Being a teenager reading volunteer

"It really challenged my comfort zone, it allowed me to come home and really appreciate all the small things in life and all the opportunities that we are lucky to receive." Read 17 year-old, Siena's experience of her time as a volunteer reader with the Book Bus. 

Siena with some of Zambia's eager readers! 

"During the summer of 2017, I spent two weeks in Zambia volunteering for the Book Bus. The charity works in various countries around the globe, encouraging children to go to school and enabling them to expand their education. The Book Bus aims to improve child literacy rates in Malawi & Zambia by providing children with books and the inspiration to read them.

My experience with the Book Bus was one of the most inspirational but also heart breaking, seeing the children in their environment, and getting an insight into a small part of their lives. These children are so eager to learn and read, but due to a lack of funding and resources, they cannot carry out daily activities in school that we take for granted.

Visiting two community schools and one government school, the difference in the learning standard and the facilities these children are able to use is astounding. The children are always so happy, full of smiles, enthusiastic to read and absolutely love the activities the Book Bus provides for them.

Volunteers  join the Book Bus  and work with the local Zambia team in the mornings visiting schools and holiday clubs. In the afternoon, we also visited local libraries to have 1 to 1 reading with the students to give some extra learning and reading time.

Engaging children with great stories

Touching my heart 

Since coming back  to the UK I have stayed in contact with one of the schools, which has given me the opportunity to see what the students are getting up to. I have also been able to fundraise for this amazing charity through using Just Giving, where all the money is donated towards resources and facilities for different activities, such as reading books, arts and craft materials, musical instruments, atlases etc.

Even though this experience was completely different to anything I have experienced before, and it really challenged my comfort zone, it allowed me to come home and really appreciate all the small things in life and all the opportunities that we are lucky to receive. It really does put life into a completely different perspective seeing such positivity in the children of Zambia.
The people in Zambia have really touched my heart, and are some of the happiest and friendliest people I have had the pleasure to meet and spend time with. The two weeks I was there was filled with many different emotions, through getting to know certain students better than others and working with the most amazing and professional team.

I would not change my experience for the world, and I thoroughly enjoyed every minute." 

Spend 2 weeks this summer helping children to read. Find out more 

A Perfect Partnership: working with the youth of Zambia

On a fateful day back in March, Kitwe’s Book Bus George met a special group of people at the Youth Day Exhibition at Copperbelt University. Like the Book Bus, the Piggy Bank Campaign—run by students at the university—was working towards aiding literacy and education in local school and communities. So wouldn’t it make sense for the two initiatives to work together?

Zambian Youth Day exhibition

“They had people, we had resources,” Monica Mulenga, Book Bus Country Director in Zambia explains. And thus a perfect match was made.

Fuelled by the mantra, ‘Your change can change lives’, the youth-run Piggy Bank Campaign raises funds to send Copperbelt University students to small underprivileged schools in the area. With them, the students bring their own laptops and a wealth of knowledge—IT skills, maths, engineering, economics, biology—to aid teachers in the classroom. Similarly, the Book Bus program in Kitwe relies on local volunteer power to visit schools Monday to Friday, reading and running arts and craft activities for the kids.

“The Book Bus has books, our bus George, and plenty of materials, but needs more people,” Monica elaborates. “Piggy Bank has plenty of students willing to volunteer, but lacks resources. So we work together to bring extra help and resources to the schools and communities.”

Piggy Bank Youth Group help with Book Bus reading sessions

In the first four weeks of working together, the partnership blossomed, engaging school kids in fun and educational activities every Friday. “We played games, danced to various songs and most important of all, read for and with the children. Parents and teachers took part in these activities too!” says Bwalya Caroline Chimba, Book Bus Kitwe Reading Coordinator.

The partnership has other benefits too. While the Piggy Bank initiative currently only has the capacity to visit schools on Friday, the Book Bus provides an extra opportunity for willing students to come help at schools on any weekday.

As well as providing support to teachers in classrooms, the Piggy Bank team also use their volunteer power to build community schools and classrooms in small villages.

Celebrating a perfect partnership 

“Education is the biggest weapon one can use to fight poverty. It is the silver bullet that both empowers the citizens and develops the country,” 

No-one can argue with that...