https://svitac.org

Staff: Gordana Varcaković, Dina Vošanović, Miloš Popić, Sanjin Vošanović

Local volunteers: Adin Midžić, Merima Hidanović, Zorana Nemček, Nusreta Ferizagić, Dijana Živković, Borjana Stjepanović

‘Weltwearts’ volunteers: Lydia Luise Jung, Lana Fuchs

‘EVS/ESC’ volunteers: Hannah Luise Ursula Külper                

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ON-GOING PROGRAMME

• Culture and Art Diversity around the World – Includes Language, Art&Crafts, Music, Drama, and Sports workshops from Monday to Friday
  • Standard and Conversational Language workshops – English, German
    • I love English – English workshops for children, teenagers and young people
    • “Lasstuns Deutsch sprechen!/Pričajmo njemački!“ (“Let’s speak German”) – German workshops for children, teenagers and young people
  • Art&Crafts workshops – practical arts and crafts workshops for children and teenagers
  • Music workshops – samba, guitar for children and young people

  HIGHLIGHTS ON MONTH’S ACTIVITIES

  • This month started quite normally, but in the second part, the number of people infected with the coronavirus began to increase. All this has led to the return of part of the restrictions, re-declaration of the epidemic in the Brčko District, the ban on gatherings and the returning online activities. International volunteers have been doing a lot of different daily activities and they focused on different things (e.g. supporting online activities, promotion of the organization through social media).
  • About 140 participants regularly attended Svitac’s (Firefly Bosnia’s) activities in July. Participants were aged between 4 and 40 years old. The youngest and the oldest participants attended Culture and Art Diversity around the World workshops and English/German workshops for adults.
    • Younger group – They painted cones from which we made a beautiful wall decoration, drew various animals with hand and fingers – giraffe, dinosaur and read fairy tales: Little Mermaid, Peter Pan, Alice in Wonderland, Cat in Boots and Hansel and Gretel. They continued to learn Latin letters V, Z, Ž and the words that begin with these letters in local languages (Bosnian/Serbian/Croatian), maths and new words in English and German related to the English alphabet, flora and fauna, musical instruments, board games, summer and tolerance. This month the group finished the Latin alphabet and started learning the Cyrillic alphabet (first two letters). In the Music Workshops, they learned and practised the song “Twinkle, twinkle little star”, which is very demanding and consists of three stanzas. The group also had the opportunity to learn about new musical instruments (shaker, tambourine and trumpet). This month, due to new participants, we repeated the rules of traffic safety and held a workshop on healthy habits. As part of our regular activities, this month we again paid attention to hygiene, where we emphasized the importance of maintaining hygiene with age-appropriate methods, and reiterated how often and how properly to wash hands and teeth. Highlight with the younger group was the workshop for International Friendship Day when they made a heart for the best friend and sent a message about the importance of friends in their lives.
    • Older group –  They made banners “Brcko – a clean city for all”, printed photos of garbage dumps and wrote motivational messages below photos. In the Language Workshops, the group learned verbs ‘must, know, want, have and be’ in English, German and Turkish and their application in sentences and speaking. The highlight with the older group was a discussion on the topic of volunteering and activism.

  EVS/ESC, WELTWARTS AND OTHER VOLUNTEERS’ PROGRAMMES

  • In July, Svitac (Firefly Bosnia) very much appreciated online collaboration with 3 international volunteers: two ‘Weltwärts’ volunteers from Germany and one EVS/ESC volunteer from Germany.

  MEETINGS and PRESENTATIONS

  • Svitac’s (Firefly Bosnia’s) staff continued to attend regular monthly meetings with the youth centre coordinator and the other NGOs based in Brčko. The purpose of the last meeting was to discuss conditions and schedules for the continuation of centre activities.
  • Svitac’s (Firefly Bosnia’s) staff participated in a study prepared by a team of researchers in BiH and Northern Macedonia in close collaboration with Eurothink Skopje, and with the support of the BiH Resilience Initiative. The study explores the link between justice, the rule of law, corruption, socio-political polarization and extremism. As part of this research, they will talk to a wide range of local community actors, including local government representatives, activists, journalists, entrepreneurs, environmentalists, teachers and analysts. The goal of the researchers is that this research also contributes to the strengthening of local communities in order to further develop their potentials and offer their citizens a better future.
  • Svitac’s (Firefly Bosnia’s) representatives attended the Public Debate on “Financing of Non-Profit Organizations from the Brcko District Budget”. Representatives of the authorities of the Brcko District of BiH introduced the participants to the way of financing non-profit organizations from the budget of the Brcko District, with reference to the Preliminary Draft Law on Associations and Foundations and Guidelines for drafting the Law on Associations and Foundations of the Brcko District of BiH. In the end, the participants had the opportunity to discuss the topic.
  • Svitac’s (Firefly Bosnia’s) representatives attended OSCE online meeting. Participants talked about new tools to strengthen cohesion in local communities. The biggest focus was on developing action plans as a positive example to promote tolerance.