Soccer Journalist Jaden Dakwa ’17 Chases Through Balls and Throughlines
By Dylan Howlett
7-minute read
On a late July afternoon, Jaden Dakwa ’17 was reminded of a universal truth: Durham Academy is inescapable. He wouldn’t have it any other way.
Dakwa earned an undergraduate journalism degree from Elon University, about 30 miles west of the DA Upper School campus where he made four years’ worth of lifelong memories. He played a college club soccer game vs. Abe Dunderdale ’16. He has served as a volunteer assistant coach with the DA varsity boys soccer team. But he has also ventured. In the fall of 2023, Dakwa traveled some 3,800 miles east to St. Mary’s University in Twickenham, England, to earn a master’s degree in sports journalism — he would also be shortlisted for the 2024 Football Writers’ Association’s Student Writer Award — and chase his dream of becoming a full-time soccer journalist. He tacked another year onto his stay as he continued to freelance in the field, and he moved back to the Triangle in the summer of 2025.
It was that July afternoon, only hours after his nonstop British Airways flight landed at Raleigh-Durham International Airport, when Dakwa visited Whole Foods Market in Chapel Hill. He bumped into one of the store’s most ardent patrons: DA Head of School Michael Ulku-Steiner, the father of Kenan Ulku-Steiner ’18 — Dakwa’s former DA soccer teammate and, to this day, a dear friend. It was, Dakwa said, the ideal — and kismet — bookend to his transatlantic journey.
“The standard that DA wants,” Dakwa said, “is a family atmosphere.”
A few weeks after Dakwa’s chance encounter with his former head of school, the freelance soccer journalist took some time for a wide-ranging conversation about the Arsenal super fan’s undying love for soccer and storytelling; his fateful decision to spurn a business degree and pursue his storytelling dreams instead; and his boundless appreciation for his lasting family-like experience at DA.
The following conversation has been lightly edited for brevity and clarity.
What was it about soccer that captured your imagination from a young age?
“It was [Brazilian men’s soccer star] Ronaldinho. But it’s a number of things: how global it is, there’s an aura to it, there’s a level of cultural affinities that tie the game together. It was something that I was always interested in from a young age, and I enjoyed seeing the skill level and the intricacy involved in it.”
You must have experienced that in droves during your time in England. What was it like being in one of the hotbeds for soccer — or football — in the world?
“Oh, it’s amazing. Whenever something you’re interested in is the main focal point, you kind of cling to it. When you’re there, you feel like you’re starting to fall in love with something again. Instead of you just talking about Arsenal or the Emirates Stadium, you’re getting on the Tube [the London Underground], and now you’re there at Emirates in an hour. I got out there twice: I went to the second leg of the UEFA Women’s Champions League quarterfinal, and then I went to see the men’s team play Bolton in the Premier League. I really enjoyed just physically being there. You always see it on TV when you wake up early to watch matches. But when you’re there, it’s a completely different experience.”
Going back a little bit, I assume when you were playing soccer that your goal was to become a professional player or, at the very least, take your playing career as far as you could go — which is what you did at Elon, where you played for the club team and also hosted a student radio show about professional soccer. But what was the moment when you thought less about playing and more about covering the games as a writer?
“When I was younger, I was obsessed with the game. It’s all I thought about. You have dreams of playing professionally. But when you’re very, very young, your parents always tell you, ‘Focus on school.’ And when you’re young, you’re also a little bit hard-headed. You get to high school, and you’re playing club soccer, and you think, ‘Let me become the best I can.’ As I got to senior year, and I realized that I wasn’t getting a lot of offers from college programs, that’s when I started to really focus on school and what college I wanted to go to. But that doesn’t mean that you can’t be around the game when you get older. You start to realize as you get older and the more you mature as a man that not a lot of stuff is just about you, right? When your parents put that many resources into your education, you want to fulfill that dream of making sure you do good on your part for the education that they wanted for you.”
How did you eventually decide to pursue a career in sports journalism?
“I started writing my junior year at Elon. I originally studied business, but I didn’t like it. I thought, ‘I don’t just want to be in college for something that I don’t like.’ So I switched to journalism and communications, and I ended up falling in love with it. After I started writing, I realized that sports could be a really good avenue just because of the passion I have for it. When I went into my senior year, I started seeing what kind of opportunities were out there, and someone at the L.A. Soccer Press approached me about an unpaid internship. I wasn’t really quite focused on the money: I was more focused on developing my craft. I just started the journey of getting better at my craft and working on it. When you’re that young, you don’t really understand all the nuances of writing. But as the years go on, you start to become more experienced. Now I know I can at least keep pace in a professional newsroom.”
Your most recognizable piece is the 2020 opinion column that you wrote for The Fayetteville Observer in which you implored all Americans to listen to Black voices in the wake of George Floyd’s murder. But most of your storytelling revolves, obviously, around soccer. What’s your favorite story that you’ve ever written?
