Seoul YWCA News in January 2014

Sungdong Youth Center

Science Camp for Youth (Paldo Yurangdan)

Sungdong Youth Center provided Science Mentoring Camp in Jeju Island from January 6 to 8. With Jeju Youth Center, participants could experience science education and solar energy kit making.

Youth Department

Y-teen National Council

9 members of Seoul Y-teen took part in the Y-teen National Council from January 15 to 17. At Willow Camp in Bucheon, 96 participants composing of Y-teen members, staffs, and volunteers gathered to know each other, decide subject of main movement, and select representatives of the National Council.   

New Year’s Worship

Seoul YWCA replaced new-year’s kick-off ceremony with worship in January 2. Reverence Song Tae Guen of Samil Church delivered sermon on ‘Genuine Loyalty’ and emphasized that all Seoul YWCA staffs have to think of our works as mission from God and do what we have to do without any complaints. Ms. Cha Gui Sook, President of Seoul YWCA, prayed that our new year will be fruitful by the faith towards God. 80 staffs and board members blessed each other and wished a hopeful new year.   

Gangnam Youth Center

Community Safety Monitoring

Gangnam Youth Center and 10 middle and high school students monitored how safe their community is as a part of short-term volunteer activity during winter vacation. After the education on disaster and safety, they tried to find unsafe facilities of their community and took pictures of them to report to the authorities. This activity help our young generation to raise their interest and consciousness about safety.

Bongcheon Social Welfare Center

Evaluation Briefing Session for the Project, ‘Making Patchwork-like World’

Evaluation Briefing Session for the Project, ‘Making Patchwork-like World’, was held at Bongcheon Social Welfare Center in January 7. Together with multi-culture instructors, related organizations, and local residents, they evaluated the project for the last 4 years and share ideas for the New Year’s activities.  

Yeongdeungpo Women’s Resources Development Center

Carer’s Monthly Meeting, General Assembly Meeting, and New Year’s Worship

Carer’s monthly meeting, general assembly meeting, and New Year’s worship were held together with 102 carer members in January 4. Reverence Lee Gyu Taek of Jesus’ Principle Church gave a sermon and all the members could have graceful time together. They also selected president and board members.

Gangnam Youth Center

Peace Maker Education

Gangnam Youth Center and School Bullying Prevention Center conducted a project for ‘Love and Feel Your Friends’ Hearts’ with 15 young people interested in school bullying prevention and peer counseling in January 11, 18, and 25. Various educations such as feeling sympathy, being a good listener, and training conversation technique were provided. After completion of all education, they will campaign for school bullying prevention as peace makers.    

Bongcheon Social Welfare Center

Village Newsletter ‘Gwanak Sonagi(Heavy Rain)’ Issued

Bongcheon Social Welfare Center published the first issue of village newsletter ‘Gwanak Sonagi’. Villagers who got trained as journalists will cover the story of Gwanak-gu Cheonglim-dong. Villagers are mainly in charge of all procedures of publishing newsletter from planning to distribution. We hope this newsletter will become a foundation for communication among the community.    

What We Will Do In 2014

6 Agendas and Main Projects

Preparation for Peaceful Reunification

As our desires for the unification of North and South have been shrinking, imagining Korean society after the unification is keenly needed. Seoul YWCA will provide with diverse unification education for children and youths to make them understand North Korean society and to raise their peace awareness in everyday life as they lack understanding of unification of our nation. At the same time, we will campaign for fundraising to expand powered milk support to children in North Korea.

Anti-Nuclear Movements

Republic of Korea is fifth-ranked among world’s nuclear power countries and the density of nuclear power plant is highest in the world. We are living with a hazard of nuclear accident. People are afraid of radioactivity after Fukushima’s nuclear crisis. In this circumstance, Seoul YWCA will offer education on riskiness of nuclear energy and necessity of anti-nuclear movement and campaign for safe food from radioactivity. We will make a group for anti-nuclear movements and foster them as a anti-nuclear activists. Energy saving movements will be also implementing in cooperation with churches, schools, and other communities. Moreover, we will try to change nuclear-dependent policy into renewable energy oriented.

Expanding Alternative Education and Youth Programs

To make youths recover their independence and find genuine happiness by themselves, Seoul YWCA will expand alternative education and youth programs. Alternative school called ‘Tong’ will be another chance to expelled students. Kidari School, fostering Y-like leaders, will be expanded to support self-governing activity of youths. Youths Issue Forum will enhance publicity on various issues related to youths and suggest policy for them. Happy Youths and Happy Parent campaign will also conducted all year around.

