Svitac (Firefly) Project Report – March 2017

 

Staff:   Gordana Varcakovic, Dina Vosanovic, Milos Popic, Sanjin Vosanovic

Local volunteers: Adin Midzic, Milica Bacanov, Nadia Selimi, Ismar Mustafic, Maja Tomic, Ines Mocevic

‘Weltwearts’ volunteer:  Alexander Likic

EVS volunteers: Eleonore Pearson, Benjamin Owens, Mahmut Taha Bicer, Yunus Seckin                 

Self-fundraising volunteers:  Bonnie Sturgess

 

ON-GOING PROGRAMME

  • Culture and Art Diversity around the World – includes Language,  Art&Crafts, Music, Drama, and Sports workshops from Monday to Friday
    • Standard Language workshops – English and German
      • English – standard English language workshops for teenagers and young people
      • German – standard German language workshops for teenagers and young people
    • Conversational Language workshops – English, German, Turkish
      • I love English – conversational English workshops for teenagers and young people
      • “Lasst uns Deutsch sprechen!/Pricajmo njemacki!“ (“Let’s speak German”) – conversational German workshops for teenagers and young people
      • Let’s speak Turkish – conversational Turkish workshops for teenagers and young people
    • Art&Crafts workshops – practical arts and crafts workshops for children and teenagers
    • Music workshops – samba, guitar, music workshops for children and young people
    • Sports workshops – for teenagers and young people
    • Yoga classes – for teenagers and young people
  • Local language lessons for international volunteers

 

HIGHLIGHTS ON MONTH’S ACTIVITIES

  • This month our volunteers, Ben and Bonnie, were given opportunity to represent English language during Mother Language Day. Bonnie gave a beautiful recital of ‘My Love’ by Oodgeroo Noonuccal, with a thoughtful introduction to the piece – acknowledging the traditional owners of the land and the loss of language that came by colonisation of Australia. Ben read poetry by the late romantic poet, Keats, and by Stolac own, Mak Dizdar. Both poems spoke of hard times and woe, and the rebellious act of continuing on after the fact. International volunteers have also been doing a lot of different daily activities and they focused on different things (fundraising, promotion of the organization through social media etc.).
  • About 112 participants regularly attended Svitac’s (Firefly’s) activities in March, reconfirming their popularity in our small Brcko District community. 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 made bumblebees from paper, did paper crafting of their favourite pets and started making decorations for Spring festival. They also learned the difference between vegetarians and vegans and a lot of new words in English related to vegans and vegetarianism. Highlights with the younger group were workshops about animal rights and how to express own point of view and opinion about this topic on creative way.
    • Older group – They did a lot of different paper crafting (animals’ prints, ugly duckling, collage for anti-racism day, maps of Balkan countries, decorations for Spring festival). In the Language Workshops, the group did words related to animals and their needs and rights as well as new words for titles and personalities. In the Music Workshops the group learned some new songs in English and local languages related to animals and spring. They also learned about rhythm and rhythmic music, and repeated some old songs.

 

ANNUAL EVENTS

  • Anti-racism Day 2017 – On 20th March Svitac (Firefly) held a series of discussion and creative workshops for the three different age groups that it engages with: 4-7 years, 8-15 years, and 16+ years. All workshops covered the themes of racism, prejudice and discrimination and were adapted to suit the relevant age groups. Each workshop explored how, throughout history and in today’s society, artists, musicians and writers have used their own creativity to fight against the injustice of racism and prejudice. The youngest age group was taught about the famous child’s story “The Ugly Duckling”. They made lots of little unique ducklings for a group poster and learned how we should never judge a person by their appearance. The 8-15 years and 16+ years age groups both learned more about different historical and current issues of racism and prejudice across the world, and also about the many different artists and musicians that have protested these issues. Both groups created their own anti-racism artworks inspired by the artists they had learned about. The day’s workshops were well attended and received, all participants really engaged with the workshop’s content and produced great artworks. Total participants: 47
  • Spring festival – It’s been decided that Spring festival will take place on 21st April. Festival preparation started at the end of March.

 

EVS, WELTWARTS AND OTHER VOLUNTEERS’ PROGRAMMES

  • In March, Svitac (Firefly) very much appreciated collaborating with 6 international volunteers: one ‘Weltwearts’ volunteer from Germany, four EVS volunteers from the UK and Turkey and one self-funded volunteers from Australia.
  • Sending EVS – Two volunteers from Bosnia doing their EVS service in Cyprus (9 months) and Lithuania (12 months).

 

MEETINGS and PRESENTATIONS

  • Svitac (Firefly) representatives continued to attend regular monthly meetings with the youth centre coordinator and the other NGOs based in Brcko. The purpose of the last meeting was to share information about activities and plans for March and discuss activities scheduled to take place in the youth centre.
  • europe@DJHT – Creating a social and fair Europe for all young people – Svitac (Firefly) representatives attended the conference organised by German National Agency (JUGEND für Europa) from 27th to 30th March in Dusseldorf, Germany. This was Europe’s biggest event in youth work and child&youth welfare with 4-day program that included expert forums, panels, field visits, guided tours, workshops and presentations. These activities were organised for participants from Germany, Russian Federation, Eastern Partnership countries, Erasmus+: Youth in Action Programme countries. Up to 500 participants – professionals from all areas of youth work and child and youth welfare – came from projects and initiatives, associations out of the NGO sector, from public bodies at local, regional, national and international levels and the realms of academia and research to discuss the challenges of youth work across Europe.

 

 

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