Applications to join 2022 volunteer programmes are now open. Rhodes University staff and students are invited to apply to be a volunteer with Community Engagement. As a RUCE volunteer, you will have be trained on how to engage meaningfully with partners and how to enact social change in sustainable and mutually-beneficial ways. You can join up to four volunteer programmes: Engaged Citizens Programme; Nine Tenths Mentoring; BuddingQ and Siyakhana eMakana. Applications close 24 February. Follow our social media for more information about the programmes.
ENGAGED CITIZENS PROGRAMME
The Engaged Citizen Programme, also fondly known as ECP, seeks to grow social responsibility in students and holistically contribute to their learning. The programme is also a pathway to Engaged Research Postgraduate studies. We also work alongside and develop community partner organisations in our locale.
Volunteerism and volunteer activities can no longer be seen solely as extra-curricular. Volunteerism provides students with skills that are necessary to produce well-rounded graduates that are locally responsive and globally engaged citizens. Volunteering provides students with the soft skills that they need to be prepared for their work and social environments. Student skills are matched with learning opportunities in the community partner sites and community partners are key sources of knowledge to students. Suitable training and orientation are necessary so that volunteers can contribute productively to their placements. The development of community partners is also key because this ensures that partners can make effective use of the volunteers. This creates a mutually beneficial and reciprocal relationship between the partner site and the volunteers.
Volunteer opportunities range from music and outdoor education, mentoring, tutoring or homework support and even gardening. Two accredited online short courses are offered in term 1.
- New volunteers – Community Engagement in Higher Education: Understanding the purpose of higher education in transformation.
- Returning volunteers: Social Responsibility: Understanding of University Social Responsibility (USR) and Student Social Responsibility (SSR)and the relationship between USR, CE and SSR.
Term 2, 3 and 4 are dedicated to volunteering in the partner site.
APPLY HERE: https://forms.gle/RMByrXhpRe6FfCVK6
SIYAKHANA EMAKANA
Want to build meaningful relationships with community-based organisations while gaining a better understanding of community development processes and project management? Siyakhana@Makana is for you! In an effort to support student organisations (societies, residences and sports clubs) to better understand community development processes and the role of volunteers in supporting community-based organisations, RUCE has introduced a programme called Siyakhana@Makana. Embarking on an exciting, creative, and challenging learning experience, participants in Siyakhana@Makana will work closely together for 19weeks.
Siyakhana@Makana is a project planning process, which seeks to support students who seek to build meaningful relationships with community organisations while working towards a shared co-created project. Working with a select group of dedicated student organisations, community organisations and independent student teams, Siyakhana@Makana groups will co-create a project based on shared goals and interests from start to finish.
APPLY HERE: Contact Luyanda: luyandahadebe98@gmail.com
NINE TENTHS MENTORING
Nine Tenths is a mentoring programme geared towards equipping matric students in selected local schools to cope with their final year of school and to pass to their full potential. Pupils are given one-on-one attention from a Rhodes University student volunteer mentor through nine guided and structured contact sessions.
Mentors are trained through the rigours of an accredited NQF5 short course. This qualification demands high levels of commitment: over 100 hours of work! In 2020 we awarded 91 (out of 98) students the accreditation. This is the most we’ve awarded in any year and a testament to the dedication to the programme and loyalty to reviving Grahamstown/Makhanda’s schooling. In 2021 Volunteer training was fully online, co-facilitated by our student leaders. It was the most well-attended training weekend we’ve had in the history of the programme. 150 volunteers applied to be part of the programme. 100 were selected. 98 completed training. This is an outstanding throughput for a highly demanding short course.
The 2019 cohort of mentees produced 32 Nine-Tenths learners who were accepted to Rhodes, and a further 21 are enrolled in Rhodes bridging courses. This makes for 72% of the Nine Tenths cohort receiving a strong Matric pass (with either a bachelor or diploma level pass) that allow them into meaningful post-school opportunities.
APPLY HERE: https://forms.gle/zz9y61jaha2TPyLw8
BUDDINGQ
Despite governments efforts to increase access to Grade R education, little has been done to improve the quality. South Africa has a known literacy crisis.
Children entering Grade 4 begin to learn content, based on the assumption that in the previous 3 years of school they have mastered reading for meaning. This is not the case in South Africa, where 78% of children in Makhanda cannot read for mean before Grade 4. This puts children on a constant ‘back foot’ for their school career, often leading to academically not coping. BuddingQ was designed to address this literacy crisis in a play-based manner, where it most matters…in Grade R, while pre-literacy skills are being developed. Volunteers are trained by fellow students who have taken the Community Psychology Elective in their Honours year. Through 15 session in the year, they engage with children to develop their fine and gross motor skills with the aim of improving the foundations required for formal literacy education when they enter Grade 1.
APPLY HERE: https://forms.gle/mqS1P3DZpG1Qn2s29
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