Clean Water Program Update

Seng, Our Clean Water Program Manager,  discusses the activities involved in the Clean Water Program; the latest collaboration with Community, Liaison and Assistance Program and the people and communities that are supported through our clean water initiative.

I am Seng.I have been the Clean Water Program manager, for about a year now. We do Clean Water  Program activities at schools and in villages. We are still providing hygiene training to students at primary and kindergarten schools, in Siem Reap town and at the same time, we are checking the filters and wells that we have provided, they are using very well.. There are now 12 schools that we have done, which means 6280 students have been provided with hygiene training! Students, teachers and principles of schools are very welcoming and very happy with what they are getting from our activities. 

Volunteer Sa Em, teaches kindergarten children at Krong Siem Reap school how to wash their hands.

Recently, the Clean Water program has cooperated with Community Liaison and Assistance program (CLA) to implement their programs in the communities.  We started with providing program training, on the 28 Apr to 18 May 2013 for all scholarship students volunteering in the program. We feel very happy when we have two teams working together because we have more experiences, and learn from CLA, even though the tasks to implement seems new to us and the work to be completed seems a bit difficult at the beginning. Now it is actually easier in implementation because there are more suggestions and ideas when discussing with each other.

Part of the CW and CL&A collaboration, the volunteers attend a fun and engaging training.

I have more knowledge about these two projects working together and having noticed that there are many more  improvements in the whole village that we have been working in. We can run projects  in the villages more frequently. We keep observing or monitoring what has been done in the village and we can inform the problems and solve them faster. 

The group conduct Specialized Training in Kork Thmey village

Since starting, there are 17 villages JWOC has implemented Clean Water. After having checked around ten villages, we decided to choose Kork Thmey village that is to the west of Siem Reap - about 30 kilometres.  There have been many problems in the village, lacking  access to water, not enough materials to make clean water and lacking good hygiene knowledge in their lives. We have seen 30 hole wells, 12pit wells and 33pully wells, but most of them haven’t enough water in dry season and sometimes they dry up. We found thirteen places to install new wells t In fact, Kork Thmey is a small village of only 170 families. Most of them are farmers, but there isn’t enough irrigation, the people can farm only in rainy season. In dry season, some people go to work in Thailand illegally, some find the work in Siem Reap town and most women stay at home looking after their house and children. 

CW and CL&A Program Managers sign a contract agreement with the village chief and group leaders at Kork Thmey village.

I really hope that there will be a lot of change in the village due to Clean Water program and Community Liaison and Assistance working together. We have assigned the group leaders in the village by ourselves, not decided by  the village chief. Most of them are women because we think they are actively involved in the community effective helpful and trying hard to help their village.

A consultation with the village chief

Drilling a new well, Kork Thmey village

I am looking forward to writing again next time to tell you more about the Clean Water Program’s work in villages and schools. Thank you very much for reading my update and for supporting Clean Water in Cambodia!    


    

The Latest from JWOC Scholarship Program

In this Blog, we hear from Vantha Koun, who is both our Scholarship Program Manager and  the Office Manager. Read more about his role managing the learning opportunities for JWOC scholars. 

I started working in JWOC in 2009. My roles are Office Manager and Scholarship Program Manger. Talk about Scholarship Program, I really enjoy to be part of it because it is helping and giving students the great opportunities to extend their knowledge.

The program also helps them to succeed in their future goals, like some of them want to work in a bank as an accountant, teller or loan officer, or a tour company, hotel and NGO etc. A good example is the two of our scholarship students who became JWOC program managers. Somit Mat is our Free Classes Program Manager and Seng Sok is our Clean Water Program Manager. They were both students supported by JWOC, graduating in 2009 and 2012 respectively.

Somit is Free Classes Program Manager and teaches English Language classes.

Seng (in the center) recently facilitated a workshop with his Clean Water team.

Since JWOC started in 2005, we have helped 145 scholarship students and currently we have 69 students studying at Universities in Siem Reap. This year we are going to give out 15 scholarships for students who can fit with our requirements.

To receive a scholarship, each student must agree to work with JWOC to give back to the community. In each week, the students volunteer between 5 and 10 hours with our programs. This may include teaching classes, collecting loan repayments, finding new locations for clean water or community liaison activities.

We don’t just give only scholarships to the students we also provide careers training like how to search for a job, how to apply for a job, how to prepare for an interview. We also have other training that is related to skills training, personal health and safety, first aid training, finances, and induction to the programs. Recently, we created a Personal Budget workshop with a JWOC volunteer, Melissa Montgomery, from USA. Melissa and I worked close together for making the workshop presentation. Melissa also spent around three days to research and select good information for the presentation. After that we both ran the workshop together. There were many scholarship students interested with our training and will try to use it after they leaned.

Melissa and Vantha conducted the personal finance workshop together.

During the workshop, they ran an activity that focused on their career goals. 

Recently I have made the announcement for Scholarship Program for the new academic year of 2013 – 2014 for all high schools in Siem Reap. I also contacted our partners with the information for their beneficiaries, and participated in a skills fair.

Vantha at the skills fair, introducing the JWOC the scholarship application process to high school students.

