Svitac Project Report – August 2016

 

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

Local volunteers: Adin Midzic, Anela Kozarevic, Sladjana Basic, Katarina Mirkovic, Mocevic Ines, Nadia Selimi, Azra Pezerovic, Maja Tomic, Matea Brkic

‘Weltwearts’ volunteer:  Jonas Kiesner

EVS volunteers:  Anne Bonitz, Monica Reeves, Vanessa Brumen, Christian Mennell, Eleonore Pearson, Trang Pham

Self-fundraising volunteers:  –

 

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, French, Italian
      • 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 French – conversational French workshops for teenagers and young people
      • Italian for Beginners – conversational Italian 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
    • Drama Klub – for teenagers and young people
    • Sports workshops – for teenagers and young people
    • Dance Workshops – for children and teenagers
  • Fun Day – a day of fun activities organised for Svitac Children.
  • Local language lessons for international volunteers

 

HIGHLIGHTS ON MONTH’S ACTIVITIES

  • August was the happiest and saddest month for Svitac staff and volunteers. The happiest because it was filled with various activities that culminated in summer camps at the end of the month, and the saddest because we had to say goodbye to our dear volunteers Vanessa, Christian and Jonas who finished their Voluntary Services in Svitac. We are going to miss you guys!
  • About 155 participants regularly attended Svitac’s activities in August, 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 – Our younger artists have been very creative and had a lot of fun this month. Using paper and paper rolls, they created octopuses, racing cars, flying spaceships, dolphins, parrots, dragons and dinosaurs. Through paper, wax and water colour paintings, they produced Harry Potter illustrated drawings / illustrations and salt paintings, coloured their favourite cartoon characters (Frozen-Elza, Ninja Turtles, and Spiderman).
    • Older group – In the Language Workshops, the group kept working on expanding their vocabulary, this time related to the holiday theme. They also learned about European countries and nationalities and how to ask someone what nationality they are or where they come from. In the Music Workshops, they very much enjoyed being introduced to brass instruments (trumpet, tuba, and trombone) which were new to most of them. They revised old songs and danced to the songs called “Shake your sillies out” and “Hokey Pokey song”. The group also continued with boomwhakers, learning ‘Eye of the tiger’ and ‘We will rock you’. They are currently setting up fun games with the instruments and working on musical skills such as listening, rhythm and timing.
  • Filming and Testimonials –  international volunteer Monica Reeves kept working on this project in collaboration with other Svitac volunteers. In August, she produced a short film for an EVS film competition.

 

