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  • „YOU DO IT QUIETLY, YOU HELP AND THAT'S IT.” THE EXPERIENCE OF VOLUNTEERING THROUGH A CASE EXAMPLE
    89-106
    Views:
    117

    The largest population movement in the history of Europe since the Second World War has been the migration process of recent years, which also appeared in Hungary in 2015. The significant demographic movement has resulted in important social reactions and has developed different narratives in the civil and also in the power fields. In Hungary, the refugee issue has become a decisive topic of political discourse since 2015, and the party coalition was among the first in Europe to represent the security policy. As a result, the refugees appeared as a source of danger, so the government has rejected them. In spite of this, the grassroots volunteer groups were organized in the civil sphere, who helped the refugee masses passing through Hungary in 2015. This paper analyses a very brief but very intense manifestation of Hungarian civil society involvement as a social response to current conflicts. We will look at how the 2015 migration wave grassroots crisis management took place in Debrecen. This cultural anthropological research is based on online and offline participatory observations and semi-structured interviews and informal conversations with volunteers who helped refugees in Debrecen. This study focuses on the motivations, attitudes, social responsibility of volunteers and their voluntary activity embedded in broader socio-political conditions. The first part of the article shows the formation and operational peculiarities of solidarity philanthropic organization with refugees in Debrecen. Then follows the individual aspects of volunteering. Finally, it will be discussed the socio-political context of the civil voluntary movement, the political interpretations of refugee assistance, and its impact on volunteering. With outlining a segment of the contemporary volunteer phenomenon we can get closer to provide a framework for understanding the possibilities of the recent civil sphere.  

  • Social Responsibility in Hungarian Higher Education: The Zsuzsanna Lorántffy Mentoring Programme at the National University of Public Service I.
    101-114
    Views:
    32

    The National University of Public Service is dedicated to social responsibility. One of its forms is volunteering, a cultural aspect that is lacking in the societal embedding in our country (Fejes, Kelemen és Szűcs, 2016). The study presents the results of an ongoing mentoring program at NUPS, where university members provided weekly subject tutoring online for residents of child protection centers in Transylvania. The primary goal of the program is to provide a form of compensation for disadvantages and psycho-social care through the establishment of personal connections (Baráth, 2016), aiding in the improvement of academic performance for underprivileged youth. In the long term, it aims to provide opportunities for the development of coping strategies that support participants in breaking through and achieving further success (Szőtsné és tsai, 2007). In the spring semester of the 2022/23 academic year, three children's homes had 36 students participating in the pilot phase of the program. After methodological training, 28 mentors provided assistance. Mentoring took place weekly in the requested subjects, including related study method counseling. Among the mentors were students, university lecturers, and functional staff, Continuous methodological counseling and experience exchange were provided. Each mentor kept a progress diary. At the end of the program, individual and focus group evaluations were conducted for all participant groups. The results of the pilot research are presented in two parts. The first presents the literature review and the academic background to the programme. The second paper will present the results of the research, the discussion and further steps planned.