My Last GLOW Camp

Well, I just got back from GLOW camp. This one was by far the best camp that we've ever had. It was also one of the most tiring too.  I'm planning on trying to relax this week if I can.

You might be asking yourself, "But Anneke it's winter...Isn't GLOW in the summer?"

Yes, in the past GLOW has only done summer camps. However this year because the American Embassy (who funded our summer camps) loved our project so much, they gave us the extra $18,000 that they had left over from their projects that they funded this past year ....that's right, free money and no grant to write for it. Soooo....we decided to hold a winter camp!

Hosting camp in the winter definitely had us concerned....What if the weather is bad? Can we even host a camp among the Georgian festivities that predominately take place in January? Will girls even want to go to a camp in the winter?  Is this place going to have heat? And so on and so on.

Fortunately the camp was a success. This year we were able to bring in around 60 girls to camp to learn about women's leadership, issues and empowerment. We had an amazing team of counselors to work with during camp and a great group of campers to host. GLOW also had a slew of visitors: a few U.S. Embassy staff members, a very excited Canadian Embassy staff member (the Canadian Embassy funded a small portion of our grant), Peace Corps staff members, guest speakers as well as a surprise visit from some of our old counselors from camps past.

GLOW also took it up a notch by really hitting hard its "Taking GLOW Home" initiative, an initiative that encourages the girls to take the information that they've learned at GLOW Camp and share it with members of their community back home through projects and training opportunities. In fact, because this is the main sustainability factor of GLOW and because we've been hugely successful with girls completing multiple projects in the past, we applied for and were awarded a grant to fund GLOW's very first GLOW Ambassador Conference. The GLOW Ambassador Conference will bring together past campers who have completed three projects or more within the first three months after camp. If they achieve this, then they are named GLOW Ambassadors and are invited to attend the conference where they will learn more about project design and management and further their leadership skills.

Since the creation of GLOW-Georgia NGO last January (we are not even a year old yet, January 27th is our anniversary) we have been able to host three GLOW camps, hire interns, and create the GLOW Ambassador Conference. All of this through grant funding and amazing support from our board of directors. Not many NGOs our age can say that, which is why I'm so proud.


Stats:
1,707 Likes on our GLOW Georgia Facebook page and counting
800~ Applications received
156 girls have attended a week long GLOW camp, transportation, food, lodging and all paid for
47 Take GLOW Home projects have been conducted around the country
20 Counselors who have received leadership experience because of their time at GLOW
16 GLOW Ambassadors
3 GLOW Interns
2 GLOW Banners
1 Amazing Year!

Below is a video from our winter camp. For more videos go to our YouTube Channel GLOW Georgia

GLOW is by far my most rewarding project that I have worked on here in Georgia which is why this past camp was bittersweet because it is also my last. Four GLOW camps in and still loving it!

Keep on GLOWing!

GLOW CAMP 2014

Yay! GLOW (Girls Leading Our World) Camp is finally over! No more pouring over large excel spreadsheets consisting of ~300 girls' contact information, no more calling counselors and giving them the new updates about transportation to and from camp (information that they will relay to the campers), and no more crunching numbers to make sure that we get confirmations from all the girls that we invited to come to camp.

I've officially been away from site for 28 days. Almost a month mind you. The first portion of my long absence was due to MST (Mid Service Training) with Peace Corps. This was a time for us volunteers to reflect about what we have accomplished the last year, what our plans are for the coming year and build up our personal goals. I thought this training was a great tool for me to reevaluate my service and figure out how to make it more worthwhile. I have less than a year left here....what haven't I done or what do I want to improve before I leave? Was this the Peace Corps experience that I had set out to have when I first joined? All of these questions of how to make the most of my time left were going through my head. This training was definitely a great way to reset my mental attitude about role in Georgia as both a volunteer and as a member of my host family.

I set some personal goals to work even harder on my Georgian language skills, spend more time with my host family and strengthen my relationships with fellow community members in Sagarejo. Those are my main goals.

In the midst of this deep thinking period, I and a few other volunteers put on the first ever Jort Off competition as a fun way to break up the somewhat serious mood. I think it was a success and a fun way to let off some steam. My friend Aaron is now the current Mr. Jort Winner but I think he'll have to defend his title in November since we are planning on doing another competition during our All Vol Conference with the new G14s.

Enough about training though... 
LETS TALK ABOUT GLOW!

To start off, GLOW is the biggest project I have worked on and probably will be one of my greatest accomplishments of my volunteer career. I and three other PCVs (Peace Corps Volunteers), along with four Georgian Board members created GLOW Georgia this year. Pretty exciting stuff to say that I co-founded an NGO but there is so much work behind it. We created the NGO in January and since then we've had to switch mindsets and focus our efforts towards GLOW Camp preparations.

