Today Reach out to Asisa (ROTA) and Occidental Petroleum Corporation (OXY) shared their 8^th Annual Ramadan 2014 Program for volunteer work during the Holy Month. For this special time of the year of sharing and giving, ROTA has organized events for Ramadan in which many volunteers can help lighten the lives of others for the 8^th time in 2014.

OXY has been assisting and supporting ROTA in this project in the past 2 years and will continue to help by not only donating, but spending time to help make these events and projects happen in collaboration with ROTA. Steve Kelly, General Manager of OXY, and Hassan Al Malki, Deputy General Manager of OXY Qatar, stated how important it is for them to engage in social projects, may it be in medical areas, the arts or volunteering, besides their work together with Qatar Petroleum for 20 years.

This years’ Ramadan Program is called “Sharing Blessings”, as George Tavola, ROTA’s Volunteer Program Manager, said “Because it is a time of sharing blessing, sharing compassion and sharing happiness”. Projects of the Program include food packing and contribution for the less fortunate, visiting children hospitals and psychiatric institutions to share the Ramadan spirit, an Iftar in Education City for street workers, and a school renovation of the Bangladeshi school in Abu Hammour.

The volunteer work in collaboration with the children’s hospital includes centers such as the Rumailah’s Children Rehabilitation Center and the Children Leukemia Department. Volunteers will visit the children hospitals, organize festivals that children with disabilities can enjoy and host the Garanga’oh celebrations for these kids.

The school renovation project, will take place from the 6^th – 13^th July in the Bangladeshi school in Abu Hammour. 70 volunteers will come to renovate the school in order to improve the quality of education, as this is one of ROTA’s main objectives in their volunteer work. In the past they have had an English language literacy project in the Bangladeshi and have also set up a computer lab for a different school in Doha. ROTA also has actively worked in projects in Bangladesh itself to improve learning conditions for Bangladeshi students. It is very important to ROTA that the standards for quality education and the access to it are constantly raised and challenged for future generations.

Around 1000 volunteers are engaged with ROTA and OXY and during the Ramadan project 250 of these volunteers will be working on these projects. The number of volunteers that can be involved has already almost reached full capacity, as the number of enthusiastic volunteers has immensely increased over the past years.

Anyone who is interested in volunteer work may join by submitting an online application and work in future projects and next years Ramadan projects. It is a great opportunity for volunteers to do something fun, while bringing joy to the less fortunate and making a difference here and there.

For more information about ROTA’s projects or to submit your online application for volunteer work, please visit their website at www.reachouttoasia.org/en

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