ANNUAL EVENTS

  • Summer Camps 2016 – Svitac organised summer camps between the 22nd and the 26th of August, and a Children Day on the 27th of August. The summer camps included Creative, Language and Music workshops. Workshops were held everyday from Monday to Friday in the youth centre, with each workshop lasting 2 and half hours. The summer camps attracted 60 participants and the Children’s Day another 150.
    • Creative camp – The theme of the creative camp was “7 continents – one world”. Participants very much enjoyed socialising while playing and learning about several countries, their unique culture, food and customs. Practical activities involved the use of different materials such as plastic bottles and cans, cardboard, plastic bags, bamboo sticks, scissors, glue, pencils, paper, clay and plasticine, paint spray and various other types of colours and tempera. The creative camp coordinator (Edina Vošanović) was assisted by 3 international volunteers and 1 local volunteer (Vanessa Brumen, Austria; Eleanor Pearson and Trang Pham Hong, UK; Maja Tomic, Brcko).
    • Music camp –  All workshops started with a warm up, slowly moving towards rhythmical games (carefully selected to be different each day) and ended with practice sections on the composition chosen for the performance. All musical games involved a great deal of team work, self-confidence and group cooperation. The games gradually increased in difficulty and variety throughout the workshops, always leaving enough space and time for volunteers to add other games of their choice. International volunteers Anne Bonnitz and Monica Reeves prepared and led a section of the workshop dedicated to making instruments out of random objects: participants played a composition with the instruments they created, including larger bins and plastic barrels. On Saturday 29th August participants performed “Funk”, a piece they had been practising over the week using samba percussion instruments. The music camp coordinator (Sanjin Vosanovic) was assisted by 2 international volunteers and 1 local volunteer (Anne Bonitz, Germany; Monica Reeves, UK; Adin Midžić, Brcko).
    • Language camp – Participants of the language camp had opportunity to attend workshops in English, Italian and German. During the workshops they learned and improved their vocabulary related to the seasons (summer and winter), holidays and sports clothing. They also learned the basics of the Italian language and the main sights and features of the countries where English is used as first language. The language workshop coordinator (Sladjana Basic) was assisted by 3 EVS international volunteers (Christian Mannell, Vanessa Brumen and Jonas Kiesner) and 4 local volunteers (Matea Brkic, Nadja Selimi, Ines Moćević and Katarina Mirkovic).
    • Children’s Day – the Youth centre organised the Children’s Day on the 27th of August, with the programme starting at 12:00am. Our young participants in the summer camps were able to show to their parents and friends what they had learned during the workshops. Our visitors enjoyed a performance from the Svitac music group, and invited to an exhibition of all drawings, models and papers made by Creative camp. They were also encouraged to play various competitive games to experience face painting and were given nice and useful presents for school during Bingo (bingo).
  • Future Shorts Film Festival – The event was held on 26th August 2016, marking the twelfth edition of the Festival in Brčko. The audience enjoyed a unique chance to experience and perceive cinema in a different way and to participate in a larger and global film festival by voting for their favourite film. The event attracted more than 55 spectators. This year summer season included eight short movies:
  1. OGASAVARA: Georgia/Drama/2015/Dir. VakhtangKotetishvili
  2. THE REFLECTION OF POWER: Romania/Experimental/2015/| Dir. MihaiGrecu
  3. PARTNER (REPLIQUE): Belgium/Drama/2015/| Dir. Antoine Giorgini
  4. THINGS USED TO BE HIDDEN: UK/Animation/2015/4mins | Tara Mercedes Wood
  5. HOTEL 22: Germany/Documentary/2014/ | Dir. Elizabeth Lo
  6. FLORIDADA, ANIMAL COLLECTIVE: Dir. PFFR Forever Ltd.
  7. AVE MARIA: Palestine/UK/Comedy/2015/ | Dir. Basil Khalil
  8. OUSTAZ: Chad/Canada/Saudi Arabia/Documentary/2015/Dir. Bentley Brown
  • Our audience in Brčko voted for “Partner” (dir. Antoine Giorgini) as their favourite film

 

EVS, WELTWARTS AND OTHER VOLUNTEERS’ PROGRAMMES

  • In August, Svitac very much appreciated collaborating with 7 international volunteers: one ‘weltwarts’ volunteer from Germany, and six EVS volunteers from the UK, Austria and Germany.
  • The EVS re-accreditation process is still ongoing.
  • Svitac sent two volunteers from the 22nd of July to the 21st of August to Don Bosco, in The Netherlands, to volunteer in the project ‘Celebrating 50 Years of Volunteering (Vakantiebos): Youth Crossing the Borders for social Change and Innovation (Group EVS 2016)’ – a project approved by the Dutch NA. Sadmir Nakicevic and Nikolina Ceko were the two BiH volunteers participating in this project.
  • Milos Popic and Svetlana Jovicevic will attend EVS training course “Social Media to Activate Youth and Communities” which will be held in Sicily from 5th to 12th October 2016.
  • The EVS project “Our Voice” Cyprus – This project will start on the 3rd September (9 months position). Svitac local volunteer, Nikola Kerezovic, was accepted for this project after he successfully passed the selection interview.
  • The EVS project “Second Wave” Lithuania – This project will start in the first week of September and will last for 12 months. The hosting organisation in Lithuania selected Gorana Sekulic as a volunteer for this project, replacing a previous candidate (Husein Bajraktarević) who could not take on the position.

 

MEETINGS and PRESENTATIONS

  • Svitac representatives and the youth centre coordinator (Sejo Usanovic) continued to attend our regular monthly meetings with the other NGOs based in Brcko. The purpose of the last meeting was to share information about activities and plans for August and discuss activities scheduled to take place in the youth centre.

 

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Activities