https://svitac.org

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

Local volunteers: Maja Tomić, Ines Moćević, Eldar Bešić, Jelena Tošić, Mira Božić

‘Weltwärts’ volunteers: Charlotte Stella Kramer, Lenja Helen Schulze Wessel

‘ESC’ volunteers: Maika Luise Dils, Marlen Eckert 

‘Love Volunteers’ volunteers: Isabell Krüger, Julia Abel, Laura Elizabeth Lawrence

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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 (4-14)
  • Standard and Conversational Language workshops – English, German
    • I love English – English workshops for 15-30
    • “Lasstuns Deutsch sprechen!/Pričajmo njemački!“ (Let’s speak German) – German workshops for 15-30
  • Music workshops – samba, guitar for 15-30

  HIGHLIGHTS ON MONTH’S ACTIVITIES

  • This month was full of colours, our participants were learning together and had lots of fun dancing. Instructive workshops were conducted with local high school students on education, culture, and lifestyle in the US. Our volunteers from Germany, Julia, and Isabell, who were themselves born and raised in East Germany (former German Democratic Republic – GDR), talked about their experiences in the GDR era and reported on their childhood. The students gained a deep and diverse insight into life in the GDR and the significant events leading up to the fall of the Berlin Wall. Julia and Isabell told how they and their families experienced the fall of the Berlin Wall and what changed for them after Germany reunified. It was a great experience to share insights from people who experienced this historic time themselves. 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 143 participants regularly attended Svitac’s (Firefly in Bosnia’s) activities in November. Participants were aged between 4 and 30 years old. The youngest and the oldest participants attended Culture and Art Diversity around the World workshops and English/German conversational workshops.
    • Younger group – They talked about the beginning of winter, colder days, rain, and wind, and made tiny colorful umbrellas, kites, and windmills from creative materials. The group finished the Cyrillic alphabet and started learning how to write numbers 1-6. In the English, German and Turkish language workshops they learned words related to hygiene, illnesses, emotions and class rules. In the music workshops, they rehearsed new dance choreography and a song about hygiene. The group started doing little theatre days when they read a story and watch a short puppet show with educational topics. This month, the international volunteers chose the story „Rainbow fish” (Riba duga) which tells us about tolerance, respect, and friendship. Since the weather was colder, the participants did group games inside (musical statues and putting together puzzles after snack time were a big favourite). All workshops are implemented with an educational visual method with pictures and video; the goal of informal educational workshops is to develop creativity, memory, motor skills, empathy, socialization and tolerance for diversities. Highlight with the younger group was the workshop for the International Day of Tolerance when they talked about the word ‘tolerance’ and what it means to them.
    • Older group –  They discussed the following topics: freedom, solidarity, equality, respect, kindness, selfishness and tolerance. In this way, we want to provide young people with a safe and neutral space, where they can express their opinions and express positive and negative emotions, without fear of condemnation. In the Language Workshops, the group repeated verbs in the present tense, learned nouns for sports and sports activities, how to say countries in Europe, wrote dictations, read and translated short texts, worked on practicing everyday communication and grammar, and got help with homework and school projects. The highlight with the older group was the workshop for International Day against Fascism and Anti-Semitism when they discussed how everyone could contribute to an equal society every day, preventing fascist structures from spreading.

ESC, WELTWARTS AND OTHER VOLUNTEERS’ PROGRAMMES

• In November, Svitac (Firefly in Bosnia) very much appreciated the collaboration with 7 Weltwärts, ‘Love Volunteers’ and ESC volunteers from Germany and USA.
• The visa process has been finished for 4 volunteers from Germany.
• Sending ESC and ‘Weltwärts’ – Six volunteers from Bosnia are doing their service in Germany, Spain and Turkey (2-12 months).

MEETINGS and PRESENTATIONS

• Svitac’s (Firefly in 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 meetings was to discuss conditions and schedules for the continuation of centre activities.
• Svitac’s (Firefly in Bosnia’s) staff attended Weltwärts Partner Conference in Halle, Germany from 14th – 18th November. The partner conference was organized within the weltwärts volunteering program and was aiming to strengthen the network between partner organizations. The participants discussed the return of volunteers after the end of the service, adjusting pedagogical activities to include education on sexuality and borders (external referent), meeting mentors from places of assignment, and exchanged of knowledge on the best practices to support volunteers discussing, how to take advantage of the synergies that network can provide.