Teach English and Study Arabic

My name is Maddy Sala, I am from the UK and I am currently studying History. I have been at the Excellence Center Palestine for 4 weeks on the Volunteer with Palestinian Refugees programme.
I participated in many activities with the Excellence Center, namely a tour of Hebron's Old Town, trips to surrounding cities, Arabic classes, and many more. The Center also organised all my volunteering, setting me up with a class both at the Center itself and in Al Farwwa refugee camp, facilitating my schedule there, picking up extra classes and initially my transport.
I thoroughly enjoyed my Arabic lessons. My teacher, Ghaidaa, was kind, supportive and dedicated. She created a positive environment in class which everyone enjoyed and massively appreciated. She had great teaching methods, giving us some good conversational knowledge which I have successfully used both while teaching and travelling.
I really enjoyed my time with Excellence, the staff are kind and welcoming and every volunteer has been very friendly. People travel together, explore the city and support each other here which, as a woman travelling alone, has been invaluable. While I don't think anyone necessarily came here for social aspect, we have all made some good friends here and live in a constantly warm and inviting atmosphere. I could not be more grateful for the host family I was placed with. They have been nothing but kind, supportive and genuinely loving for my entire month-long stay. Like all people in Hebron, they have consistently offered generosity and hospitality, making my entire experience considerably easier and happier. For me, the host family system has been invaluable and incredibly positive, I cannot overstate how crucial they have been to my time in Palestine. The students I have taught have been welcoming and enthusiastic. They are always eager to learn and love their time with the Excellence Center.
On the weekends, I have been to a few places around Palestine with both my host family and other volunteers. On my first weekend, I was able to visit Bethlehem and the Church of the Nativity which was amazing. I visited Ramallah twice, staying overnight the second time, which was both incredibly interesting and fun. I also went to Jerusalem twice, being able to see the Dome of the Rock, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre and many more amazing sites. Palestine is a beautiful, interesting and welcoming country that I genuinely believe everyone should visit.
While many people are concerned with safety in Palestine, I felt very safe for the vast majority of my stay. Having a host family who gave me lots of advice and guidance ensured I was constantly safe and socially aware, as well as the ability to always travel with other volunteers. Additionally, the people of Palestine are incredibly helpful and friendly and are always happy to help you, whatever you may need. People will often speak to you in the street and get to know you and are always eager to give directions or assist in any way they can.
I truly enjoyed my time in Palestine and at the Excellence Centre. I feel it has improved me as a person and allowed me to help others. Palestine is beautiful and full of culture, life and genuinely good people. I am very grateful to have been able to visit here and definitely feel I chose the right programme and organisation, I loved teaching the students and spending time working with them. However, I would say that your time spent with the Excellence Centre can be very dependent on your choices rather than the Centre's oppprtunities, especially programmes outside of teaching. While I really enjoyed my time here, I feel there is potentially a lack of organization and support given to interns and volunteers in other programmes who require more than a destination and students in order to carry out their volunteering. Even those who did teaching programmes like myself I feel could have been given more support and training. Luckily, another volunteer (a teacher by profession) was able to give me guidance and teach me how to make lesson plans, prepare for class, etc, but others may not be so lucky and would need more support from the Centre to prepare themselves for the responsibility of leading a class, particularly those teaching outside the Centre such as at Al Farwwa.
In general, I had an amazing time in Palestine. I learnt about the culture, met incredible people and taught wonderful classes full of bright and enthusiastic students. I also cannot overstate the kindness and love of my host family who I will be forever grateful to and plan to keep close contact with after leaving Palestine. While I do feel the Centre can lack organization at times, I am grateful for the opportunity and incredibly glad that I came to a genuinely incredible country.