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Description
Citizens most often associate the term volunteering with humanitarian work; not recognizing it as civic activism that can move a community. Volunteer engagement is not sufficiently recognized in the education system. Educational institutions do not work on training staff in the field of volunteering, nor do they encourage them to create volunteer programs for students.
Oaza conducted a survey among high school students on volunteering in 2012, and again in 2016. It can be noted that the knowledge of student volunteering in 2016 increased significantly compared to 2012. Awareness of volunteering is growing and developing among young people. However, most students still believe that volunteering is mainly about helping people in need.
In order to create and test volunteer programs in educational institutions, a focus group will be organized with representatives of secondary schools and associations in Baranja. Through a conversation with the pedagogues of three secondary schools, we will emphasize support in the creation of volunteer programs that will be included in the curriculum of the next school year.
The workshops "Being a volunteer" and "Volunteer management" will introduce students to the basics of volunteering and teach them how to organize volunteer actions. Together with the organizers of volunteering in the community (Crveni križ Beli Manastir, DŠO, "Oaza") and representatives of secondary schools, a round table on the topic "How to interest and encourage students and citizens to volunteer" will be organized.
Two volunteer actions will be organized (help for the elderly, and the other according to the user''s choice) together with students and citizens of Beli Manastir.
In 2022, a volunteer action was organized for the first time as part of the Day of Good Deeds celebration, which met with a great response from student volunteers and citizens. Through this project, in 2023, another volunteer action will be organized to mark this day.