March Newsletter

A lot has been happening at Meaningful Volunteer in March! We've been busy, busy, busy. 

New Volunteers Welcomed

29th March 2009

Two new volunteers were welcomed into Meaningful Volunteer programs.

Ingrid Potgieter - from New Zealand via way of South Africa - will be volunteering with Project Lifecycle for at least three months.  Ingrid has a strong passion for female human rights and wrote her masters thesis on the overlap between female reproductive rights and the Millennium Development Goals.

Steve Harrison - from the U.S. via way of Peru - will be volunteering with the RYE School.  Steve will be volunteering for at least two months as part of the RYE School Summer program and bought many school supplies with him to help get the school started.

Read more about this story here.

RYE School Summer Program

25th March 2009

The schools in the Philippines are just about to have their graduation ceremony and are about to start the summer holidays.

Meaningful Volunteer is taking advantage of this opportunity to start its Summer School Program.  This will serve two purposes.  Firstly, it will give some students who are struggling in their studies that extra boost.   And secondly, it will allow us to run some pilot classes to determine what th best way of running the classes is.

Read more about this story here.

Control Group Testing Begins

28th March 2009

Meaningful Volunteer wants to do great job of educating children.  We also want to know that we are doing a great job.

To accomplish this we are doing control group testing.  This means that we are going to test as many children as we can to find out their average English competency.  The children who attend the RYE School will do the same test.  Six months or so later, a similar test will be given.  If the children in the RYE School are doing significantly better than those students who are not attending, then we are doing something right!
 

Read more about this story here.

Partnership Formed with IRH

20th March 2009

Meaningful Volunteer is delighted to announce its new partnership with IRH (Institute for reproductive Health, Philippines).  

The IRH has been involved with family planning for many years in the Philippines and Meaningful Volunteer will serve as its partner in the Romblon area.   The IRH will visit Romblon in the near future to commence the training phase of Project Lifecycle.  Meaningful Volunteer will provide logistical and project management support.

Read more about this story here.

Project Lifecycle Project Outline

29th March 2009

This document covers the implementation of the SDM (Standard Days Method) as part of Project Lifecycle – a project initiated by Meaningful Volunteer on the island of Tablas in the province of Romblon, the Philippines.

One of the reasons that poverty persists on Tablas is the large family size.  The more children you have, the harder it is send them to school, provide them with adequate nutritional food and so on.  There are many reasons for the large family size, one of which is inadequate family planning.  Anecdotally, it seems like most people are using natural methods such as withdrawal, periodic abstinence and the rhythm method.  Family planning seems to be done haphazardly at best.  

Read more about this story here.

Motorcycle Purchased

30th March 2009

Getting around on the island of Tablas is hard.  The public transport is infrequent and hard to predict.  A public tricycle goes past about every hour but you might end up waiting up to two hours.

This can be frustrating to say the least...

To ensure that projects run smoothly and volunteers are not stranded for lengthy periods, the Meaningful Volunteer Trust in New Zealand purchased a new Kawasaki Fury 125 motorcycle for 60,400 pesos (about $US1,100). 

A local driver will be used to ferry volunteers from place to place.

Read more about this story here.

Cycle Beads Now Available for Purchase Online

31st March 2009

If you're keen to get involved in Project Lifecycle, but just can't afford the time off to volunteer, then why not purchase some Cycle Beads?

Click here for purchase options.

Office Space Rented in Sogud

31st March 2009

Meaningful Volunteer wants to make a real and sustainable impact in the province of Romblon.  We are balancing numerous projects and need a base of operations.  With that in mind, Meaningful Volunteer rented an office in Sogud.

Read more about this story here.

Four Laptop Computers Purchased

21st March 2009

The Meaningful Volunteer Trust - based out of Auckland New Zealand, recently purchased four laptop computers for use in the RYE School.

These laptops (see here for specs) will be used to teach the children in the Romblon Province of the Philippines.  They will initially be taught how to type and use a mouse.  These two skills alone will open up a world of possibilities to them.

Read more about this story here.