Dar Al Atta’a organises volunteering workshop in Oman

 To help Omani youth understand the benefits of volunteering, Dar Al Atta’a organised a workshop titled “Bright Ideas for Community Projects”.

The initiative was held in collaboration with the Shell Development Company’s Small and Medium Enterprise development arm, Intilaaqah, and centred on how young people could develop creative ideas and improve their own capabilities to help them contribute better to society, in the form of volunteer work. 

“Shell's collaboration with Dar Al Atta’aAssociation iscontinuousand comes as part of commitment towards community development and is based on the company's interest to social responsibility in the Sultanate,” said Muna Al Shekaili, Director General of External Affairs at Shell Development Oman.

Shell Intilaaqah provides training, consultancy and workshop services for ambitious Omani youth who are interested in starting and developing their business, and have signed an agreement with Dar Al Atta’a to support this year’s Big Give competition.

The workshop was held to impart the importance of volunteerism to those who will be taking part in Dar Al Atta’a’s annual Big Give charity drive, which sees teams from different universities around the Sultanate come up with innovative ideas to raise funds for those in need.

“Shell Intilaaqah and Dar Al Atta’a’s main focus in this workshop wastowards training the students from different universities and colleges, in the field of project management and to focus on the knowledge of the skills they will need for the Big Give Competition for this year,” added Al Shekaili.

18 teams are expected to take part in this year’s Big Give, which begins in April and goes on until mid July.

“We’ve formed a team which has been named the ‘pioneers of volunteerism’,and we have come up with some ideas,such as a running race and visual shows and competitions as we aim to collect fundsto build a home for a needy family,”said Safa Abdullah Al Farsi, a student from the Higher College of Technology in Muscat.

The Sultan Qaboos University will also be participating in this year’s initiative.

“We have formed a team in the name of Maysam,and we have a number of ideas, including a campaign to distribute gifts and donations to orphans,in addition to communicating with orphanages to support them,” said Reham Mohammed Al Ghussaini from the university’s Faculty of Economics and Political Science.

There are several criteria which determine the quality of an entry into the competition, such as the best idea, best project implementation, most funds raised, and amount of publicity and awareness generated.

Now entering its sixth season, the Big Give competition began in Oman in 2012, and has previously won the Sultan Qaboos Award for Volunteerism.

Source: Timesofoman