..Bruce
Peru: 'Nuevo Jerusalen' Poor Kid's Centre
Volunteer vacancies:4 volunteers at any given timeJuly 05 - Dec 05 3 vacancies Jan 06 - June 06: 4 vacancies On line Application |
| INTRODUCTION |
NUEVO
JERUSALEN will work at getting all children to attend school and help with the
provision of school materials.
In
NUEVO JERUSALEN itself, we will recruit a group of volunteers to join our trained
social worker and a team of Peruvian staff to work at the project in the mornings
every week day. Children will come for lessons and lunch, remaining at the centre
until they are attending school regularly. The social worker liaises with parents,
teachers and community members; the volunteers organise activities of a wide-ranging
nature.
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Many children
do not attend school in NUEVO JERUSALEN, due one or mor of three reasons: extreme
poverty (even attending free school in Peru costs about 110 a year), abandonment
or parental abuse (children of poor parents often are made to work instead of
attending school) Our primary goal is to get as many children into school as possible,
and this involves encouraging learning, talking to parents and in some cases purchassing
uniforms and school books. We have the more general aim of providing children
aged between 6 and 12 with fun activities to do in the morning, to keep them occupied,
together and away from the streets, and to give extra help to those struggling
in school and with learning difficulties. |
What to expect as a Volunteer:Your Job at 'NUEVO JERUSALEN' will involve:
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Accomodation & food costs:We ask a fee from our volunteers to keep our work going. The money goes to pay for the bills, meals, and the cost of the social worker, cook and secretary - also to promote the opening of other Children's Centres in Peru. This fee includes accommodation and 3 meals a day, 5 days a week.
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Besides these activities, we welcome new ideas to make our project most effective for the children. Volunteering at NUEVO JERUSALEN can be a tiring but immensely rewarding experience. You should be able to cope with big groups of street children demanding a lot of attention and enthusiasm. You will have to be a team worker, working together with Peruvian and international volunteers. In the centre you will be a representative of the project and are expected to be responsible and behave as an example for the children. What you do in your free time outside the centre is up to you.
Volunteering at 'NUEVO JERUSALEN' is a fantastic way of getting to know Peru, of improving your Spanish, and above all, of interacting with the community and with the children of the city in a positive and helpful way.
The Region:
Trujillo is a city of 651,000
inhabitants, on the Paciffic Ocean in northern Peru. It is the site of the largest
city in the Inca Empire, has the largest quantity and best preserved Inca ruins
in Peru. Today it suffers from a range of social problems, including bad sanitation,
lack of electricity and a shortage of food, and was recently classified as one
of Perus poorest cities. Like many Latin American settlements, it is characterised
by an attractive and ornate colonial centre, with the poorest partssprawling along
the coast to the north and south, and to the west toward the Andees mountains.
For the visitor it is a safe and lively place, with good restaurants and bars,
an excellent market, all manner of beach and ocean sports and, as a testament
to the great Inca civilisation, the palaces of Chan-Chan and the Temples of Huaca
de la Luna, which lie just outside the city. The local inhabitants are generally
kind and friendly, and we have been able to cooperate well with schools and families
in the past. The Programme:
Our centre is located
in the heart of NUEVO JERUSALEN, and is comprised of an open plan semi-complete
adobe building - someone's front room - separated into two class areas - for children
of differing learning skills.. Children attend the centre from between 9 AM and
12:00 PM, (ending with a light lunch) during the children's time in the centre
volunteers organise a range of workshops and activities, including art, music,
science, sport and drama. Groups are divided up according to age or ability; individual
classes are also given to help with reading, writing, spelling and maths. None
of these children go to school, so an important of our program is teaching them
group discipline and study habits. We regularly plan trips outside the centre,
to play football and other games. Our international Volunteers do not live in
the NUEVO JERUSALEN centre, but rather on our main campus, which is located in
the centre of Trujillo, a half block from the main square. NUEVO JERUSALEN is
only an eight minute taxi ride from the campus. The Language School:
In the evenings English-speaking and French-speaking volunteers give English and French classes to adults, who pay a monthly contribution to our work. Our students know that their tuition goes towards our work with the children and enables us to maintain NUEVO JERUSALEN and our other centres. Volunteers are therefore obliged to give at least one class per night to maintain our Language School.Spanish classes are offered for free to all our volunteers.