Nita Hor is one of our current scholarship students, studying Accounting and Finance at Build Bright University. She is in her third year and told us that she is very happy when JWOC gave her a scholarship. The study at the University is very important for her, because she can use her knowledge to get a good, well paid job. Currently she is working as an accountant in a tour company and she volunteers in JWOC Microfinance Program as a Loan Officer in her free time. She really enjoys with her volunteer role, because she can get new experiences from the beneficiaries especially she helps her community.  

Nita works in the tourism industry and studies finance - she is pictured here at work. 

The Scholarship Program not just give opportunities to the students to continue their knowledge but also provide skill training and a way to use their skills through our program. We also help graduated students to succeed their career goals.  

This year in September, I will take a fundraising tour to the USA – look for my blog in October.  Check out our website if you want to donate to the Scholarship Program!

Free Classes Program

In this blog, we hear from Somit Mat about the Sewing Classes and the graduate livelihood projects.

Hello everyone, my name is Somit. I am originally from Kompong Thom province, Siem Reap’s neighboring province on the way to Phnom Penh. I moved to Siem Reap in 2005 to continue my studies at university. I am JWOC’s Free Classes Program Manager, and I have been working for JWOC since late 2009. I was also a scholarship student at JWOC, and I volunteered in the Clean Water Program and the Free Classes Program. Before being a Program Manager, I was a graduate intern for one year and then I was promoted to be the Program Manager in October 2010. 

I really love working with JWOC’s Free Classes Program. My team is fantastic. They are very enthusiastic about their work and volunteering. They work very hard to provide the services we have to students and other beneficiaries from Siem Reap town and the surrounding districts. What is more, JWOC’s team is helpful and cooperative.

The Free Classes Program has six different projects within it; English for Children and Adults Classes, Computer Classes, Art Class, a Children and Young Adults Library, Under 8’s Classes and Sewing Classes. Today, I am going to tell you about the Sewing Classes and what is currently happening on our latest course. The Sewing Classes provide two sewing courses; Basic Sewing and Sewing for Livelihood.  They both run for 16 weeks and are open to women and men who want to gain some practical skills to better their lives and economic situation. Most of our students are women, and we see this as a good chance for them to learn sewing skills to enter the workforce.

I have recently become more involved in the Sewing Classes. Previously, it was the role of the Education and Volunteer Manager, but now I have swapped to manage the sewing classes which is an exciting opportunity for me. I have taken responsibility for this class since January 2013 and so far I really enjoy working on this project a lot because I have a great team to work with.

 

Mala and Sareom coordinate and teach the Sewing Classes

Saroem, our Seamstress, and Mala, our Sewing Coordinator, are very helpful and reliable. Without them we could not run the classes. As some of you know, Saroem has been with JWOC since 2009. She is a skillful seamstress and she teaches her classes carefully. All students really enjoy learning with her. Saroem has designed the courses and even written a basic sewing textbook for students to be able to extend their reading time and practice techniques at home. Mala is also an important person in the Sewing Classes. She coordinates everything for the class; for example, she follows up students’ attendance, takes photos, writes reports, looks after all sewing materials and machines, advertises for new students, interviewing new students and plenty more! She is also responsible for teaching English vocabulary for sewing and basic terms for customer service for 30 minutes in each class. They both work very hard, and they are very passionate about the work they are doing for their students.

Current students learned how to make a blouse in the first few weeks

Talking about the current Beginning Sewing course, there are 12 students learning with Saroem and Mala. They are in week 13 and they will finish their course soon. On April 8^th we took a fun trip to the markets in the town to learn more about what is going on in the current sewing market. The trip was really successful and we want to do more of them in the future.

Sareom and students talk to a tailor about quality of work in the market

Maly, who is a current sewing student

Maly Chaoyin, one of the current students, told me that she has learned a lot in this class. She started at the beginning with very low skills, but now she can sew very well, both by hand and by machine, and she can make shirts, school boys and girls shirts, shorts and women skirts, and she will learn to make trousers very soon. Lastly she added that she really enjoys learning in the class very much because the classmates are friendly and the teachers are especially helpful and reliable.

Apart from working with the class, we are now making a very huge number of uniforms for Helping Hands Cambodia. Helping Hands is an NGO which presently works in a number of villages in the Commune of Doun Keo located between 25 and 40 kilometers from Siem Reap town. In order to help generate incomes for local people, JWOC works with Helping Hands each year to make those uniforms. Last year our graduate students made around 300 school girls and boys uniforms for them. This year they have ordered 759 uniforms, and 9 of our graduate students are making them. And we hope that next year Helping Hands will keep ordering a lot of uniforms from us. We enjoy the partnership and the opportunity for our graduate students to earn some money.

Graduates work on the Helping Hands project to make school uniforms

Lastly, I want to say that I am very happy to work on JWOC’s Sewing Class as we have such a good team to work with. I am very pleased as a manager to see how Mala and Saroem have developed their skills teaching and coordinating, and how our students have achieved their goals. We will keep our work with Sewing Class running smoothly and effectively in order benefit those who need help for bettering their economic situation, especially women.