ALEKSANDR KURUSHEV

All summer camps are held under one common theme, though every camp has its own focus within which everyday activities for youngsters are organized. Each day of the camp program has a special topic to be discussed and a related activity to work out the outcome. There is also a creative and interactive presentation of a country-participant every day to introduce general and interesting facts about the country as well as cultural customs and national traditions to schoolchildren. The standard number of days in a shift is 10 plus 1 optional Saturday, and there is a special agenda on the 1st, 3rd, 5th, 7th and 10th camp days (camp introductory and final events, the mid-camp event, the day outside Tallinn). Every camp is thoroughly documented. The related activities suitable to support topic discussions and country presentations are as follows: various intellectual and sport games for youngsters, creative team projects like posters and sculptures or board-games, pieces of amateur drama or other types of performances, excursions and workshops, playing the games and music popular in the countries the volunteers represent, teaching their songs or folk dances, etc. There are 4 camp shifts during this summer project, 10-11 days length with an opportunity for kids/teens to join every Monday. Every shift has an option for different ages from 10 to 16 years old. All of them are day camps that are held in Tallinn. The working language is English. A number of volunteers working with schoolchildren in one camp may vary from 2 to 8 (both long-term volunteers for the whole summer and short-term volunteers who may join for 2 or 4 weeks); they work in pairs with one of the camp groups of 10-12 teens and change the groups every 2-3 days. Based on the previous year, our partner expects a number of kids/teens participants in one camp shift as up to 40 split into 2-4 camp groups; the local participants are mainly youngsters from minority groups of Tallinn whose family’s languages include Russian. Based on described above, the work and duties of the volunteer include the following: prepare and facilitate topic discussions and camp activities for smaller teams of youngsters as well as larger all-camp events, support and lead youngsters in their work on team projects; help the youngsters and other volunteers in their performances and country presentations; assist the program leader implementing camp activities and trainings for other volunteers; work on the documenting camp events and support the local staff in their work with an international team of volunteers – organizing folders with working materials, making on-line reports and advert, making analysis, compiling the camp albums and leaflets, providing feedback. Based on the shifts, other work will include taking turn in assisting with catering and taking care of other volunteers, staying on overnight securing the international teenagers who are accommodated at school and accommodation site access, managing their arrivals