When the world arrives in Miami for the 2026 FIFA World Cup, the concentration is going to shine on a packed Hard Rock Stadium, worldwide stars, and one in all the largest sporting occasions ever held in North America.
But for University of Miami alumna Jennifer Roche, the event’s success gained’t be measured solely by attendance figures or tv rankings. Instead, she is concentrated on what stays after the final whistle.
As director of neighborhood and legacy for the FIFA World Cup 2026 Miami Host Committee, Roche is chargeable for making certain that the event leaves a significant and lasting affect on South Florida’s communities. Her purpose: Use the world’s hottest sport as a catalyst for social change.
“How are we using the global game?” requested Roche, who earned a grasp’s diploma from the School of Education and Human Development’s Sport Administration program in 2016. “How are we using this mega event to create social change and make sure we’re leaving something behind?”
Roche has requested such difficult questions for a lot of her profession and endeavored to verify they didn’t go unanswered.
Growing up in Washington, D.C., Roche wasn’t the outspoken chief she is at the moment. “I was extremely shy,” she recalled. “Sports gave me my confidence.”
As a youngster, she competed in gymnastics and observe and discipline, discovering a sense of belonging and self-assurance by means of athletics. While her dad and mom labored as water useful resource engineers, Roche discovered herself drawn to the vitality and neighborhood of sports activities.
She attended the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the place she studied train and sports activities science and spent 4 years as a cheerleader. Initially, she envisioned a profession in athletic coaching or bodily remedy. But as commencement approached, she realized her pursuits prolonged beyond the discipline and into the administration and administration of sports activities.
Her uncle was an vital affect in her life, as his profession with the worldwide governing physique for observe and discipline in Monaco uncovered Roche to the world aspect of sports activities. “I saw all the different things he was able to do,” she stated. “And that’s when I knew I wanted to work for a governing body.”
In 2015, Roche moved to Miami to pursue a graduate diploma in sport administration at the University, immersing herself in the area’s various sports activities panorama, taking internships with a number of organizations, and studying firsthand how the trade operated.
She labored with the University athletic division’s Hurricane Club, gained expertise at main sporting occasions, and accomplished her final graduate internship with Special Olympics Florida.
“The experience proved transformative,” Roche stated.
After graduating in 2016, she joined Special Olympics Florida full time and ultimately grew to become senior supervisor of sports activities coaching and competitors. In that position, she oversaw packages serving greater than 10,000 athletes all through South Florida. “The work,” she stated, “helped reinforce a lesson that was central to my career—that sports can be a powerful tool for inclusion, empowerment, and opportunity.”
In 2020, Roche joined CONCACAF, the Confederation of North, Central America, and Caribbean Association Football that serves as the official governing physique of soccer in the area and is one in all FIFA’s six continental confederations.
Over 4 years, she traveled extensively all through CONCACAF’s 41 member websites, serving to handle legacy initiatives linked to the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar. The initiatives targeted on schooling, life expertise, and neighborhood improvement by means of soccer.
“There was no one-size-fits-all approach,” Roche stated. “You had the United States, Mexico, and Canada, and then you had small island nations with completely different challenges and opportunities. The work taught me how to listen, adapt, and design programs that reflected local needs rather than imposing a universal solution.”
In November 2024, Roche joined the FIFA World Cup 2026 Miami Host Committee. “For someone who had built a career in Miami and spent years preparing for a role in global sports, it felt like a full-circle moment,” she stated. “This is honestly a dream come true, my North Star.”
As a part of her tasks with the Miami Host Committee, Roche oversees neighborhood and legacy initiatives, that are constructed round three pillars: entry to soccer, sustainability, and neighborhood engagement.
Working alongside Miami-Dade County commissioners, colleges, nonprofits, and different organizations, she has helped arrange almost 20 so-called “One Game, One Future” clinics throughout the area, making soccer accessible to children who would possibly in any other case have by no means had the alternative to play the sport.
Children between the ages of seven and 16 take part in soccer instruction whereas coaches obtain coaching on matters that stretch far beyond the sport itself, together with psychological well being, violence prevention, confidence constructing, diet, and empowering ladies and younger ladies. And the clinics replicate the host committee’s inclusive mission, happening in Little Havana, Little Haiti, Miami Gardens, and different neighborhoods all through the county.
At each clinic, neighborhood companions present advantages that stretch beyond soccer, providing providers resembling free well being screenings, together with blood stress, glucose, and melancholy assessments for kids, coaches, and households.
Goodwill Industries serves as the host committee’s logistics and transport accomplice—a alternative Roche says was intentional due to the group’s dedication to using folks with disabilities.
The host committee can also be investing in longer-term legacy initiatives—amongst them, an enlargement of blind soccer programming with the Miami Lighthouse for the Blind, assist for Little Haiti FC’s youth improvement initiatives, and plans for a new neighborhood soccer discipline in Miami Gardens that can stay free and accessible after the event concludes.
“My goal is to have a constant stream of community activity and opportunities for families, kids, coaches, and everyone to be involved in the lead-up to the World Cup,” Roche stated. “The tournament may last only a few weeks. Its legacy will endure for decades.”
She is one in all a number of college students and graduates of the Sport Administration program who’re taking part in vital roles with FIFA.
“The beauty of our program is the depth of connections we have within the sports industry,” stated Paul Resnick, senior lecturer and internship director for the program. “Knowing several years out that the FIFA World Cup would be coming to the Americas, we set out to make sure we established a wide net of contacts within the FIFA offices. And when Miami was awarded as a site for the games, our faculty was in touch with those on the executive team. This helped to provide so many of the internships and volunteer positions for our students and alumni.”
Windy Dees, graduate program director for the Sport Administration program, which falls below the Department of Kinesiology and Sport Sciences, stated college students are educated in all sides of sports activities enterprise. “We place a major emphasis on the global nature of the sport industry,” she stated. “The number of current students and alums we have contributing to this mega event speaks to the hard work and preparation they put in throughout the program to train for these professional opportunities.”
Michael Giannetta, who earned a Bachelor of Science diploma in Sport Administration, serves as parking and allowing coordinator for FIFA World Cup. “Working to develop parking permits across 16 stadiums in three countries has been a unique challenge, but we’re prepared for the tournament,” he stated.
Resnick known as Roche “a shining example of how to keep working up the ranks of this industry. I know for a fact, this is just another step in her successful future in the sports world.”