Our BYLP participants had a great week two host site stay this past week. They maybe in Washington DC now, but here are some photos and a summery of their amazing week two experiences: The Colorado group led a second bottle plant session, this time with an elderly group. The elderly residents also got a nice surprise when the Belarusian students sang some folk songs from their country. This group also did two more non-profit tours which showed how a small idea can turn into a large organization. For cultural fun activities, our students took a train up to the 14,710 foot summit of Pikes Peak and went to Elitch Gardens Amusement Park. -One highlight for the students took place on Saturday when they were able to volunteer at the Indian Wedding and Cultural Festival that was organized by one of their American BYLP peers and the organization she founded at 16 years old. Our participants saw first hand what their own BYLP team member was able to accomplish with this large scale project. The Illinois group worked hard in a couple different community gardens in their area. They pulled weeds at the oldest organic farm west of the Mississippi River and harvested vegetables at Fairmont City Library Garden. At this garden, our Belarusian students were shown how to play kickball by the Fairmont students and then paired up with a younger student to make Sub Irrigated Planters. These students also got to experience and amusement park; Six Flags! -Climbing to the top of Monks Mound at the Cahokia Mounds; one of only 21 World Heritage sites, was a highlight for this group. The base of Monks Mound is larger than the Great Pyramid of Giza. What a great accomplishment! Our Minnesota group was not let down and also got to visit an amusement park; Valleyfair Amusement Park, the largest in Minnesota. It was hard to get the students to leave, they were having so much fun. Other cultural activities that filled the week was a tour of Stillwater, MN and taking a paddleboat ride down the St. Croix River, and also visiting Land O Lakes. At Land O Lakes the students got their hands dirty by working in the Giving Garden. This garden is maintained by AFSA FFA students and all the produce that is harvested is donated to Keystone Community Food Shelf. -Learning how to play baseball was not only a great teambuilding activity, but also one of the highlights of their week. Baseball is not well known sport in Belarus, so their American peers were able to spend an afternoon teaching them how to play Americas favorite pastime. On Thursday, we had all the participants reconnect during an online session. Each host site joined in and was able to see and chat with each other about their upcoming service projects. This session was not only fun for all of the students, but it showed them what a great tool the internet can be in staying connected and getting help and support for whatever obstacles they may face when implementing their own project. This year we had a truly wonderful group of students and we know they are going to do some great things!
Posted on: Mon, 21 Jul 2014 21:50:53 +0000
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