It is officially summertime here in the Philippines, and all of us PC Volunteers are feeling the heat. It's been consistently around 100 F here every day and the sun is brutal. Because of this, things are moving a bit slower around town. Work is still moving forward for me, though, but before I get into that I had a request to post some pics of our whale shark expedition last month. So, here some pics of one of the whale sharks we saw, courtesy of another volunteer (thanks Marissa!).

 I haven't had any other adventures recently, but there are some things planned in May that I'm excited about. As far as work goes, we recently completed a four day summer camp for over 400 college scholars in the beginning of April. It was a collaborative effort between myself, DSWD staff and Sorsogon State College. It was a huge task and kind of chaotic at times, but the kids had fun and I think that’s really the biggest success indicator. All of the staff were incredible especially since they were essentially sacrificing their weekend with no monetary reward.

 The next step at this point is to see if we can get the scholars more involved in taking ownership of the program. Right now we are working out the details for a Training of Trainers (ToT) in May that will train select scholars in leadership and facilitation skills. The end goal will be to get the scholars to start leading sessions on campus, similar to the ones I was leading last year, by themselves (or with minimal help). The whole thing is pretty ambitious, but I think regardless of how successful the program is we'll all learn a lot of important stuff. The most important thing is developing some kind of support system for college grantees coming from poor families. This way we help can ease the abrupt transition into college life. Anyways, that's what's new! Hope everyone's great.

Peace!