We Continue Helping Those in Need
26. March 2020The desire to help those in need does not cease during the current Coronavirus pandemic. Students as well as the staff of Tomas Bata University in Zlín have joined those who help. For example, the “TBU for Climate” association and the local scouts established the Scout Crisis Centre Zlín. The Centre associates not only scouts and students, but also individual volunteers who want to offer help and assistance.
The Scout Crisis Centre recruits volunteers using Facebook and, at present, it has almost 300 members. The volunteering activities include, for instance, sewing of face masks, shopping, dog walking services, children day care or telephone support for seniors. Anyone willing to help may join the Centre.
Besides the abovementioned, the Scout Crisis Centre associates approximately 50 seamstresses who sew cotton face masks. The masks are sent particularly to hospitals, senior citizens’ homes, children’s homes, pharmacies and other places. More than 3,000 cotton face masks have been distributed so far. The local Vietnamese community is also enormously helpful as regards the production of face masks.
Face masks are also sewn by volunteers at the Faculty of Technology and at the Faculty of Management and Economics, as well as in the work-rooms of the Fashion Design studio at the Faculty of Multimedia Communications. Besides cotton face masks, special face masks made from nanomaterial and developed at the TBU Centre of Polymer Systems in cooperation with the Spur a.s. company are produced at the University. According to Kristýna Petříčková, Head of the Fashion Design studio: “Volunteers have sewn nearly thousand cotton face masks for the University staff and for the international students who stay in the Residence Halls. The teams take their turns; some employees sew face masks also at home.” One of the volunteers is Jana Semotamová, employed at the Language Centre of the Faculty of Humanities. She has sewn about 400 face masks for the TBU Refectory staff, international students and for children in the University nursery school so far.
Since last week, the Faculty of Humanities has been offering day care to children of the University staff. Future teachers and health professionals take care of the children during the working hours of their parents employed at the University.
