The Ewha Volunteer Center is holding a three-day Volunteer Group Festival "bibbidi-bobbidi-boo" at the Student Union Building from March 31 to April 2.
16 student-organized volunteer groups will gather for the project with the expectation that it will have a good advertizing effect and vitalize Ewha volunteer groups. Students are encouraged to drop by the festival booths to learn more about various volunteer groups and participate in donation events.
"During the meeting for the project, we pointed out how volunteer groups rarely advertize themselves to Ewha students and how hard it is to recruit new members to our groups. So we wanted to make a festival and give out journals that could capture students' interest and participation," said Kim Hee-yun (Social Studies, 4), a current leader of the Seo-bu Bubbles, a volunteer bathing-aid group.
Seo-bu Bubbles gathers biweekly on Saturdays to visit social welfare centers to help bathe disabled people, and self-supporting seniors. "Through the Volunteer Group Festival, we hope we can make ourselves known to more students," said Kim.
Ee-eo-do, a group newly established this year, is a volunteer teaching group for adolescents living in the Seodaemun-gu district in Seoul. Its name is made from the initials from the Korean name of the group, whose full name is Ewha Children? Education Helpers.
"We thought we could promote recognition among students by having the chance to better explain our activities," said Koh Eun-kyul (Molecule & Life Sciences, 2), the leader of Ee-eo-do.
During the event, Ee-eo-do plans to hold a donation campaign to help support the children they teach. "Students can take part in our group during the event period by either donating clothes or books they no longer need," said Koh.
"The journals will include the introductions of each volunteer group, news and activity stories from them," said Kang Joo-hee, the leader of Ewha Mosaic. Ewha Mosaic provides free classes on Korean language, piano and the Bible to foreign students to help them better adjust to Korea.
Other groups such as Da-jung, a volunteer group that visits families of immigrant women, hope to use this opportunity to call for more awareness, to give people new perspectives, and to increase care for the minority groups around us.
"We will be showing what we do in our monthly events with immigrant women, such as writing traditional Korean family precepts, making Korean ceramics, and holding lectures," said Seo Jae-won (Politics & Diplomacy, 3), the current leader of Da-jung.
Rotaract, Eklass, and Nanumi are also preparing various events for the festival to encourage students to join them. Rotaract is a group that teaches children once a week at Sunduckwon, a social welfare center in Seoul. Eklass, which is a part of the larger group Korea Ewha Camper, is a volunteer group that goes to a Mongolian school to have mentor-mentee relationships with the students and to teach Korean to the immigrants. Nanumi is a study group which holds regular study sessions for local elementary children in districts of Seoul.
"This festival will be a successful event for both Ewha students and volunteer groups. This is a chance for students to actually taste and see what each volunteer group really is and does," said Kang from Ewha Mosaic.