The students were dying to ask questions about FC Bayern to their prominent guest: how you become a mascot at the Allianz Arena, or whether summer signing Harry Kane had repaid his transfer fee yet. They were just some of the things the young people in the seminar room at the FC Bayern Campus wanted to know from Dr Michael Diederich. The executive vice chairman of the German record champions was a guest as part of the extracurricular educational program 'Learning with a Kick', which has been based at FCB's youth academy since this year - and naturally took the time to quench the thirst for knowledge of the course participants.
However, the topic at the forefront for the ninth grade of the Munich-South Special Education Center this Thursday was a different one: the two-and-a-half-hour workshop focused on violence prevention and street and domestic violence - a subject that is also close to Diederich's heart. Many conflicts are caused by "misunderstandings, not approaching each other and a lack of tolerance for the other person", explained the CFO. That's why you can't start early enough with education. Offers such as the weekly workshops on Campus are an "important building block for society, cohesion, democracy and stability".
Wide range of topics
'Learning with a Kick' is a free offering from the AWO München-Stadt and is part of the nationwide network 'Lernort Stadion e.V.', in which 27 German professional clubs are involved. As well as FC Bayern, it's supported financially by the DFL Foundation. The idea is to "use the stadium as a special place of learning" and to talk to pupils from eighth grade up to vocational college about "socially relevant, sometimes political topics", said 'Learning with a Kick' coordinator Moritz Janke. Thanks to many speakers and various partners, a wide range of areas such as discrimination and prejudice, sustainability, gender and identity or media education can be covered.
The participants in the violence prevention workshop first had to deal with the various forms of violence in everyday life in order to become aware of the consequences and their own responsibility. The aim was to teach the teenagers how they can stand together against perpetrators of violence and de-escalate the situation. The special environment in the stadium is intended to support this process. "The attractiveness of football also appeals to kids who would otherwise tend to keep their distance and not deal with the topic of violence," says Andreas Schmiedel from the Munich Information Center for Men, who ran the course together with his colleague Sandra Münzberg. "The opposite is the case here: the approach is positive and attractive. This makes it easier to communicate the topics on offer."
Classroom at FC Bayern Campus
Until the beginning of 2023, Munich's Olympiastadion provided the setting for the workshops. Due to the renovation work there, the German record champions are now providing 'Learning with a Kick' with the ideal classroom. The move has "brought us even closer to FC Bayern", revealed Jochen Kaufmann, head of the Munich fan project, who helped launch the educational program in 2015. Janke added: "We are happy to be able to come here once a week." Another unusual feature of the new location is the so-called "storytelling café", where participants can talk to people from the FC Bayern Campus after the workshops. This time, Michael Scott from FCB's U19 team, who had won 2-1 against FC Copenhagen's youngsters in the UEFA Youth League the day before, was there.
For Diederich, a commitment like this is part of the club's DNA: "FC Bayern is much more than just a sports club. Due to our pull and importance, it also has a high social relevance. It's important for us to get people excited about sport and community action." The next opportunity to bring people together could come soon. When the question arose among the course participants as to whether the class or even the whole school could attend an FC Bayern Women's match at the Allianz Arena, the board member asked how many young people actually attend the Munich South Special Education Center. He liked the answer: "80 pupils? We'll invite the whole school!"
In October, Bayern invited around 1,000 boys and girls to the Circus Roncalli:
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