From the time she first stepped on the soccer pitch at age six, Karin Sendel, has been shattering gender stereotypes while creating equal opportunities for young female athletes in Israel. Told many times throughout her childhood that soccer is not a sport for girls, Karin ignored traditional societal norms on her way to becoming a 17-year professional soccer player, ten-time League Champion, eight-time Israeli Cup winner, and captain of the Israeli National Team. 

Along with her professional soccer career, Karin is Chairperson of the Soccer Players Organization, an NGO protecting and maintaining the rights of the players as employees of their clubs. The first woman in Israel to ever hold this position and just the second worldwide, Karin has made a significant impact. She’s professionalizing the women’s soccer league, winning court cases against the Ministry of Sport by demanding equal pay, and publicizing the inequities between the women’s national team and their male counterparts. She’s also been a vocal leader with the “Kicking Out Racism and Violence from the Fields” initiative in cooperation with the Israeli Soccer Association and the Ministry of Homeland Security. This program resulted in the foundation of the Prevention of Violence in Sports Law in Israel.