Our WE-Munich office intended to give nearly a dozen physically and mentally challenged children from the FortSchritt daycare a day they won’t forget. And that’s why a team of 12 employees organized a WE Volunteer day trip for the children on April 24 as part of our company’s corporate citizenship initiatives. It was a valuable experience not only for the children, but also for the adults.
The daycare center provides a special education program for children as young as 6 months old. Because of the lack of funds and skilled workers, the children rarely have the opportunity to participate in school trips. The center director happily welcomed WE’s offer of an afternoon of fun. It was a gorgeous, sunshine-filled day, which was a blessing given how harsh the Munich winter has been this year. A perfect day for a boat ride! Our program for the day included a train ride to Herrsching, where we visited an adventure playground, and a lake boat trip with the paddlesteamer. On board, we invited the kids to have lunch.
As able-bodied people, we sometimes take our mobility for granted. The children were seated in special buggies, and the elevators were not working when we arrived at the train station. But together with the childcare assistants and a little bit of physical strength, we solved this problem; we carried the kids in their buggies down the stairs to the platform. To our surprise, the train ride from Munich to Herrsching alone was a lot of fun for the kids — and we would have never left the playground if it had been up them! The time on the playground also made the kids a bit tired, so it was nice they could relax a bit and enjoy their sausages and German potato salad while watching waves during the boat ride.
We entertained the kids the entire time, pushed their buggies and helped them at lunch. The daycare follows the principle of conductive education, which is based on the idea that every person has the opportunity to develop and needs to be encouraged to do so. This reminded us again that we can perform better every day if we try to do so. Intern Kathrin Axtner said, “It was gorgeous to see the happiness in the children’s faces. Adriano organized this project with passion, and I think that’s the reason why everything worked out so well. The project was also a gain for us as a team, as it tied us together more.”
