SCORP: Standing Committee on Refugee Project

1. Lebanon-Switzerland Transnational Project -
"Lebanese Project for Palestinian Refugees"

The Palestinian Refugee project in Lebanon was designed for foreign medical students to spend a month of social work in one of the refugee camps in Lebanon. The primary aim of the project is to expose the participating students directly to the refugees and to their problems through providing medical and social assistance in a camp hospital and in the headquarter of a NGO working in the camp.

The project's participants provide outpatient and inpatient services in a small hospital, administered by the Red Crescent Organization, near the entrance of Al Burj Camp (Haifa Hospital).

In the NGO (Assumoud), the participants can join the activities that the NGO already runs, initiate new activities, or run activities that SCORP has provided like teaching languages and raising awareness on public health issues like hygiene, immunization and nutrition.

Every visiting student has to hand in a report at the end of the month and will be given a certificate. SCORP covers fully the accommodation, board, transportation and social program for participating students that come from all over the world.

The participants can also work on Saturdays in an outpatient setting in the Shatila refugee camp located inside Beirut, in the "Volunteer Outreach Clinic" (VOC) which is run by volunteer medical students (mostly SCORP members) as well as by several volunteer doctors from the American University of Beirut - Medical Center.

We are currently contemplating the organization of a "Pre-Project Workshop" where participants will be introduced to the social and medical conditions of refugees in Lebanon, and will be trained in communication skills, in addition to having the chance of integrating their research work and rehearsing the sessions to be presented.

For more information visit our web site:

http://lebrefugeeproject.tripod.com

2.The Annual Clothes and Books Collection
for the refugees in Borj el Barajneh Camp

The library in Al-Burj Camp that SCORP helped establish

Every year SCORP members organize a clothes, toys and books' collection campaign throughout the American University of Beirut campus. The activity is run over a period of two months : mid-December until mid-February.

Clothes and donations are then packed and transported to the " Assumoud" NGO in El-Burj camp. The NGO will be in charge of distribution to needy people.

3. The Annual Fund raising Iftar
Today, four annual fundraising Iftars have been organized with great success.

 

The major part of funds raised from this event is dedicated as scholarships to support needy students from the refugee camps, helping them to pursue a higher education

4. Greeting Cards selling
Greeting cards are made from the paintings drawn by the children of the Al-Burj camp and are sold annually at Christmas and New Year.

Money collected is used to provide supplies to the camp (library supplies, computers...)

5. Landmine Victim Project
The project started with providing awareness lectures about the prevention of landmine injuries. The idea was then expanded to include the assessment of mental health among landmine victims in the South of Lebanon and to study the prevalence of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and Depression in this subpopulation. The project is currently on hold for logistic reasons.

6. Future projects
In addition to continuing in already established projects and activities, SCORP members are striving to promote its ideals among medical students and to promote principles of human rights, conflict resolution and peace among the Lebanese population, in collaboration with local and international Non-Governmental Organizations.

Future projects include:

Lectures and Seminars:
Organizing seminars and lectures in the refugee camps in Lebanon, targeting public health issues like smoking, hygiene, reproductive health and family planning with the help of SCOPH and SCORA

Human rights workshop:
We belive that medical students, as future health care providers, need to know what human rights are, how to protect them, and how not to violate them. Medical students should also be trained in detecting human rights violations and in ways to deal with those violations.

Peace Day