EuroLeague clubs celebrate International Education Day during the week of Round 21. Before CSKA – Valencia game our team’s players Andrey Vorontsevich, Kosta Koufos and Daniel Hackett visited schools in Moscow.
Vorontsevich went to School 1409 at Khodynka Field where he met the kids from several classes at a time. The forward told them about the importance of education, the ways to combine studies and sports, including pro sports. Andrey knows everything about it as he got his second diploma while playing for CSKA. There were many questions, and Vorontsevich was happy to give his answers. After that the Army Man had a short warm up for the kids and gave autographs.
“It’s never too late to study, you need to try hard and study both at school and at the college, and not forget about sports,” Vorontsevich said. "I am sure that such a symbiosis of study and sport will be of great benefit to everyone. Perhaps the kids from elementary grades do not fully understand yet why they go to school, but we tried to tell why this is important in order to succeed in the future.”
Kosta Koufos and Dani Hackett attended a physical education lesson in School 1287 with in-depth study of the English language. The status of the school helped the players to establish communication with pupils, because the dialogs did not require much of translation, and most of the children did not hesitate to ask questions in English. Koufos felt especially comfortable: his mother worked as a teacher, therefore he is accustomed both to study and knows the ways of communicating with children. The stern look of a huge center was enough for the mischievous boys to stop making noise. But the girls willingly obeyed the colorful Hackett as the guard offered them some basketball exercises.
“The main thing that we have learned is that life is not limited to basketball only,” Koufos said. “We tried to tell the children: find what you like, determine the goal in life, go for it, take quality over quantity on your way.”
