LSH 2903 – Community Service – Learning / Exercise #9 extra
Charity and Volunteering in the UAE - Information and Activities
The UAE is famous for its
hospitality and the desire to give one's time and efforts to help other people.
When I travel to other countries
and talk to people about my job, the students and the UAE in general, one
constant thought I hear repeated is that the UAE is a very hospitable country
and its people are very generous. People in the UAE often want to do things to
help others, whether it is other UAE Nationals or people from other countries.
Within the UAE we see so
many examples of people volunteering and giving to charities to try and help
others. People do this out of the simple goodness of their hearts and to try to
help other people to have a better life than they have at the moment. An
obvious example is TAKATOF which promotes the idea of volunteering within the
country.
Just last semester (March
2013) we had a major charity fundraising week when students, staff and teachers
of ADMC raised 25,000 Dh to donate to a school in a poor village Cambodia.
The UAE is also very
strongly represented in the international field of assisting people from other
countries. It may be through the Red Crescent that people donate money, time or
skills to try and help others. So much of the time when we hear about various
international problems, the UAE is one of the first to step forward and provide
assistance.
Activities
Use the following link to access the website of the
UAE Red Crescent.
Once you are there, see if you can answer the
following questions. This will help you to find out what the organisation does,
what some of their projects are and who are the people involved in the
organisation.
1.
The
UAE Red Crescent has contributed to a number of building projects both inside
and outside the UAE. Name three projects the UAERC has worked on
a.
Building schools and helping people in YEMEN.
b.
Aid poverty in Somali’s.
c.
Donating to Syria.
2.
Name
at least 4 countries the UAERC has worked in to provide various project
assistance
a.
Syria
b.
Somali
c.
Yemen
d.
Eastern Asia
3.
What
was the estimated total cost of projects undertaken in the UAE during 2009?
-
180, 830, 333
Million
4.
According
to the information about the foreign based projects, which group of projects
received funding of 8,373,558 Dirhams?
-
External Projects
5.
According
to the information about the Foreign Projects, the UAERC is involved in some
very important work. According to the English translation, these are listed
below. Try to come up with an easy explanation for each of the terms in the
grid.
|
|
Translation
Term
|
My/Our
own meaning
|
|
|
reconstruction
|
Rebuilding
|
|
|
disasters
|
Catastrophes
|
|
|
crises
|
Disaster
|
|
|
rehabilitation
|
Recovery
|
|
|
infrastructure
|
Structure
|
|
|
devastation
|
Damage
|
|
|
public
utilities
|
Services
|
6.
Name
three situations which are listed as �natural
disasters�.
a.
Earth Quakes
b.
Storms
c.
Tsunami
7.
Crescent
Volunteers University
What
are the three areas of training/qualification that university students could
work towards?
a.
First Aid
b.
Volunteer work
c.
The
international Humanitarian law
Follow Up
In the previous questions you have looked at a
particular charity – the UAE Red Crescent. The questions were designed to get
you thinking about some of the activities the charity does as well as thinking
about the possibilities of being able to volunteer your own time and efforts
towards the benefit of other people.
In the past ADMC has had very strong ties with
volunteering and charity organisation both here and abroad.
Here in the UAE we have partnered with the Zayed
Higher Organization and the Future Centre, offering opportunities for our
students to work with people less privileged than themselves.
During the second semester of 2012-13, ADMC ran a major charity
fundraising week when students, staff and teachers of ADMC raised 25,000 Dh to
donate to a school in a poor village Cambodia
This semester, we will be working with the Abu Dhabi
Science Festival, helping to educate school children and the general public
about how exciting science can be.
In groups, you need to select one charity from the UAE
and put together a short presentation which you and the rest of your group can present
to the whole class.
Think about the questions you were asked earlier on
this worksheet as a way of guiding you.
Important: There are no right or wrong answers for such an
exercise. This should be a presentation which gives information about the charity
you have selected, and that information should be the ideas that you would like
other people to know about.
Here are a few suggested websites for you to use. Or,
you could always select a different charity to present.
Your presentation should last approx. 8-10 minutes
(which should include time for questions).
OVER TO YOU J
