FDNC has benefited a great deal from the presence of local and international volunteers and interns.  The stopping of our various volunteer programs lead to a void in Mbale, especially for the number of NGO’s that have not been as fortunate at attracting skilled international volunteers. 

FDNC is well built and suited to refill this void because of its successful history of hosting international individuals and groups, as well is its critical role in starting the volunteer programs which fits well with FDNC’s mission to empower grassroots communities through greater cooperation within the development community.

We envision a completely grass-roots program that plays a pivotal role in a broader local NGO empowerment strategy.  This program is now market driven (i.e. tailored to the needs of individual NGO’s and local communities), and will succeed in areas that previous volunteer programs failed. The volunteer policy will be communicated to volunteers before they take office:

It is a non-profit program that charges minimal fees as opposed to the outrageous costs. 
 
The involvement of both local and foreign interns is vital.  Our previous volunteer activities built a great experience learning internship program, but was quite limited in creating local beneficiaries. Ultimately, progress towards sustainable human development is only possible through empowerment of locals.  FDNC envisions creating a competition for funded internships to attract the most talented local university students and graduates in development studies, social work, business, etc. 

To facilitate such a competition, foreign volunteers could be charged a minimal fee to help support local interns that would otherwise not have the means to participate.  In this way, the program would help to cultivate future community development professionals and social entrepreneurs.

This program focuses more on the organizations rather than on the interns. The program organizes regular skills development workshops in areas such as enterprise development, mindset transformation and job creation, self-help approaches to self-reliance, grant writing, computer applications, accounting, and leadership development.  The emphasis of this program is not on simply how can western university students’ benefits from international exposure, but more on how the presence of interns can help to build the capacities of the organizations.  Most importantly, the emphasis is on how bringing together talented local and international interns with grass roots development efforts will deliver better services to those most in need.

Marketing and attracting foreign interns at this conceptual stage involves significant efforts by FDNC, our current and former volunteers to harness their professional and social networks as a great potential to bring about positive change in our communities.  FDNC is keen to foster capacity to other local NGOs building on our success. For further information, please CONTACT US»