Girls Play Global thanks to this Tar Heel
Senior Janani Shivakumar has reached nearly 1,000 girl soccer players in rural India through her nonprofit.
In middle school, Janani Shivakumar moved from New Jersey back to her family’s native India. Shivakumar’s parents wanted to give their daughter a more global perspective and share their family’s cultural heritage with her.
But she was frustrated. Just before the move, a teenage Shivakumar had fallen in love with soccer, watching U.S. women’s soccer stars like Alex Morgan dominate on the world stage. When Shivakumar tried to sign up for a girls soccer team in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu, she discovered no such team existed.
Janani Shivakumar’s family moved to India to broaden her worldview; however, when she had no place to play soccer, she resolved to change that. (Submitted photo)
“In India there is a huge taboo around girls playing sports, especially male-dominated sports like soccer,” said Shivakumar, a 2026 UNC Kenan-Flagler Business School graduate who also majored in economics in the UNC College of Arts and Sciences.
“When I had approached my school at the time, they basically were like, ‘We don’t have a girls soccer team, and we don’t plan on starting one anytime soon.’”
Undeterred, Shivakumar joined a boys club team. She was the only female player among 100 boys and barely spoke the native language.
When the family moved back to New Jersey four years later, Shivakumar resolved to fight back against the taboo she experienced in India. With the help of her parents, she started a nonprofit called Girls Play Global to empower young girls in rural India.
Since 2019, Shivakumar has held yearly soccer tournaments (with a break during the pandemic) in Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu, reaching nearly 1,000 girls.
Each year, the tournaments center around one of the United Nations’ sustainable development goals — themes such as promoting peace, gender equality and climate action — and include workshops and learning opportunities for the participants.
“I didn’t want any other girl to go through what I had,” said Shivakumar, asked by the United Nations to speak about her work many times. “There was a lack of support from coaches, my peers, and I think a lot of that very early on in your life changes the way that you think about yourself and other people. I made it my priority to do something to help those girls, which led to me wanting to pursue a career in impact.”
Janani Shivakumar with participants at the 2025 tournament. Since 2019, Girls Play Global has brought nearly 1,000 girls to the field. (Submitted photo)
Making a difference
The Honors Carolina student balanced these efforts with a rigorous course load at Carolina and studied abroad in Finland, Iceland, Estonia, Uruguay, South Africa and Argentina.
Before graduation, she credited Carolina, especially Kenan-Flagler, for helping her crystalize her career goals.
“When I came to Carolina, I knew that I always wanted to have a career with some sort of impact, and I just didn’t know what that looked like,” she said. “Once I got into the B-School, I was so surprised by how much impact you can actually have in the business world.”
Specifically, Shivakumar learned about the fields of impact investing and sustainable investing, joining the Impact Investing Club at Carolina and connecting with the Ackerman Center for Excellence and Sustainability, where she helps conduct diligence and make early-stage investments through the Impact Investing Fund.
Those experiences have also helped Shivakumar scale Girls Play Global. Each year she’s held the tournament, she’s seen more girls come from farther away to play. Gradually, she’s witnessed the taboos she encountered lessen. The competition has grown fiercer, and girls soccer teams have formed throughout Tamil Nadu with the sole purpose of participating in Shivakumar’s tournaments.
“There was one moment in the most recent tournament where I was just standing there in awe of how good these girls were,” said Shivakumar, noting that it used to be a challenge to get girls on the field.
“Seeing the skill level grow over time has probably been the most inspiring thing for me.”
