President Milanović Meets Student Volunteers Organizing Pre-Holiday Gift Campaign for Nursing Homes
On the occasion of International Volunteer Day, the President of the Republic Zoran Milanović met today with student volunteers who, last year, initiated the humanitarian effort “U vaše živote kap naše dobrote” [A drop of our kindness into your lives]. This volunteer gift donation campaign was launched with the aim of supporting elderly nursing home residents on the eve of the Christmas holidays and raising awareness of the increasing diagnoses of dementia.
Members of the Student Section for Psychiatry from the University of Zagreb School of Medicine and the Academy of Dramatic Arts Student Association, along with their mentors and coordinators, are actively participating in the humanitarian campaign. During their presentation of the campaign to President Milanović, they emphasized that this year’s effort is directed towards benefiting more than 500 nursing home residents in the areas of Zagreb, Slavonia and Banija. The humanitarian campaign is scheduled to take place from the 15th to the 20th of December.
According to the delegation, the experience from last year revealed that conversations and social interactions are as crucial to nursing home residents as the provision of basic necessities in the form of gifts. Therefore, this year, as an integral part of their campaign, student volunteers have devised individualized social programmes for each nursing home in Zagreb. These programmes encompass activities such as poetry readings, performances of dramatic texts and singing. Notably, renowned Croatian actors have also joined the initiative.
Attending the meeting in the Office of the President were students from the University of Zagreb School of Medicine Ana Maria Antić, Dora Herceg, Jelena Ivančić, Veronika Lendvaj, Jana Majdak, Mara Parentić, Toma Perko, Tea Plišić and Eva Podolski, as well as students from the University of Zagreb Academy of Dramatic Arts Dora Dimić Rakar, Vid Lež, Toma Serdarević and Tibor Vukelić. Ninoslav Mimica, Professor at the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Zagreb School of Medicine and mentor of the Student Section for Psychiatry, and Zrinka Šamija, Head of the Office for International Cooperation at the Academy of Dramatic Arts, attended the meeting alongside the student volunteers.
President Milanović was accompanied by Jadranka Žarković, Adviser to the President of the Republic for Education.
PHOTO: Office of the President of the Republic of Croatia / Marko Beljan