Charlotte set as flagship city for dual-track sports and careers initiative
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA – African Media Agency – 2 March 2026 – The SEED Project, together with implementation partners the Pan African Council, Champs for Change, and the Global Africa Business Accelerator (GABA) Center, has taken a major step toward launching the U.S.–Africa Youth Talent Combine and Sports Careers Summit following a high-level Stakeholder Roundtable held during NBA All-Star Week in Los Angeles.
Convened by SEED Project and supported by SEED founder Amadou Gallo Fall, the roundtable brought together HBCU leaders, African and Caribbean diaspora representatives, city officials, impact investors, sports executives, and youth development organizations. The group aligned around the shared goal of using sport as a platform for education, careers, and economic mobility on both sides of the Atlantic.
Dual-track model: on-court and across the ecosystem
The U.S.–Africa Youth Talent Combine and Sports Careers Summit builds on a historical combine model while adding a second, equally weighted track focused on careers:
- A high-performance basketball combine for athletes, featuring standardized testing, positional skill work, and 5‑on‑5 evaluations.
- A parallel Sports Careers Summit for non‑athlete and multi‑interest youth, offering personality-based career assessments, hands-on labs, shadowing experiences, and mentoring across media, analytics, operations, coaching, entrepreneurship, technology, esports, and sports diplomacy.
“This is about who gets to build the future of sport,” said Fabien Anthony, Chairman of the Pan African Council. “We are designing a platform where young people can move from fan to professional on the floor, in the boardroom, and across the global economy.”
Charlotte as flagship launch
Roundtable participants endorsed Charlotte, North Carolina as the flagship host city for the first event, subject to final alignment with the Charlotte Hornets and facility partners. The concept calls for:
- A three‑day program at the Hornets’ arena, combining on‑court evaluation and off‑court career exploration.
- HBCU- and city-led learning experiences, using Charlotte’s history with HBCU tournaments and NBA All-Star as a live case study in major event delivery, cultural impact, and local economic benefits.
“Charlotte offers a powerful classroom,” said Kimberly Nelson, CEO of the GABA Center. “Young people will see how a single event mobilizes hundreds of roles from game operations and storytelling to hospitality, technology, finance, healthcare and city planning.”
Centering youth careers in sport
Champs for Change (C4C) will lead design and delivery of the Sports Careers Summit, ensuring non‑athlete youth are full co‑beneficiaries of the program rather than an add‑on.
“Every young person who walks into this experience should leave with a clearer pathway whether that’s in front of the camera, behind the camera, at the scorer’s table, in the startup lab, or leading in their community,” said Memuna Williams, co‑founder of Champs for Change. “We’re building a generation of African and diaspora leaders who see sport as an industry.”
Next steps
SEED Project and its partners agreed to a 90‑day roadmap that includes finalizing dates and space requirements with the Charlotte Hornets, refining the combine and Summit curriculum, mapping industry roles to HBCU and African university programs, and structuring a shared sponsorship and scholarship fund. A post-meeting report, recording these commitments was circulated among project stakeholders on February 24.
“This initiative is a movement to build prosperity across the continent, elevate youth through mentorship and professionalism, and integrate African talent into global value chains,” the partners said in a joint statement.
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