Meet the winners of the 2022 CJF Women’s Leadership Awards

Words by Sita Narayan-Dinanauth
Photography by Jesús Rengifo Saldaña & Pete Beng

CJF are able to engage with men, women and children in some of the most isolated parts of the world. We decided it was time to reward women who’ve made a difference in these places by giving them a financial gift to further female empowerment at our skateparks in their local communities.

We’re excited to award Kayla Wheeler (Edu-Skate Teacher in CJF Jamaica) 116,200 JMD to spend on female-led activities at Jamaica’s Freedom Skatepark. We’ve also awarded Arissa Moreno Ruiz (Development Director for CJF Peru) 1,727.50 PEN to spend on female-only skate activities in her local community in and around our CJF skatepark in Peru.

CJF skate teachers like Kayla and Arissa are in an ideal position to teach girls and women about safe spaces, establishing boundaries and awareness through our Edu-Skate Programme and they can run girls-only skate sessions that focus on empowerment.

When we first decided on the award, we set aside a budget of £1000 and pledged to give it to a woman or women who fit our criteria. We knew we were looking for those who:

• Were female
• Were skateboarders
• Had worked with CJF before and were in a position to continue to work with young girls at CJF skatepark locations from September to December 2022
• Had shown leadership qualities
• Had already shown the motivation to further female participation in their local community

And there was no age limit!

Based on the set criteria one candidate from each project location clearly stood out from the rest: Arissa and Kayla. Over a series of consultation meetings we established a project plan to match their skills and interests, as well as the needs of the local female skateboarding community.

We’re looking forward to presenting their upcoming projects through interviews published soon. Follow us on LinkedIn to be updated on their work.

Help us do more!

Concrete Jungle Foundation is a non-profit organisation that builds skateparks and runs youth programmes for communities around the world.

If you’d like to follow what’s going on in Peru and Jamaica, check out the cjf_peru and @cjf_jamaica Instagram accounts.

If you have the means to support our work, please consider joining our monthly donor programme today.

You can also get merchandise from our online shop. All profits go to maintaining the charity’s operations over the world.

Thank you for helping us share the joy of skateboarding and supporting local communities!