Volunteer: education roles
Volunteer in Greece or remotely
If you have experience in teaching, teacher training, trauma informed practice, psychosocial support and/or Education in Emergencies, we need your skills!
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All volunteers work directly through one of our partner organisations in Greece. We will provide you with the skills and understanding you need to work with this community and make a difference. We will then support you throughout your placement.
There are four ways you can volunteer. Not sure which is right for you? Just fill in our application form and we can talk it through.
Volunteer roles
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Community Teacher Trainers
(remote/Greece)
Community Teacher Trainers lead and help design a series of training workshops attended by a group of community teachers who are living and teaching in camps and community spaces across Greece. This includes:
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Leading teacher training to non-native English speakers who may or may not have formal teaching experience (either over Zoom or in person).
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Training community teachers in a variety of disciplines (e.g. classroom management skills, designing learning sessions with variety/balance/student involvement, structuring a lesson, etc.)
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Responding to the needs of workshop participants and being able to design relevant material to suit their needs.
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Helping with programme development and programme evaluation when necessary.
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Time commitment
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You will need to be available to deliver weekly online workshops for 12-16 weeks. This is in addition to the time taken to complete our induction, prepare your modules and and carry out an evaluation of the programme.
Person Specification for Community Teacher Trainer
You will be a qualified teacher who has direct experience of teaching others to deliver educational programmes at a grassroots level. Ideally you will have had experience of working in a camp setting and understand how different the context of working with refugees is and the educational resourcing constraints. You will also need to be able to meet the following additional essential criteria:
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Capability to work remotely using digital technology
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Experience of working with refugees or at-risk vulnerable groups.
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Experience with or understanding of working with trauma.
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Delivering teacher training to students with English as an Additional Language.
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Developing ESL curricula.
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Mentoring and training other teachers.
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Capability to work in changing circumstances and respond flexibly
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If you are interested in volunteering with refugeeEd as a Community Teacher Trainer and would like to know more, please contact ctt@refugeeEd.com for more details.
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Or:
Community Teacher Mentor
(remote)
Mentors meet 1:1 online or in person weekly with trainee teachers on the CTT programme, who are community teachers living and teaching in camps and community spaces across Greece. This includes:
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Getting to know your mentee, their teaching experiences and their current teaching context in order to develop a trusting where confidences can be built.
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Setting goals with your mentee and directing sessions towards achieving them.
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Staying up to date with the CTT programme’s content and progress so as to offer tailored support on the material covered in the workshops and be available to answer specific questions.
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Offering advice regarding any of your mentees specific classroom challenges, or supporting your mentee to try out and review new teaching concepts.
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Finding resources to support your mentees practice and professional development, including classroom materials or curricula, free online training or development opportunities.
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Supporting your mentee towards their professional goals if desired, through CV support, professional advice, or searching for opportunities.
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Reviewing sessions through feedback each week, helping with programme development and programme evaluation when necessary.
Time commitment
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You will need to be available for up to eight regular mentoring sessions. These will likely be weekly but the role will require some flexibility to find a time that suits the mentee, including being relatively flexible about rearranging.
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Person Specification for Mentor
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You will be a qualified teacher with experience teaching English as a second language and working with people on the move, understanding how different the context of working with refugees is and the educational resourcing constraints. You will also need to be able to meet the following additional essential criteria:
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Capability to work remotely using digital technology
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Experience with or understanding of working with trauma.
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Capability to work in changing circumstances and respond flexibly
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Ability to support others through teaching challenges and share appropriate resources
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Willingness to support with CV development and offer professional development advice
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Patience and reliability
If you are interested in volunteering with refugeeEd as a Mentor or would like to know more, please contact ctt@refugeeEd.com for more details.
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Or:
Education specialists
(remote/Greece)
Volunteer Education Specialists are experienced practitioners who deliver capacity building for organisations operating in Greece. This is led through webinars offered to groups of participants that can be addressed to one organisation or can be open to multiple. The webinars can include topics connected to education, sociology, psychology, employability and education management, among others.
