Market Data 
The I SUPPORT SPORT FOR CHANGE t-shirt collaboration between football powerhouse AC Milan and fashion powerbrand Off-White is more than a limited-edition fashion drop. With proceeds from the $100 garment going to support Success Academy Charter Schools in New York City, it’s a connection that brings global sport into local communities to create new pathways for youth education.
“This collaboration opens the minds of our scholars to again see what could be possible,” Success Academy athletic director Peter Dicce said. “We talk to our scholars about how it’s great to have hopes and dreams of being a pro player, but there’s a way to be involved in sports that extends beyond that—being a doctor for the team, being a reporter, managing the stadium and team facilities, designing uniforms and apparel, or running a retail store.”
The project builds on more than two decades of community work by AC Milan’s charity foundation arm, Fondazione Milan, using sport to encourage positive changes for vulnerable youth. Through its Sport for Change initiative, the foundation addresses poverty and educational inequality across more than twenty countries.
Success Academy serves students across New York City, with most scholars (as its students are called) coming from low-income households in culturally vibrant neighborhoods like Harlem. That sense of purpose and place gives the collaboration with AC Milan and Off-White even greater significance.
According to Rocco Giorgianni, Secretary General of Fondazione Milan, this type of collaboration is an outgrowth of the AC Milan mission.
“It’s simple in certain ways,” Giorgianni said. “We use sport as a tool to give possibilities to young people to develop over time. That’s the idea behind all AC Milan Foundation projects, including these partnerships with Off-White and Success Academy.”
Benedetto DiBlasi, a foundation fundraiser, added that the focus on long-term outcomes is the consistent theme. “Through Sport for Change and other programs, we’ve supported over 270 projects in 25 countries,” he said. “Each one is different. What is happening in New York, as in other places, is very special because of the people involved.”
Those connections—and the broader effort to bring AC Milan’s community work into New York City—trace back to 2012, when three friends founded the AC Milan Club New York City.
What Francesco Campari, Alessandro Rimoldi, and Giancarlo Rosselli started as a supporters’ club has grown into a community of more than 650 members and 80,000 online followers. Beyond gathering to watch AC Milan matches, the club raises money for people in financial need, helps others find jobs, and connects with local supporter groups from other international clubs. Members like Franco Zagari also volunteer their time to lead foundation-linked programs, including those with Success Academy. It’s part of a New York City undercurrent that most people rarely see.
Playing recreational soccer was another way Milan-born Campari found community in New York. It was during these games that he crossed paths with Boris Bozic, a member of the Serbian community who was splitting most of his time between working various jobs and coaching youth players.
Nearly a decade later, through regular contact with representatives from the AC Milan foundation, Campari learned about a new project being launched with club sponsor PUMA. The initiative, called From Milan to the World, would spotlight nonprofit organizations in different cities on each continent and provide funding to those that received the most votes in a featured contest. When Campari was asked if he knew of any people or programs in New York that might want to enter, Bozic came immediately to mind.
“That’s when I found out—something I didn’t even know—that he had helped build a soccer program at a school that didn’t have one,” Campari recalled. “So, we decided to invest in relationships that had already taken root. That’s what led us to Success Academy.”
The entry from Success Academy ended up being the top vote-getter in the contest. Along with the funding came connections to the AC Milan foundation and its people. The resources and, more importantly, the relationships have been growing ever since.
“What started with one project in New York has become an ongoing relationship,” foundation head Giorgianni said. “It’s not a one-time activation. It’s something we want to grow together.”
“We’re genuinely grateful for the relationship and the scholars and staff at Success Academy don’t take it for granted,” Dicce agreed. “It’s not built out of a perceived inequity. It’s a true collaboration, a true relationship. We are in frequent contact. They seem truly excited to hear about the successes, especially on the girls’ side,” Dicce said. “At the same time, they are learning about our community.”
That learning extends beyond the pitch, into cultural understanding and shared knowledge. It is about taking part in global exchanges focused around soccer, education, and culture.
Early last year, a donor asked Dicce and Success Academy CEO Eva Moskowitz what was something that he could do to really make a difference for scholar-athletes. That led to funding Success Academy boys’ and girls’ soccer teams to travel to Italy, with family members and coaches in tow. The ten-day trip included meeting with AC Milan foundation staff, touring the stadium and museum, and attending a men’s first team match as part of an educational immersion into the cities, communities, and culture of Italy.
For Success Academy students, opportunities like these serve as a bridge that takes them beyond the pitch and the classroom, and into the sport, business, and creative industries.
This past summer, AC Milan hosted a joint youth soccer event with Manchester City Football Club ahead of their friendly at Yankee Stadium in New York. Children from Success Academy and Manchester City’s City in the Community foundation came together for a session led by academy coaches. PUMA provided boots and kits, club legends like Milan’s Franco Baresi made appearances, and participants were surprised with tickets to the match and received in-stadium recognition on game day. The event reflected both clubs’ shared value of using football to promote healthy lives and lifestyles.
That same spirit extends to the collaboration with Off-White. The brand, founded by the late designer Virgil Abloh, is known for luxury streetwear that blends the arts, architecture, and social commentary. Past projects between the AC Milan foundation and Off-White have included limited-edition t-shirts supporting upgrades to a sports center in an underserved suburb of Milan and programs that directly reached hundreds of at-risk children in the slums of Nairobi, Kenya.
Dicce believes the collaborations resonate far beyond the soccer pitch, reaching more than 8,000 Success Academy athletics participants across 300 teams at 57 schools.
Campari added that he hopes for more collaborations like this one because it means being on the pitch with kids and seeing the looks on parents’ faces, something he described as “the soul of what we are doing.”
“That’s why I think that we’ll keep flourishing,” Campari said. “Something like the I SUPPORT SPORT FOR CHANGE t-shirt is about the potential to do something lasting. Not just a brand appearance, but real community investment.”
As Giorgianni sees it, “With Off-White, the partnership is not just a commercial relationship, but something even more meaningful, with the brand playing a key role as Cultural Curator of the Club. The support has helped reinforce our positioning as a social and cultural institution, globally. When a collaboration goes beyond its initial scope and allows you to explore new and impactful ways of working together, that’s when it becomes a success. In this case, with Success Academy, it is a double success because you can reach a different level of relationship and a different level of commitment, one that we can renew year after year.”
And that is what the collaboration between AC Milan, Off-White, and Success Academy shows: how the power of sport to make a positive impact in community and society can create real opportunities for the next generation.
