Hardworking and Ready for New Challenges
Jenny Heintz, Returned Peace Corps Volunteer 2007-2009
In the summer of ‘08 and ‘09 I had the pleasure of teaching at and directing environmentally focused summer camps in Western and Southern Ukraine, for students 14-20 years old. During the 8-day camp sessions we shared about environmental issues, waste management and project planning. The students would then decide on a project to implement in a nearby town.
I have never been so impressed by young people as I was at these camps. Usually, at the beginning of camp the students would be unsure of ever seeing any actual outcome or improvement from a project that they themselves were in-charge of. However, by mid-way through the camp they were the ones teaching me about enthusiasm and leadership.
This past summer we came across a situation at camp that had never arisen before: The mayor of the village where we wanted to do our clean-up project did NOT want us cleaning up the town. There were several moments of frustration and arguing between the counselors, at the end of which we decided to ask the kids what they thought we should do.
We were nervous. We thought the kids might just give up when they heard the town administration was against the idea of a community clean-up project. We were wrong. Within three seconds of announcing the problem to the students, six of them had volunteered to go talk to the mayor themselves.
I walked with the self-chosen “delegation” of students the 3 miles to the town administration building and knocked on the mayor’s door. The students (all of them around the age of 16) shocked me with their poise. They would not and did not take no for an answer.
The next day we implemented the project as originally planned. Just as we were heading out for our celebration hike and barbeque the mayor pulled-up to our campsite in his truck. He had come to personally thank the students for their hard work and for their achievement. He could not believe how much trash we had picked up and was thoroughly impressed.
Ukraine may have its problems and may have a long way too go. But with students like the ones I came across all that needs to be done and to show them they CAN do things and progress will not be far behind.
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my God, i thought you were heading to chip in with some decisive insght at the end there, not leave it with ‘we leave it to you to decide’.
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This site is sponsored by the US-Ukraine Foundation and I am writing from personal experience after living in Ukraine for two years.
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The students who volunteered were in the middle of the group in terms of age. All of them were around 16 years old which in Ukraine means that they were in 10th or 11th grade (11th grade is the last year in Secondary School).
This sounds like a great experience, not just for the children, but for you as well. Just curious, where the students that volunteered to speak to the mayor the older or younger kids in the group?