What: Camp Middle Jubba

When: June 25-July 27

Where: Montello Elementary School

For: Children in grades 3-6

Application deadline: June 8

Needed: Volunteers to teach school expectations and literacy skills

FMI: Morgan Brown at [email protected]; Sheikh Mohamed at [email protected]; or Elizabeth Brown at 784-8317

To find out more about Somali Bantus: http://sbcmaa.org/index.html

Volunteers sought for first Bantu kids camp

LEWISTON – The Somali Bantu Association is looking for volunteers for its first-ever summer camp for kids, designed for fun but also to teach Bantu children how to behave in school.

In their homeland and in refugee camps where they lived before coming here, most Bantu children had no access to schools. They didn’t learn how to act in the classroom.

“For many, this is the first time inside the classroom,” said Sheikh Mohamed, secretary of the Somali Bantu Association. “They don’t know what’s expected of them.”

Almost all of the Bantu students have received warnings or complaints from teachers for talking, not paying attention or playing when they were supposed to be listening and learning, he said.

He and Somali Bantu Association Chairman Mohamed Farah hope the camp will change that behavior.

Camp Middle Jubba for children in grades 3-6 will be held from June 25 to July 27 at Montello Elementary School. The application deadline is June 8.

The camp is not only for Bantus. All children in the age group are welcome to apply.

“The blending would be wonderful,” said organizer Morgan Brown, a Bates College senior. “Kids would learn from kids.”

In many ways, it will be like all summer camps, Brown said. There will be sports, rock climbing and bird- and whale-watching.

But there will also be education. The group is looking for volunteers to help reinforce expected school behavior, teach literacy skills and talk about American sports, such as baseball.

“Our people don’t know the different kind of games that this country has,” Mohamed said. Understanding baseball, football and basketball would help children better learn the culture, he said.

Somali Bantus come from a different culture, speak a different language and have a different history from ethnic Somalis, who began arriving in Lewiston in 2001. Bantus began to arrive here about two years ago. The Somali Bantu Association now has about 500 members, according to Mohamed and Farah.

Bantus, known as Africa’s original refugees, are generally less educated and were considered outsiders in Somalia, where some were slaves or indentured servants up to the first quarter of the 20th century, according to historical references.

Many Bantu parents have never gone to school, Mohamed said.

That lack of education has kept them back as a society and made them second-class citizens, a trend the association is intent on changing.

Camp Middle Jubba is offered by The Opportunity to Shine Program, a collaborative between United Way of Androscoggin County and the Libra Foundation.

To find out more about volunteering, staff positions or how to apply to be a camper, e-mail Morgan Brown at [email protected] or Sheikh Mohamed at [email protected], or call Elizabeth Brown at 784-8317.

The camp will run from 8:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. Monday through Friday for five weeks.

A lot of good can happen in that time, Mohamed said with a smile. “It will be five great weeks.”