Singapore Tamil Youth Conference 2016 Manifesto NUSTLS Singapore Tamil Youth Conference 2016 Manif | Page 90

Issue 15: Overseas Community Involvement Programmes (OCIPs)
Pre-Panel Discussion
1. Why do the youths embark on Overseas Community Involvement Programmes (OCIPs)?
• Most youths have embarked on OCIPs before, mainly through school platforms. Some countries
that they have been to include Vietnam, Laos, Japan, Philippines, Bintan and Cambodia.
• The youths would like to attain a different experience by embarking on these OCIPs. Apart from
developing personally and rendering service to the beneficiaries, they would like to embrace
the cultural differences in these regional countries.
• Some youths who embarked on OCIPs chose the country instead of the beneficiaries they
would like to work with.
2. Why do some youths choose not to embark on OCIPs?
• The youths who have not embarked on any OCIPs felt that it is more important to focus on
rendering community service to those in our home country before helping foreign countries.
• Some of them feel that the impact made is minimal via OCIPs as they are generally not
sustainable and the root cause of the problem is often not solved.
• Organising OCIPs requires a lot of planning and execution, which can put a heavy burden on the
youths.
• OCIPs often work with Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) and the youths are concerned
that these NGOs are not regulated.
• OCIPs require the youths to use up their own money. Although there are subsidies available e.g.
70% discount for the first Youth Expedition Project, multiple OCIPs require self-funding.
3. Why are there rarely any OCIPs to Tamil communities/diasporas abroad?
• The youths are generally unaware of the lifestyles and challenges that the Tamil Diasporas
worldwide face.
• There may be domestic socio-political issues in these regions, which prevents these Tamil
Diasporas from actively voicing out their challenges.
• School-based projects focus on a country’s need, rather a particular community’s need.
4. Are the current OCIPs impactful?
• Most of the current projects do not result in long-term tangible outcomes. This is mainly
because current projects focus on handing over the project to the next batch of volunteers
instead of passing on the required resources to the community themselves. Thus, after helping
the community once, there is a need to go back again. The community also expects these OCIP
groups to come back annually, resulting in a lack of self-motivation within the community for
self-improvement.
• There seems to be a lack of identification of the specific needs of the target group. Most of the
needs that are identified are what the volunteers perceive to be the needs of the community.
Thus, the project based on this perceived need tends to be less impactful.
• Regular OCIPs programmes might lack rejuvenation and the activities remain the same,
resulting in no new benefit created within the foreign community.
Issue 15: Overseas Community Involvement Programmes (OCIPs)
PAGE 90