DCU Student Teachers Prepare for Volunteering Experience in Tanzanian Primary Schools

For the second successive year, a group of BEd student teachers from the Institute of Education will be volunteering in Tanzanian primary schools. In July, the students will travel with the DCU Tanzania Pre-Primary Education Project team (Fiona Giblin, Dr Catherine Mulryan-Kyne and Prof Bernard Pierce), who were awarded a DCU President’s Award for Engagement last year for the project. The volunteering initiative builds upon and extends the work of the project team who are engaged in capacity building that is consistent with Tanzanian pre-primary education policy, through the development of school infrastructure and the provision of a hybrid teacher professional learning programme.

These students will be working with 10 project partner schools to support the pre-primary teachers in their teaching of the Tanzanian Pre-Primary Curriculum. The students will provide and donate teaching materials to enhance the learning of over 1000 pre-primary pupils. This volunteering opportunity offers the students a transformative learning experience in terms of developing their own teaching skills and intercultural understandings of early childhood education. While immersed in a culturally diverse environment, the students will gain an insight into global issues such as social justice, human rights, citizenship, and equity; and gain a valuable insight to bring back to their local communities and primary schools at home. 

The students have been busy since December participating in monthly training sessions in preparation for the volunteering experience. They are also organising various fundraising events and activities, with all donations going directly to the project with the aim to provide quality educational experiences to the young children in Tanzania.