In the beginning of July this year, Volunteer Bulgaria and university student volunteers organized a contest on the theme of “What Do We Know about the Bulgarian Heroes?” in Petko Slavejkov Home for Children without Parental Care. The event aimed to commemorate the 2nd of July - the Day of Hristo Botev and the other heroes who died in the name of Bulgaria’s liberty and independence. On the one hand, the contest assignments were not easy (e.g. learning and reciting Bulgarian epic poems by heart; writing Bulgarian heroes’ biographies; writing a paragraph, answering a question based on personal experience). However, on the other hand the prizes ensured by our volunteers seemed attractive enough for the participants- cinema tickets, cell phone vouchers and an MP3 player.
In the contest we had 6 participants altogether! We are proud of this significant number given the fact that it is usually hard to motivate the children to study and that the contest tasks were many and difficult. The participants were adolescents aged between 12 and 16 years. The indisputable winner was the 12-year-old Nadya who recited the two poems perfectly well.
Our team of volunteers and the Home’s team of psychologists served as a jury of the contest. The good cooperation between our two teams is of great importance for our present and future initiatives with the home’s residents.
“I was happy to see the youths motivated and learning. It was wonderful that they felt appreciated and awarded for their efforts. The best was that they took the contest more as an opportunity to support each other than to compete,” said Maggie, one of the volunteers.
We are looking forward to preparing the next contest.
The winner with her brother who supported her throughout the contest
Angel won the Special Jury Prize for his answer to the question “What did I learn from Levski?” (Levski is Bulgaria’s most eminent national hero). In his answer, Angel wrоte: “From Levski’s short life I drew a conclusion for my own life: under no circumstances should one give up. One should do everything with love and dedication, instead.”
