24% vs. 40%
Children in lower-income households participate in sports at substantially lower rates than children in higher-income households.
Change the Game
We did not build a new gym. We changed what the gym could do.
A school gym is a long-lived public asset. By adding futsal to an existing facility, AFF helped that space serve more children, more often, without waiting for new construction.
Documented impact
The public return on one court.
More than 36,000 documented player-hours show what one location produced over five years in a limited-use operating environment.
1
location
Documented
5
years of documented activity
Documented
36,000+
documented player-hours
Documented
7,200+
annualized limited-use reference
Derived
A documented result under limited-use conditions—not an estimate of the facility’s full participation capacity.
Based on AFF program records. The 7,200+ annualized reference is calculated from the documented five-year floor for comparison.
A small change. A large result.
A few new lines can change the life of a gym.
AFF partnered with a local public school and helped fund the markings needed to create a futsal court inside its existing gym. No new land, building, utilities, or major construction was required.
Existing fixed asset
Gym, floor, lighting, parking, and the school community
+
Limited incremental capital
Markings, goals, equipment, and practical guidance
=
Recurring participation
More sessions, more players, and years of continued use
The result: more opportunities for children and more productive use throughout the school day and beyond. Here, “return” means participation, facility use, access, and cost efficiency—not profit.
Who the model is designed to reach
Expand who the gym can serve.
Traditional school teams matter, but their rosters are necessarily limited. Futsal gives the same gym another way in—across ages, body types, experience levels, and family circumstances.
Public-school children
Students who can play where they already go to school—using gyms the community already funds.
Children outside traditional athletic pathways
Kids who may not find a place on limited roster sports, or who thrive in a different kind of game.
Families facing financial barriers
Households for whom rising youth-sports costs can close doors; school-based play lowers the threshold to begin.
Children exploring new talents
Players discovering control, awareness, timing, and teamwork—skills that are not tied to early size or height.
Success in futsal is not tied to height or early physical development. Children can contribute through control, awareness, timing, movement, courage, communication, creativity, and cooperation.
The structural problem
Too many children still face costly, narrow routes into organized play.
For many families, rising costs can make participation difficult to begin—and harder to sustain.
6×
Children from lower-income households quit sports because of cost at six times the rate of children from higher-income households.
2×
By age 14, girls drop out of sports at twice the rate of boys.
1.3 million fewer
Girls have 1.3 million fewer opportunities to play high school sports than boys.
The opportunity gap is also an infrastructure gap.
A place to play changes who gets to play.
Quality facilities, safe environments, supportive coaches, and clear pathways can help children—especially girls—remain involved in sport. AFF helps schools use the spaces already within reach to create those opportunities closer to home.
The building may already exist. The opportunity may not.
Sources: Aspen Institute Project Play; National Recreation and Park Association; and Women’s Sports Foundation.
Derived
From proof to planning
How the documented result becomes a benchmark.
Dividing the documented 36,000+ player-hours by 5 years creates a limited-use reference of7,200+ player-hours per location, per year. It is a comparison point—not a capacity estimate or a guaranteed result.
Sessions per week × weeks per year × average attendance × session length = annual player-hours
The scenarios below make their assumptions visible and remain clearly separated from AFF’s documented history.
Strategic targetIllustrative
A regional roadmap
What could a connected regional school system look like?
Each middle-school hub should connect with two to three elementary programs, giving children an earlier introduction to futsal and a familiar place to continue playing as they grow.
The network already exists
Orlando already has the shape of the system.
Across Greater Orlando’s three principal counties, approximately 223 regular elementary schools and 78 regular middle schools form an existing public network—before private schools and specialized charter schools are counted.
OCPS alone includes 133 regular elementary schools, 41 regular middle schools, and 10 K–8 schools.
The proposed feeder structure is not an abstract diagram. It closely matches the school system already on the ground.
2.9
Elementary schools per middle school
Almost exactly AFF’s 2–3 feeder design
41%
Of regional middle schools in Stage 2
32 of 78 possible middle-school hubs
29%–43%
Of regional elementary schools in Stage 2
64–96 of 223 feeder-school opportunities
Stage 1
Initial regional network
8
Middle-school hubs
16–24
Elementary feeder programs
24–32
Total school sites
Establish local clusters, recurring play, and a manageable competition calendar.
Stage 2
Expanding regional system
32
Middle-school hubs
64–96
Elementary feeder programs
96–128
Total school sites
Connect multiple clusters into a durable regional calendar with broader access.
Strategic planning ranges. These figures describe a possible growth path—not an existing AFF inventory or a guaranteed timeline.
A conservative reference for each stage
Applying the 7,200+ annualized benchmark to every site shows what five years of limited-use replication could produce—before school-day PE, broader intramurals, or connected competition.
Initial regional network · 24–32 sites
864,000–1,152,000
Five-year player-hours · limited-use reference
Expanding regional system · 96–128 sites
3,456,000–4,608,000
Five-year player-hours · limited-use reference
Illustrative linear replication based on 7,200 player-hours per location per year. These are reference points, not forecasts or guaranteed results.
10.8M
Five-year player-hours · three-county limited-use illustration
If all 301 regular elementary and middle schools merely matched the limited-use reference—before PE, intramurals, or connected competition.
Illustrative pro forma
The mature-system possibility
What if the whole system wakes up?
