A new service learning initiative “Me&U Community Caring Programme” was launched in September to unleash students' potential and help contribute their knowledge to the community. 30 passionate students were selected from over 100 applications to form 3 teams to serve elderly persons, animals and sub-divided unit tenants. Other than a series of training and service sessions, they would be required to lead some empowerment projects throughout the service period.
The programme was officially kicked off in October. Community exploration, educational tour and first-aid skills training were held to help prepare members to the programme.
An orientation was held to introduce the programme arrangements and expectations to students. Students were invited to participate in some team building and personal growth assessment exercises to facilitate their self-discovery.
Team members conducted community tour and visited subdivided unit tenants in Mongkok, Sham Shui Po, and Tai Kok Tsui respectively. Through communicating with the tenants, students had an understanding of their living conditions which also deepened their awareness of the disparity between rich and poor, strengthened their communication skills with service targets, and reflected on how to use their knowledge to help the underprivileged group.
An educational tour to SPCA headquarters was organized to help students learn about the organization’s works and exchange ideas with its inspectorate member. Students also had the chance to visit its adoption section to interact with some abandoned animals. That valuable experience allowed them to understand more the conceptual differences between “animal rights” and “animal welfare” which would be useful for their animal welfare promotional video production project.
A training session was provided to students to introduce the services of Auxiliary Medical Service Volunteer Team and enhance their communication skills with elderly persons. Some basic first-aid techniques, e.g. cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) and AED applications, were taught to facilitate their services in the coming future.
