VoRTCS volunteers come from every walk of life. There are students,
professionals, tradesmen, mothers, fathers, doctors, teachers, and a
surprising number of lawyers. Some of our tutors are at university,
some professionals in their thirties, some still at high school – and
some have seen their children graduate from high school and have the
generosity of spirit to help someone else’s children do the same.
What
we have in common at VoRTCS is a belief that refugees are a valuable
addition to Australia, with the potential to contribute an enormous
amount to our society. Their humanity deserves that they are made
welcome and helped to find their way.
We want to help them do
this not out of pity, but out of friendship, respect and empathy.
Refugees are incredibly courageous, dignified and courageous people.
They have been forced to leave their home country because of war or
other horrendous events, and have endured months or years in refugee
camps with little food and security. They have lost family members and
friends, and many still do not know whether their loved ones are
alive. And yet they have the courage to begin again, to bring their
children to Australia hoping to give them a chance to grow up without
war or danger.
There are currently more than 700 volunteers
currently assisting refugee families around South East Queensland in
the Refugee Tutoring program.
Volunteering for VoRTCS is a
chance to share something so much more valuable than money or material
goods. We don’t ask that our volunteers are teachers or counsellors,
or that they made straight-A’s in high school, or that they have a long
resume full of tutoring experience. VoRTCS is about human beings
helping other human beings in our community. It is about each of us
giving what we can of our learning, our time and our experiences to
those who need assistance. Whether this is struggling for weeks to
find a way to teach an 8 year old child what letter comes after ‘g’ in
the alphabet, teaching a single mother how to navigate a doctor’s
surgery in the suburbs, or watching a child smile when she has painted
a picture all by herself - it is about helping make people smile. It
is about being human. And if you take most of our volunteers aside,
most will tell you that they think they get more out of volunteering
than the refugee families do. Of course, the families’ smiles tell a
different story.
You hear a lot in the media these days about
the ‘spirit of Australia’. It is amorphous, elusive, and very
politically-convenient for those same reasons. One thing that embodies
the Australian spirit is the old adage: you just don’t kick a person
when they’re down. As Australians, we should aim to help people stand
back up again, and we stand beside them until they find their way.
Because there, but for the winds of fate, go you and I.
Claire Schneider
President - VoRTCS
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