“I've had a lot of amazing opportunities to write and also spend time around some amazing athletes. But I think my favorite would probably be some of the feature stories I've written. I wrote one on Showkat Tahir, an English forward who was a young prospect at Brentford FC’s academy when it completely closed down. He had to rearrange his plans and figure out where he was gonna go. He ended up playing on a semi-pro team in England, and then he came to North Carolina FC, which is how I met him and eventually profiled him for L.A. Soccer Press. It was great to understand his journey, and you get to see what it's like behind the scenes. I think that's kind of what everyone wants to see, of what the day-to-day routine looks like for a professional athlete: the challenges, getting ready to play for the club, all those little things.”
What do you love about writing feature stories?
“You can really sit down and project the profile of a person. Some of the news stories you write are just basics — 500, 600 words of just filling in details. When you get to write a feature story, you're taking the time to really understand the profile of a person — not just as an athlete, but also their personality, why they operate the way they do, why they're so skilled at what they do, what led them to the person they are today, what events in their life shaped them. You really have to put time in and really use your creativity and your mind. It’s done with the intent to really show what this person projects to the world.”
What was your experience like playing for the DA boys soccer team and for longtime head coach Julian Cochran?
“Senior year was the first season where I started for most of the year. That was also my first kind of experience being around a team in more of a leadership role as a consistent starter. But you start to understand that, once again, not a lot of it is just about you. Your teammates are involved. You understand a lot of stuff about the game that you didn’t understand years ago, but you also become more wise and you understand that soccer is a team sport, and it’s not just about you. Playing with the group created memories I’ll never forget.”
As a graduating senior, you wrote a heartfelt message, featured in Durham Academy Magazine, in which you spoke at length about how DA very much felt like a family. What did DA mean to you during your four years at the Upper School?
“I’ll always remember the laughs, the jokes, the time we shared — all the road trips with boys soccer, spending extra time with teachers, hanging out with friends on other teams. You feel like you’re immersed into something that’s just bigger than school. Some of the teachers I was close with — including [former Upper School history teacher] Mr. [Mike] Spatola — I’m still in touch with them today. We talk about different things. We impart wisdom to each other, the stuff that’s not just a test you can study for. This is actual knowledge that we speak about, real-world stuff. Durham Academy will always be a special place for me because it’s much bigger than a school. There’s a real family aspect to it, and it’s tangible evidence because I still speak with a lot of those people today. I didn’t just graduate from the school and say, ‘OK. I’m finished. It doesn’t mean anything to me.’ I’m always around. I even went back and served as an assistant coach with the soccer team for two seasons. Kenan Ulku-Steiner ’18 was one of my best friends, and you get to see him grow up, and now he’s teaching other kids [at Head-Royce School in Oakland, California]. You see how people mature and grow over the years, and that’s what it’s all about. You put time in, and then they put time in as well. They give back, and you give back. And it becomes a cycle of what you know. The standard that DA wants is a family atmosphere.”
In addition to Mr. Spatola, you also specifically mentioned in that same message Kemi Nonez — who during your time at the Upper School was DA’s director of diversity, equity and engagement and now serves as the school’s director of enrollment management — and Upper School history teacher Owen Bryant. What have they all meant to you as a student and now as an alum?
“Mr. Spatola was a big piece of my development. My dad was usually always busy with work, and people don’t really realize the amount of resources it takes to educate a kid. It takes a village. My dad wasn’t always able to be around, in a sense, where he could be with me every single day. And so Mr. Spatola was almost like another father figure to me — not just an educator, but someone who really sat me down and showed me little things about discipline. He was always special. Ms. Nonez was someone who had a big piece in making me understand why DA was so special. She was always such a big factor in me learning about diversity, but also pushing for my personal development and the very best version of myself. I graduated with her son, Xavier [Nonez ’17], and it was just lovely to be around her. The rest of the school’s staff always kind of looked out for me, and they wanted to see me become the best man possible. And Mr. Bryant was always pushing me for better as well. They all understood that you have to push yourself to lengths where you’re uncomfortable in order to grow. They were very insistent on seeing me reach that potential. Whenever you have three people like that who are insistent on seeing you reach your top potential, and then you do grow and you hit certain milestones, it’s something lovely to look back on. You start to realize how fast the time goes. Those moments and those memories will never be forgotten.”
Your parents wrote in your “senior ad” in the 2017 DA yearbook that you should “always remember that your goal in life is to find your gift and your purpose is to give it away.” What role has DA played in that goal and that purpose?
“Those finite four years teach you so much about life. You realize how short your experience on Earth is. It’s the same thing when you get to college: You start to see how short that little four-year period is, and you see some of the events that happen in the real world, and you start to make connections. You start to see it’s a perfect time to impart what you learned and actually make a significant impact on the world. I’m thankful that DA gave me the opportunity to do that.”