At the end of July volunteers in India and Kenya travelled to Delhi and Nairobi for one of the highlights of the Suas Volunteer Programme, Global Perspectives week. The week gives volunteers an opportunity to learn more about development in their host countries, and in the world more generally, through a week-long series of workshops. In addition the week is a forum for all of the volunteers to come together and share their own experiences of the summer thus far and set goals for the final weeks of the programme.

This year, for the first time on the Suas Volunteer Programme there have been three Coordinators specifically responsible for the Global Perspectives aspect of the volunteers’ experience, in charge of GP week itself as well as organising on-going visits to other NGOs that work in India and Kenya.

In India, Development Coordinator Dave O’Mahony put together was an impressive line-up of speakers and facilitators, many of whom have addressed Suas volunteers previously, including Pat Bourne, First Secretary of the Irish Embassy in Delhi, Colin Gonsalves, a prominent Human Rights lawyer and Gerry Pinto, an expert on the issue of Child Labour in India. Among other issues discussed were the Indian Caste system, the hierarchical social system which remains prevalent in Indian society despite being legislated against, the Environment, and Indian Democracy, a particularly relevant issue as India marks the Sixtieth Anniversary of both independence and partition from Pakistan on the 15th August this year. There were also speakers from international organisations such as the World Bank, UNICEF and the UNDP on the role such organisations play in Indian development.

In Kenya, The Development Coordinator in Nairobi, Aisling Falconer, organised a similarly impressive array of speakers and facilitators for Global Perspectives week in Kenya which was held in the United Nations’ Gigiri Complex in Nairobi. One of the most interesting talks of the week was delivered by Salim Lone, a Kenyan journalist and former UN Spokesperson on Iraq. Volunteers were briefed by representatives from a number of different arms of the UN on the work they undertake in Kenya, including the UN Environmental Programme and the UN Volunteer Programme. The issue of HIV and AIDS was also one of the central themes of the week and volunteers were given the opportunity to visit the KENWA (Kenyan Network of Women with AIDS) HIV clinic in Soweto, Nairobi. The themes of Global Perspectives week in Kenya  have been reinforced through visits to other NGOs working in Nairobi and Mombasa, facilitated by the Sinéad Travers, the Development Coordinator for Mombasa.

The Global Perspectives week of workshops is intended to give a broader focus to the volunteers’ experience and to help them answer some of the questions that their work with the partner organisation have raised such as: Why are class sizes so huge in Kenya? Or why are there so many different schools systems in Indian none of which seem to relate to each other? What is the government in these countries doing to address the problems in their education systems?

Volunteers from previous programmes have often returned to Ireland and shared some of their experiences through giving presentations, organising talks or writing articles for their local or college newspapers. Volunteers have also the option of signing up for one of the Suas Global Issues Series which run for between 6 and 8 weeks in Third Level institutions across Ireland to further their explore global development issues.

Read volunteers' thoughts on Global Perspectives Week 2008