I was head of the Recruitment Committee for the NGO so a lot of what I had to do was needed way before camp even started. I was in charge of creating application workshop materials, finding and interviewing counselors for camp, receiving all the potential campers' applications and creating a master excel list of all of their info to send out to our counselors, developing a grading system for the campers' applications so the counselors could review and pick the very best candidates to attend camp, creating a info packet for all the campers selected (what to bring, what to expect, where camp was etc), and balancing our numbers to make sure that we had enough girls to attend each camp. It was a lot of work and many hours pouring over the master excel sheet but it all came together in the end.

Below is a description of Glow Camp. You can also watch our GLOW Camp videos:  Beginning of Camp and Closing of Camp courtesy of Alan, one of the G14 GLOW Committee members that will take over this year.

For more pictures and information about GLOW you can find us on our Facebook page: GLOW Georgia .

The Beginning: 
GLOW Camp officially began on August 2 and continued until August 20th. Over that period we hosted two 1 week camps, held two ToTs (training of trainers), trained 13 counselors sand 7 PCVs, and saw GLOW come to life with the 97 girls who attended our camps.

Here is how camp went:
ToT
First we had two days of ToT before camp. ToT is basically the time in which we train the counselors who will be hosting the camp that week. We go over the camp schedule, assign and diviup presentations, go over camp expectations and the mission of GLOW. That's usually what happens the first day of ToT. The second day is a working day for the counselors as they prepare their power point presentations and activities. The PCVs meanwhile are assisting their counselors and preparing the physical materials needed for these sessions. It's a long two days but everything needs to be really before the 50 girls arrive at camp.

Camp: Day 1
1:00pm
The campers arrived from one of the three marshrutkas that we had for camp. These three marshrutkas met campers earlier that day at assigned places and times. It was quite hectic to somehow get 50 girls meet one of these three stopping points across the country in a timely manner and make it to camp but somehow we did it.

3:00pm-9:30pm
After greeting the smiling girls with room and group assignments, we officially began our camp with an opening about what GLOW is and what was to be expected over the next few days. This was followed by camp group icebreakers, dinner and a camp wide scavenger hunt.

Day 2-6
8:00am
The girls woke up early meet their exercising rotation group for 8am exercises. I and my fellow PCVS offered different exercising stations for each day of camp. I taught Zumba in the gym, Brenna taught combat in the lecture hall, Betsy taught yoga on the upstairs balcony, Alica taught relays on the field and palates and full body workouts were taught by our visiting PCVS for that week.

8:45-10:00am
Once exercise was over, there was a quick breakfast followed by our daily camp opening before launching into the day's sessions.

11:00am -1:30 and then 4:30-6:30
We covered: Hygiene, Smoking and Alcohol awareness, Men's Health, First Aid, Nutrition and Fitness, Problem Solving and Conflict Resolution, Self Esteem, Peer Pressure and Bullying, Relationships and Communication, Women's Health and Reproductive Educations, Gender Based Violence and Women's Rights, Gender Roles and Gender in My Life, Children's Rights and Rights of Persons with Disabilities, Diversity and Tolerance, Leadership, Civic Responsibility, Volunteerism, Youth Participation and Project Development, CVs, Cover Letters and Social media, Setting Future Goals, and a Q/A with a Women's Guest Panel.

Some of these were lecture based large group sessions while others were discussion based small group sessions. In between these sessions we had lunch and  fun afternoon activities planned for the girls (capture the flag, hiking, board games, tag, volleyball etc.).

We would close the last session of the day with journaling time in which the girls would reflect on what they had learned that day and how they could potentially use that information to create a community project back home.

6:30-7:30
Dinner

8:00-9:30
Evening activity: Movie Night, Disco Night, Campfire Night, Talent Show Night and Farewell Dinner Night

Day 7 (Last Day!) 
8:45-10:00am
Breakfast

10:00-11:00am
Number and contact information exchange

11:00am-12:15pm
Camp Closing

12:15pm-1:00pm
Lunch

1:00pm
Departure (PCVS doing happy dance in the background as girls load into marshrutkas)


Day off and then repeat again.


There were a few mishaps through these two weeks of camp.
*The first camp we had ~30 girls separated on the hiking trail for two hours. They were with their leaders but the group had taken a wrong turn. All girls and leaders were accounted for in the end

*During the first day of our second camp, an hour before the campers arrived, one of our counselors had to leave due to a death in her family. We scrambled to find a replacement counselor and ended up calling one of the previous counselors from the week before. She graciously accepted and arrived at camp two hours later.

*One of our PCVS was doing a pre-exercise run and was attacked by a dog. She was bitten three times and had to be sent to Tbilisi for rabies shots and recovery. We managed to do without her the rest of the week but  it was still very unfortunate for both her and us.

*Water randomly was shut off time to time...not too much of a problem except for the fact that we exercised everyday and the day we were hosting a guest from the US Embassy we greeted her with a fresh post workout aroma.

Again GLOW Camp was quite a production but talking to those girls and seeing them open up about issues and topics as the week progressed was worth it.