With the onset of the summer vacation, the Good Shepherd Social Welfare Foundation will start a series of “Young Volunteers’ Camp” on July, inviting parents to bring their children for memories of a very special summer, allowing children to learn to use their abilities to help others and see the value of life from a different perspective.

The Foundation says that several parents wish to bring their children to the institution to serve as volunteers, to learn to give and help others but unfortunately, not much service work would need the help of a child. Thus, a camp was planned for these young volunteers to experience and know what is community service work and for them to learn how to exert effort.

At the same time, the Foundation hopes to reduce the misinterpretation or labelling of the public towards the institution through the “Young Volunteers’ Camp”. As examples, Tainan Babies Home has frequently been identified as an orphanage but in fact, every child has a father and a mother. Children have been taken into the institution for unavoidable reasons. Adoptive parents are usually considered to be very caring and full of love for adopting children but in fact, there is not much difference between an adoptive family and an ordinary family. Young parents are often considered as young people raising children, not knowing how to take care of their babies but in reality, they are earnest and seriously learning how to become fathers and mothers. Through the activity, we wish to convey “a person is worth more than the whole world”, take off the basic context of everyday life and learn to appreciate oneself and the advantages and worth of others too. From their young age, learn to be able to know how to treat people in different situations with empathy.

Apart from this, the Good Shepherd has always been using “resilience” in providing company to those who have suffered from trauma or frustration, to find one’s worth and head for a new life. Thence in the “Young Volunteers’ Camp”, the Foundation will teach the children to know resilience through games hoping that in the future days to come, they can learn to use resilience to find the courage to be positive.

The Foundation expresses that the theory of resilience includes 5 big concepts namely: community support network and acceptance without conditions, the ability to explore the meaning of life, the ability to interact socially and solve problems, the ability to look at oneself positively and the ability for humor. The Foundation believes that if we first promote prevention, it could lessen sad and unfortunate situations happening in society. And every year, use a different method such as pictures, drawings, exhibitions, selection of golden phrases to hold the “Good Shepherd Feast of Resilience” to promote resilience to the general public.

This year, we are promoting the Feast of Resilience towards its tenth year and hoping that through “Good Shepherd’s Young Volunteers’ Camp”, bring parents and their children in a carefree and interesting manner, to know and recognize the mission and the services done in each facet of the Good Shepherd Social Welfare Foundation, and also to know oneself through games, find one’s personality and good character traits to enable the seedling of resilience to be planted in the heart of every child.