Commitment
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With the support of refugeeEd, education Specialists will develop their webinar content and deliver this remotely to organisations through webinars. They need to be available to deliver at least three webinars - though there is a lot of flexibility regarding timings.
Education Specialists can also have the opportunity to volunteer with organisations in Greece to provide mentoring, coaching and capacity building support to improve their educational operations.
​Person Specification for Education Specialist
Education Specialists are experienced practitioners who are used to leading training in their area of expertise. They will need to be proactive and adaptable, and able to tailor the content of their training according to the needs of the organisation(s). They will need to be confident working remotely using tools such as Canva and Zoom. They will need strong interpersonal and presentation skills to engage the group in their sessions.
Education Specialists will draw on their own expertise, which may be in one or more of the following:
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Experience of working with refugees, asylum seekers or migrants, especially in Education in Emergencies contexts.
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Experience of trauma informed practice.
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Experience designing programmes for students with English as an Additional Language, particularly for those with little to no prior English and/or knowledge of the roman alphabet.
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Experience training and mentoring TEFL students.
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Experience teaching in a low-resource context.
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Experience developing vocational training courses.
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Experience in developing employability skills with students.
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Experience with community-centred and anti-colonialist programme design.
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Experience in charity or schools administration (sometimes coordinators are looking for support with organisational challenges).
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Other experience that may time well with something a project is looking to develop, e.g. ICT skills, maths, experience with particular special needs.
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RefugeeEd offers continuous support during the preparation of the training courses as well as tools connected to module creation. All specialists have access to the Canva Pro and Zoom accounts of RefugeeEd and receive sample presentations to start creating their material. During the webinars our coordinators are there to offer technical support as well as feedback afterwards​
Teachers
(Greece)
Are you available for a minimum of 6 weeks? Then this is a great opportunity to support local organisations enabling a real change in the lives of people on the move. The majority of people that you will be working with are from Afghanistan, Syria, Pakistan and DR Congo. There are also smaller numbers of arrivals from many other African countries, Iran, Yemen, Iraq, Palestine.
There are a range of organisations across Greece that work to support various needs. Most are small, grassroots organisations. They may particularly focus on education, or offer a range of services to refugees, including education. Education may be targeted to children, young people, adults or a mix. They usually focus on English as this is the most transferable language if people don’t know what country they will end up in but may teach other subjects as well or instead.
Projects that the field volunteer could get involved in include::​
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Adult English classes, or tuition in other languages including Greek, French, German, Spanish, Farsi, Kurdish and Arabic
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Vocational classes for adults
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Programmes to complement the limited education children and young people are receiving in Greek schools. This may be more informal, such as a homework club or play-based educational activities.
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Fuller schooling programmes for children unable to attend school, or during the long school summer break.
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IT/computing classes for adults/teenagers
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Theater, music and other creative activities, for all age groups
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Maths, science or occasionally other subjects
Time commitment
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Most organisations working in education stipulate that the minimum length of time a volunteer can stay is two months, though some still have a minimum of 6 weeks. This is because it is important for teachers to build up a relationship with their pupils and it can be stressful for students to have lots of very short-term teachers coming and going. The longer you can stay, the better. We often find that volunteers who originally planned to stay a few weeks end up extending their stay for several months!
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Person Specification for teachers
Teachers will need the following skills:
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Experience in teaching and/or working with vulnerable groups
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Be able to work with little or no material
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Be able to work in big teams with teammates coming from different cultures
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Be in a good mental and physical condition during the trip
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Be proactive and flexible
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Have a good level of English
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All teachers are receiving support from RefugeeEd before, during and after their trip. We will make sure that your qualifications and needs will be matched with the needs of the organisation in order to offer an impactful experience for both the community and the teacher. In some cases accommodation and/or food is provided by the hosting organisation as well as monthly stipends.
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This role is particularly suited to those who've completed a teaching qualification and want to build up some experience or for experienced teachers who want to challenge themselves and teach in a new context. However you don’t need to have particular qualifications to get involved and support our cause. Either way you can find useful material for teaching at our ​resources section.