AGAPEDIA – Social Projects
From his playing days until now, Jürgen has supported social projects that particularly benefit youth. All the proceeds from his farewell match in 1999, which was attended by over 50,000 fans, were donated to such charitable causes.
Agapedia (www.agapedia.de), founded in 1995, focuses on developing sustainable programs and resources to directly assist children in need and children suffering hardships. Agapedia now provides services in 4 countries:
• Germany — Between 30 and 60 children ages 6 to 12 from the city of Esslingen are provided with personal development activities and cultural experiences afternoons Monday to Friday.
• Romania — The focus is primarily on taking care of abandoned infants and toddlers between the ages of 0 and 3. Efforts are made to re-integrate these children back into their original families with the on-going support of Agapedia or to place the children with a suitable other Romanian family through adoption. All children are visited and looked after by the Agapedia staff on a regular basis until the age of 18.
• Bulgaria — The emphases are on helping children in state-owned orphanages learn independence, responsibility and trust in their own abilities as well as the educational skills necessary to successfully integrate into society upon leaving the orphanage environment at the age of 18. Agapedia also manages 3 supervised transition settings to help these young adults find work and accommodations as they start their independent lives.
• Moldova — As in Romania, the focus is primarily on taking care of abandoned infants and toddlers between the ages of 0 and 3. Efforts are made to re-integrate these children back into their original families with the on-going support of Agapedia or to place the children with a suitable other Romanian family through adoption. All children are visited and looked after by the Agapedia staff on a regular basis until the age of 18.
The administrative costs associated with Agapedia are covered by Jürgen, other founding members, and donations from individuals and corporations. Jürgen is thankful that some of his business clients, such as MasterCard and Hyundai, have extended support to Agapedia.
Jürgen also donates his time and resources to youth oriented football projects.
In 2000, Jürgen and teammates from Germany’s FIFA World Cup and UEFA European Championship teams throughout the 1990’s came together to form fussballd21 (www.fd21.de). This website provides soccer education related information to youth players, their parents, and their coaches to guide the youth development process through positive experiences. Again, Jürgen’s initiatives have been supported by business clients such as adidas in addition to other well intended corporate sponsors.
In addition, Jürgen has collaborated on several books about football for youth. For example “Meine Fussballschule” and “Die Fussball Akademie” by Claus-Peter Niem and Karin Nelle, which are available on amazon.de
