Four international volunteers arrived in Sarajevo on the 1st of March, ready to start their short-term ESC project. Sena, Betül, Burhan and Çağlar are young people who came from Turkey to volunteer in BRAVO, and they will live and work with us for the next 2 months, until April 30th.
Firstly, to make sure that they will make the best out of their time in Sarajevo, BRAVO local volunteers offered them their time and made sure that our international volunteers had a great day. Furthermore, at the arrival, BRAVO local members helped the volunteers to get more comfortable in their new surroundings, by taking them on a tour through beautiful Sarajevo. Upon their arrival, Sena, Betül, Burhan and Çağlar had the opportunity to enjoy and taste Bosnian food, learn about Bosnian culture, and meet friendly Bosnian people.
Since they came here to gain new experiences and to learn new things, they have also visited BRAVO’s office and learned about our basic responsibilities and tasks that they are going to perform and provide in the next two months.
PROJECT DAILY PROGRAM:
Working hours will usually be from 09:00am – 17:00pm, but since our volunteers will work in different institutions, working hours will vary from agreement with that institution. However, they will not work more than 8 hours with breaks, each day.
Since the main focus of our organization are international projects, it is planned for them to work on some projects that BRAVO is planning or implementing in the next 2 months. At the same time, we are actively working with people with fewer opportunities, and our volunteers will participate and work in some of our partner institutions where they will work with, and assist people with disabilities, Down syndrome, but also work in the sensory room.
In the most trophy-winning, women’s club in Bosnia and Herzegovina, SFK 2000 Sarajevo, our volunteers will have the opportunity to work with the young girls and women through their training activities. They will have the opportunity to participate in promotion activities planned for the football school for girls. Also, through various activities, they will have the opportunity to improve their skills, but also gain various experiences and knowledge.
Even though the Erasmus+ program does not cover the language support in the short-term ESC projects, we think it is important for our volunteers to communicate with people with disabilities in Bosnian language, so the volunteers will have the opportunity to attend, one hour a week, a Bosnian language course with the disabled people in the center, free of charge.
These will be the basic commands which are needed in the activities. The program is not “fixed” and can be adapted and changed based on the volunteer’s performances. This means that volunteers can stay in the BRAVO office even more days if they find themselves more into Project Management or Youth policies, but also, they can spend more time working with our sport clubs or/and institutions for People with disabilities.
SENDING ORGANIZATIONS:
Egitim Programlari ve Evrensel ve Kulturel Aktiviteler Dernegi - EPEKA
Burhan and Çağlar are representing an amazing organization called Egitim Programlari ve Evrensel ve Kulturel Aktiviteler Dernegi – EPEKA, located in Sinop.
EPEKA was established in 2012 for the purpose of creating and developing cultural and educational programs for the disadvantaged young people and women. They are a nongovernmental and non-profit organization, with 35 members, who are active in the field of contemporary art, ICT, non-formal education, ecology, entrepreneurship, local handicrafts, youth programs and volunteering. EPEKA has quite a lot of experience in EU Youth in Action and Erasmus + programs, and we also provide non-formal education abroad and in our town with a multicultural atmosphere for the young people that we are working with, which means we often send them to European countries, so they can gain more knowledge through an international group of young people, such as through youth exchanges, training courses for youth and youth volunteering, and at the same time we host European young people here in Sinop for youth exchanges about environment, crisis management, leadership skills, volunteering for the disabled people and orator skills. EPEKA is accredited as a sending and hosting organization for the European Voluntary Service. Within EVS we host young volunteers in our town in the rehabilitation center for the mentally and physically disabled people. Providing traineeship in Sinop for the university students whose major is SEN and organizing student exchange programs with different countries from all around the world, are some of our activities too.
We worked for the disadvantaged women in our Grundtvig project “WOW- Working on Women” with our European partners. Within this project, we provided cooking, handcrafts, computers, women and childcare, and English courses for the women who are lower educated and unemployed. We still hold English classes for the disadvantaged women and youth.
For the purpose of raising awareness of animal rights, we provided volunteering activities for our youth to work in the animal shelter in our town, to cook for them and play with the animals that are living in the cages and organize sales with our young people for fundraising to buy food and medical equipment for the homeless animals.
Our website: https://epeka.org.tr/en/
Bolu Gençlik ve Spor İl Müdürlüğü
Sena and Betul are representind a Bolu Gençlik ve Spor İl Müdürlüğü
TASK DEFINITION OF BOLU:
To carry out activities supporting the personal, social and sportive development of the youth; To provide opportunities to develop their own potentials by taking into account the needs of different youth groups, and to provide loans, scholarships, accommodation and nutrition for the young people in higher education.
SUMMARY INFORMATION ON SERVICES
To make researches and researches on the needs of the youth and the services and opportunities offered to the youth, to develop suggestions, to provide information, guidance and counseling in the field of youth.
– To determine the procedures and principles regarding youth work and projects.
– To carry out youth studies and projects, to support these studies and projects, to control their implementation and results.
– To observe that sports activities are carried out within the plan and program and in accordance with the legislation, to take measures to encourage their development and spread.
– To determine the policies to be applied in the field of sports and to ensure the implementation of international rules and instructions.
– To perform other duties and services given by the Ministry.
More information find on their website: http://bolu.gsb.gov.tr/
