard, American football, skateboard and smart soccer ball which all produce and harness energy. Some outdoor accessories, like the jump rope, are made to accommodate varying cultures and communities — for example, Muslim girls in some countries who can’t play outside after the age of twelve will have the option to use the product indoors.
“It is important for us to exist as more than just the SOCCKET,” Matthews said. “We need to show our company is more than a product, it is a movement.
From creating the SOCCKET, Matthews and Silverman, “realized that the world of play was truly uncharted territory when it came to tangibly addressing real issues facing society,” Uncharted Play’s website noted.
With the help of Uncharted Play, hopefully the world will catch on and realize that using a piece of sports equipment is more than just a pastime or a way to exercise. Each kick of a ball, toss of a football, or skip of a jump rope is indeed a powerful way to play.