A New Destination for OXAB Volunteers

UPDATE 2/3/08: OXAB are looking at offering Serbia as a new destination this year, but this is still a work in progress. We will let you know nearer the time if this is the case.
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In 2005, for the first time, OXAB volunteers had a chance to visit Serbia, another country in the former Yugoslavia. We organised trips to a school for 15-19 year olds in Arandjelovac. We hoped this would be a great opportunity for volunteers to do some really constructive work with older children, aimed at helping them improve their English.

As with the rest of former Yugoslavia, Serbia has had a very tumultuous recent history and bears many of the same social and economic scars. The capital Belgrade was the former capital of Yugoslavia and the current Serbia remained as Yugoslavia after Bosnia-Herzegovina and Croatia separated away, until 2003, when it was renamed Serbia and Montenegro. In 2006, Montenegro declared independence, becoming the last of the former Yugoslav republics to secede. The southern province of Serbia, Kosovo, which had been under United Nations administration since 1999, unilaterally declared independence on 17th February 2008; the United Kingdom formally recognised its independence the next day. As Serbia and several other European countries are refusing to recognise it, Kosovo’s status is still in question but conflict is mostly limited to northern Kosovo.

As with any country, we would urge any people intending to visit Serbia or Kosovo to heed UK Foreign Office advice (or the advice of your home country’s foreign service).

Arandjelovac is situated in a beautiul area which was perfectly peaceful when we sent volunteers there. We hope to provide more general pages on Serbia shortly, including more hisory, and some practical advice for our volunteers.

The School

The school is equivalent to a 6th form college (15-19 year olds) and according to the Serbian system it is one of a group of schools each specialising in different areas. This one focuses on business, tourism and catering.

They would like help making their English teaching a bit more practical rather than book-based as at present. They would also particularly appreciate volunteers coming to help some of their more difficult students. They have a school parliament which does various projects - any ideas and help regarding this, would be very warmly received. At the moment they also have peer drug and sex education programs.

Many of the children speak very good English so language is unlikely to be a problem.

Available Accommodation

As a tourist location, many families routinely rent their flats out and would be happy to do this for volunteers at a cheap price. Several of the kids have suggested that they are so happy to have people coming to help that they would love to have someone stay with them for free!

The Town of Arandjelovac

The town is in the wooded hills at about 400m altitude about an hour away from Belgrade. It used to be a popular tourist area for Yugoslavia as it is a spa town. The spas remain so volunteers can visit the pool, sauna and taste the very strange sulphuric water from the spa, which is situated in a park of sculptures. It is also famous for a cave in the hills (which reach up to 700 metres) to which volunteers could walk.

Last updated: March 2nd, 2008