Greater Orlando’s three public-school districts serve approximately 355,000 K–12 students. A mature futsal system could combine school-day PE, intramurals, clubs, and connected community play across that existing network.
Potential player-hours
over five years
Greater Orlando alone
Pro forma assumptions:355,000 students2 hours / week36 weeks5 years127,800,000
1 hour / week
63.9M
Player-hours over five years
1.5 hours / week
95.9M
Player-hours over five years
2 hours / week
127.8M
Player-hours over five years
Mature-system scenario based on average futsal-connected participation across PE, intramurals, clubs, and community play. It is an illustration of potential—not a forecast, commitment, or guaranteed result.
During the school day
Physical education
Futsal can reach entire grade levels through regular PE instruction and repeated play across the school year.
After school
Intramural and club play
Recurring sessions give interested students more time to play, improve, and return to the gym each week.
Across the network
Leagues, festivals, and tournaments
Connected schools can create additional evening and weekend activity that no isolated location can produce alone.
A K–12 continuation
A system that grows with its players.
Elementary
Broad introduction
PE and entry-level play help children discover the game early, close to home, and alongside classmates.
Middle school
Connected hubs
Recurring programs, intramurals, and feeder relationships turn first exposure into a place to continue.
High school
Natural continuation
As experienced cohorts move upward, high schools can add deeper competition, leadership, coaching, and officiating.
8 regions → 1B+ hours
Eight Orlando-scale systems operating at the same illustrative level would exceed one billion player-hours over five years. This is replicability arithmetic—not a national forecast.
Approximate district enrollment base: Orange County Public Schools, Seminole County Public Schools, and School District of Osceola County. Rounded public descriptions; planning snapshot for review.
Public infrastructure already built
The first investment has already been made.
Gymnasiums, floors, lighting, parking, and school communities are already in place. Futsal can help those public assets produce more participation and community value without beginning with a new sports complex.
Illustrative replacement-value floor
78 Greater Orlando middle-school gyms
Review-stage illustration: 78 middle-school gyms × a $5 million replacement-value planning input. A current Florida construction-cost source is required before publication. OCPS alone represents an illustrative $205,000,000; K–8 and high-school facilities are not included.
From court to system
Every new location can strengthen the others.
Standalone courts create capacity. Connected locations can create additional activity that isolated sites cannot produce alone.
Court
Mark and equip an existing gym so futsal can be played where children already are.
Program
Turn the marked court into recurring sessions with prepared leadership and simple tracking.
Team
Give players a place to belong—groups that return, improve, and invite others in.
Network
Connect schools so shared play, festivals, and competitions can create activity beyond each court alone.
System
Build regional pathways—feeder schools, middle-school nodes, and room for leagues and wider ladders.
A court creates capacity. Continuity comes from recurring leadership, reliable access, equipment upkeep, simple measurement, and a funding mix that can last.
As nearby schools become ready, shared play, festivals, leagues, and tournaments can add a network dividend: participation created by the connections among locations, beyond each location’s standalone activity. AFF will measure that effect before publishing it as a result.
Illustrative
Network milestones
What happens when schools start connecting.
An illustrative ladder of possible activity—not proven thresholds. Actual results depend on leadership, continuity, and local conditions.
1–2
A working court and recurring local program; early habits of play and measurement.
3–5
Nearby schools can begin occasional shared sessions or friendly exchanges.
6–12
Enough nodes for a local cluster—festivals, rotating hosts, and denser school-to-school contact.
13–24
Room for a more continuous regional calendar and clearer feeder-to-middle-school links.
25+
Structural capacity for broader league nights, multi-site events, and system-level coordination.
Illustrative. These bands describe structural possibility—not guaranteed activity at each count.
Performance framework
How AFF will measure output, cost, and reach.
A credible model needs definitions, records, and metrics another school or funder can understand. The sequence matters: documented counts first, derived annualized figures second, illustrative replication third, and strategic targets last.
Facility-hours
One hour in which the gym or court is actively being used.
Player-hours
One participant using the facility for one hour.
Twenty children playing for two hours equals two facility-hours and forty player-hours.
Location
- Documented player-hours and facility-hours
- Unique participants and session counts
- Attendance and return over time
Regional replication
- Locations opened and sustained
- Feeder-to-middle-school links in the planning frame
- Linear replication totals vs. observed output
Network-generated
- Standalone location output vs. connection-driven activity
- Realized school-to-school connections
- Network dividend once measured (unpublished until verified)
Access
- Ages served and gender participation
- Reach beyond limited traditional rosters
- Barriers reduced for families facing cost constraints
Economics
- Startup capital to open the use
- Annual operating expenses to sustain it
- Cost per added player-hour and per unique participant (when verified)
System development
- Progress along the court → program → team → network → system path
- Readiness of additional schools
- Illustrative milestone activity—qualified, not proven thresholds
These figures should come from attendance records, schedules, invoices, and clearly stated assumptions—not promotional estimates. Uncollected metrics are categories to measure—not numbers to display.
Until the full cost model is verified, AFF will not publish a dollar return or utilization multiplier. The regional pro forma above is a transparent scenario built from visible assumptions—not a measured network multiplier or a claim of actual results.
Change the Game
Help change what a school gym can do.
A school may already have the space. AFF can help bring together the equipment, local leadership, and support needed to put it to fuller use—and measure what changes for the children who use it.
Change the Game.