INTERNATIONAL VOLUNTEER DAY: PUBLIC LECTURE AT KING’S PRIORY SCHOOL, TYNEMOUTH, UK

On 5 December, Professor Matt Baillie Smith was invited by the Kings Priory School and the Geographical Association (Tyne & Wear Branch) for a public lecture on “Volunteering, humanitarian crises and development: beyond the gap year” to promote critical debates amongst A-level students in Tynemouth, UK, and help inspire the geographers of the future.

The public event was organised by James Hand, teacher of A-Level Geography at Kings Priory School (Tynemouth, UK) and Secretary of the Tyne and Wear Branch of the Geographical Association (GA) and attended by over 50 students as part of a series of talks during the school’s academic year. The series was particularly aimed at introducing A-Level students to experts and researchers working at the cutting edge of the fields that they are studying at A-Level, as well as broadening their understanding of geography beyond the curriculum.

Volunteering was selected as one of the thematic areas for this series of public talks because of the critical roles played by volunteers across the globe in responding to diverse crises across the globe, from conflicts and the impacts of the climate emergency, to issues of displacement, struggles for rights and the Covid-19 pandemic.

However, and despite volunteering being a key part of the way individuals, communities, NGOs and governments respond and cope, the work of these volunteers often goes unrecognised. As the world faces multiple crises, including displacement, geographers have a critical role to play in making sure we understand the lives, experiences and knowledge of the people confronting these challenges.

During his talk, Professor Matt Baillie Smith shared learning from the Refugee Youth Volunteering Uganda (RYVU) project, as well as his wider experience of working alongside NGOs and humanitarian organisations to develop research on volunteers. He shared key findings from the RYVU research on the ways refugee groups themselves are responding to humanitarian crises and development issues in Uganda. The event also included an opportunity for A-level students to play the RYVU interactive games and talk about what it means to work in partnership so that researchers, practitioners and policy-makers can collaborate to promote dialogue and change.