Promoting Gender-Responsive Awareness

To seek gender-based discrimination in our society and realize gender equality, education for promoting gender-responsive awareness will be providing. We will try to enlarge women’s opportunities to take part in policy making. Media monitoring from the viewpoint of gender-responsiveness and campaign for work family balance will be carried out all year round.

Prevention of Violence against Women

To recover victims of domestic violence and support their independent life, shelter and various healing programs will be offered. We will also try to build stronger community safety net to protect women and girls from all kinds of violence.

Improvement of Human Rights of Care Service Provider

Seoul YWCA will try to change our common awareness on care service provider and the worth of their work, which takes the largest part of women’s unofficial labor. In cooperation with other organization, we will try to revise the Labor Standard Act and the Employment Security Act.

92th General Assembly

2013 Annual Report

In 2013, Seoul YWCA has strove to pursue 3 core objectives ‘Justice by caring’, ‘Peace by sharing’, ‘Young leadership development’ under the theme ‘Women, Wind of Life and Saving the World’.

Justice by Caring

To establish desirable relationship between care service users and helpers (baby sitter, house-keeping helper, and post-natal carer), standard contract form was created. Detailed guidance for service users was posted on our homepage and interview to hire baby sitter was begun to be required.

Periodic medical check-up and monthly refresher course and intensive training were conducted to enhance professionalism of helpers. Their wages were subdivided and systematized and properly guaranteed leave was given to them to raise reliability and satisfaction between users and them. Integrated management of helpers through management system was started.

New jobs for helpers were created; Food Mom who makes side dishes only, Safe Mom who does babysitting and housekeeping for dual career couple, and Danuri Housekeeping Helper, international migrant women.  

Peace by Sharing

Various movements for sharing what we have were implemented under the theme, ‘We Want Your Talent, Heart, and What You Have Shared; for example, through ‘School for Everything’, any member who got talent can be a teacher for others, and through ‘Donate to Celebrate’, people can donate when they want to celebrate personal anniversaries in a meaningful way.

To heighten public awareness on sharing peace, campaign for North Korean Children, ‘Friends, Let’s Have a Meal Together’ was run and money boxes were distributed to our members to raise fund for them. ‘Pink Box Project’ for underprivileged women and girls in Tanzania, Myanmar, Thailand, and Cambodia was carried out to provide them with cotton sanitary napkin, underwear, vitamin, and cosmetic items. As a part of multi-cultural family support programs, ‘Making Patchwork-like World’ was conducted to make people in community understand multi-cultural family and acknowledge them as their neighbor.  

Young Leadership Development

To foster young people as good citizens with community spirit, volunteer activity, social participation, and education on human rights, multiculturalism, and peace were run.

Project called ‘Find human rights in films for youth’ was provided to students in several schools to enhance their human rights sensitivity. Campaign for energy saving, called ‘Unplugged Youth’, was carried on to make young people join the campaign in their everyday life. Camp for South and North Korean university students, ‘Peace School on the Road’, was started to prepare peaceful reunification of two Koreas and to let both young people be ready for it together.

Various youth volunteer programs were conducted in and out of country. Education programs, campaign, and discussion meeting on school bullying prevention were conducted. Club activities helped youths form an organization and run it by themselves. ‘Kidari School’ opened to develop youth leadership with YWCA spirit.

Programs of Outreach Centers

In Bongcheon & Garak Social Welfare Center, specialized welfare services were provided to strengthen family function and meet the welfare needs of community. Various activities through community networks were useful to improve community capacity about welfare. In Yeongdeungpo & Nowon Women Resources Development Center, vocational training programs were provided to grow women’s financial empowerment and their social status. Also, they helped women find jobs or start their own business. In Gangnam & Sungdong Youth Center, they focused on club activities, volunteer programs, counseling, and educational programs. Discussion meeting and seminar regarding school bullying, campaign for making school culture without violence, and parent training were offered to make ‘youth-friendly’ social environment.    

Programs for Members

Increasing the number of members was our priority. To make our members feel free to visit to Seoul YWCA every time, invitation events, various education programs instructed by talent donators, and lifetime member academy were given. Club activities among members were actively supported. All of our programs for members were posted on facebook and homepage of Seoul YWCA.