Frequently asked questions about the shanty town school
What do you offer the volunteers?
- Basic guidance in your tasks
- Basic school infrastructure and materials
- Spending of the Otra Cosa restaurant tips to organize your own additional activities.
- Otra Cosa Volunteer discounts
- Introduction to Huanchaco and the CEP school
What are the advantages of working as a volunteer in this program?
- Get to know the about the lives of children who live in the shanty town of Ramon Castilla
- Improve your Spanish while working with the kids and volunteer teachers
- Have a good time with really great kids while helping out in the classrooms or organize your own activities outside.
- Get an impression of how a NGO like CEP works and how they try to help.
- Get to know a Peruvian fishing village like Huanchaco from an inhabitant’s perspective instead of the short stay tourist perspective.
- Extend your travelling time in Peru at a very low cost of living and recharge your travelling batteries.
What do I need to bring?
Nothing out of the ordinary really. From July until September it's Peruvian "winter", which means its between 12 and 20 degrees Celsius and not every day has sun. So then you might want to wear a sweater although it never gets really cold. The other months of the year the weather is really nice and you need to bring your beach gear. If you have any nice games to bring along or books with dynamics for kids that might be helpful in organizing your activities.
Do I need to know Spanish?
A basic level of Spanish is necessary to handle the kids and work with them. Rossella is not very demanding though about your level of Spanish as long as you speak a few words at least, so you can learn as you go along, but remember that your Peruvian colleges only speak Spanish.
Otra Cosa can help you with good affordable Spanish lessons (15/18 Soles/hour) and/or free Intercambio conversation exchange (1hour Spanish for 1 hour English, with local University students).
Other project specific questions
For any other project specific questions just include them in your e-mail to Peter or Juany and we'll try to answer them.
General questions
For general questions about volunteering with Otra Cosa Network, life in Huanchaco, how to get here etc, see our General Frequently Asked Questions page.
For anything not included there, simply include your questions in your application e-mail and Peter/Juany will try their best to answer it.
