About the Program
We work every afternoon from Monday to Friday in two community centers 15min by car from the center of Cochabamba provided by the local communities. In each location, we have access to two classrooms, an outdoor parc and a sports field. We always have one educator who is supervising all activities accompanied by 3 to 7 local and international volunteers to carry out the activities. We have up to 40 children and adolescents in each site, aged between 2 and 17 years old. We divide the children into two groups: the small children (pre-school), from 2 to 7 years old and the older ones.
Each day we offer a program of activities that are both educational and fun for the different age groups. The activities go from teaching English, helping with homework, doing sports, creative projects around art (theatre, music, painting, drawing, etc.), community projects, health and nutrition.
Being present every day in these two communities prevent the children from being left alone in the streets and at risk of being victims from different kinds of violence. Indeed, their parents have to work long hours and are often not able to take care of their children, nor to support them in their formal education.
As some of the children are living in "favelas" types of home with no access to electricity and water, we provide each child each day with a healthy snack and drinking water. We also put the emphasis on hygiene as they have to wash their hands and brush their teeth with us.
Your Role as a Volunteer
As we have to manage a big group of children and only have one educator per location, we need volunteers to be able to run our activities. Furthermore, volunteers bring new and innovative ideas for activities and are therefore an added-value for the children. We expect volunteers to help the educator on-site every day with the activities for the children, to follow Bolivia Digna's rules, to represent the association towards the children and their families. We also expect the volunteers to come up with ideas for activities, discuss them with the educators and prepare them.
Volunteers will always be supported by the Volunteer Coordinator for any issues or concerns or to prepare its activities for the children. He/she will be supervised by an educator and/or the Volunteer Coordinator and will never be alone with a classroom.
We generally work 5 days a week (from Monday to Friday) and mainly in the afternoons so weekends are free to explore the city or travel farther afield to experience all that Bolivia has to offer.
Our activities in the centers:
- Pre-school activities: We take care of
children aged 2-6 years, where we organize
recreational activities and arrange
education for them (e.g. learning the
numbers, reading aloud, playing in the
park, etc.).
- English school: We organize English
lessons twice a week, with games to
improve the English skills of the children,
to give them confidence, and courage to
speak another language.
- Homework aid: Every day, the
children come to the centers with their
homework. We support and motivate the
children to do their homework.
- Sports: Many children and young adults are
interested in sports. Our goal is to support and
improve their self-confidence, for which we use sport
as a tool to pass on important values.
- Creative projects: are the activities, where we give
the children the opportunity to develop skills and
showcase talents, in addition to vocational education.
Here, we arrange activities such as music, theater,
dancing, painting, puppets, performing arts, etc.,
which attract, entertain and inspire the children.
- Health and nutrition: Many
children live in communities
without clean water. Their
diet is often very unhealthy
and the standard of hygiene
is non-existent. We
therefore try to improve
the children’s current
situation, and at the same
time inform them about
preventive measures.
- Community projects: In general, anything that benefits the community,
benefits the children. That is why we undertake, facilitate and help
projects that improve life conditions or the state of society, for
example: community garden, forestry, cleaning, construction
and improvement of infrastructure etc.
- Solidarity kitchen: with the aim of improving
nutrition and ensuring healthy food for the children and
seniors, we distribute free lunch from Monday to Friday.
- The Wonderful Women Program: with the
aim of improving the living conditions of families, we are
developing a training program in engineering in various
subjects aimed at young females and mothers. We also
support the creation of sustainable micro-enterprises.
- A Ray of Light Program: Here, we are
convinced that technical education at high school or
university level is an opportunity to improve the lives of young
people and their families. Therefore we pay for technical- and university
studies for young people, who contains the motivation and responsibility to
fight for a better future.
- The Fortress of Love Project: in Quechua
Munakuypa Kallpan - is a shelter for mothers and children,
who are the victims of violence, and who need decent
housing that protects them from situations of violence,
and violation of their rights.
Bolivia Digna is a small charity and there is a number of different internal projects
which volunteers can help with, such as:
- Finance/administrative management
- Fundraising activities for a specific project or for
materials
- Help with social media, promotion and web activities
- Help apply for public or private funding, respond to
calls for proposals of funding
- Communication with and recruitment of
volunteers
- Coordination and follow-up of volunteers
- Volunteer training
Our Support
We support the volunteers before, during and after their volunteering:
Before the volunteering: we always schedule a Skype call with the volunteer to get to know each other, to explain a bit more about our projects and activities and to answer any question (s)he may have. We then help the volunteer with practical matters if necessary (visa, vaccinations, flights, etc.). Before (s)he arrives, we send him/her our volunteering guide with information about the NGO, our work, tips on working with children, but also about the city and country.
During the volunteering: we welcome the volunteer at the aiport, make a tour of the house and go through the volunteering guide. We also make a tour of the city, Cochabamba, meet the team and other volunteers and then organise a training on how to work with children and interculturality. For long-term volunteers we follow-up on its work, define its objectives before starting and regularly see how it goes. We are always present in case of issues 24h/7d.
Volunteers are always under the supervision of an educator and are never alone with the children. They are either accompanied by one of our educators, the volunteer coordinator or a long-term local/international volunteer.
At the end of the volunteering: Airport drop-off. Evaluation and Certificate. We keep contact!
