Camp GLOW Follow-Up Projects!

The camp itself was a huge success and a fun opportunity for the girls, Volunteers and Nicaraguan organizations that participated. Motivated girls were given a chance to work with volunteers in their community to do a follow-up project. There were 22 girls who ended up taking part in a project, which is huge considering that there were just over 60 campers! We thought we'd talk a bit about what each girl did, as it's an accomplishment worth recognizing.

Welcome to the new GAD members!

Welcome to the newest members of GAD: Monica and Ilana from HE 61, Emily from TEFL 62 and Morgan from Environment 62! 

New and exciting things are going down with GAD -- organizing a pilot program for a boys' camp in Chinandega, developing teacher trainings about gender in the classroom, and getting started on Camp GLOW 2015!! 

Stay tuned for updates and information or get in touch with us at gad.nicaragua@gmail.com to get involved!

PCV Project - Literacy at the Casa Materna

Yet another project idea for working with women in the Casa Materna! Isabel from TEFL 60 shares about her experience teaching the alphabet to women waiting to give birth…

I was fresh to site and looking for ways to get involved in my community. I tapped my Health 58 site mate Melissa who worked at the Casa Materna and told her I would love to put my interest in reading to use and do workshops with the pregnant women about the importance of early childhood literacy and how to read aloud to their kids. 

There was a long pause from Melissa. “Well, the problem is that most of the women don’t know how to read themselves. Lots of women come in and can’t even write their name. So...”  

Resource - Volunteerism Action Guide

Service-Learning and Volunteerism may have become common fare for high school-ers, college students, and adults in the United States, but bringing these ideas and practices into our work in Nicaragua can be a powerful way to empower adult or youth groups in site. A service activity can bring together a group of teachers, or health workers, or members of a specific neighborhood—depending on community needs and your connections.

As part of its V2 Volunteerism initiative, Peace Corps has published a “Volunteerism Action Guide: Multiplying the Power of Service.” According to an article on the Peace Corps website…

Nicaragua wins award for Fatherhood Campaign

La Red de Masculinidad por la Igualdad de Género (REDMAS), a coalition of over 20 organizations in Nicaragua working on masculinity and gender issues with boys and men, is reponsible for the popular “Que tuani no ser machista” and “Ganale a las ganas” campaigns. REDMAS also coordinates MenCare Nicaragua, which launched a “Vos sos mi papa” campaign that recently placed as a finalist in the 2014 Avon Communications Awards.

The Campaña de Paternidad, or Fatherhood Campaign, included posters, handouts, t-shirts and even baseball caps with messages encouraging men to be involved in parenting their children in a way that shows respectful and non-violent relationships between men and women.

Here’s one of the posters from the campaign:

Check out Men-Care.org for more information about the campaign, including 2 short videos about being male in Nicaragua. 

Also check out the REDMAS website for other campaigns and information about who they work with. 

PCV Project: Pinto para Aprender

In Peace Corps we give a lot of charlas: charlas about teaching strategies, charlas about how to start a business, charlas about how to use a condon, charlas about how to give good charlas, but we all know this isn’t the only way to share information or explore a topic with a group of people. In this blog post we’ll share details about three health volunteers that used art and creative expression to engage girls and boys in topics of sexual health, healthy relationships, and positive lifestyles.

PCV Project: Garden in the Casa Materna

Want to improve women's nutrition or generate money for women's health?  Consider doing a garden project at a Casa Materna! Read this post for some ideas on how to get started and some tips based off my experience working on a garden project in Rio San Juan.