Zonta Skopje and Zonta Pinellas and me -- planning for the Say No To Violence Against Women events

Early in the semester in my "Democracy and Civil Society" class at the State University in Tetovo, I asked for students to write about a community need, to indicate what NGOs or community organizations were working on that/those issue(s), and identify a possible community service project for our class.

Students indicated a desire to reduce violence in the family, among other important issues.

I had met with a Peace Corps, Maria, who was working with an NGO called the Forumi Gruas - a legal clinic working to help women who are survivors of domestic violence.

Earlier in the semester, we took a field trip there, and students met with the center's founder and director and the lead attorney as well as with Peace Corps Volunteer Maria.

See this post for more about our class visit and the work of the center: field trip to Forumi Gruas

and see this post first meeting with Peace Corps Volunteer Maria

I still wanted to organize some kind of service project with my students in the "Democracy and Civil Society" class, and so I was brainstorming what we could do.

I have worked with Zonta Pinellas (back home at USFSP, on projects related to human trafficking -- see   blog post  and this blog post).

So when I learned that there was a Zonta Club Skopje (at in International Women's Association meeting), I thought they might be a good partner for a project.

Back in April, we had a skype video conference with Lolita, President of the Zonta Club Skopje, and my colleague back in sunny Florida, Donna. Each shared more about the history, project and activities of their respective Zonta chapters, and, given our shared interests, came up with the idea of a

Say No to Violence Against Women event

actually - events! - both in Tetovo (with my class) and in Skopje.

(While much planning went in to our 2 events in 2 cities -- Zonta Skopje previously organized - with the support of USAID a bus tour around Macedonia that took the orange campaign to 16 cities in 16 days!)

Once we settled on this idea, we were able to involve other partners in Tetovo (Maria, Forumi Gruas, my class, and other colleagues at the State University) and in Skopje (founder of the first shelter and hotline/SOS number in Macedonia and students from the State University Tetovo Skopje campus - thanks Gjylia!)

 I enjoyed working with Lolita and Donna and Maria organizing these events. (And Donna was working on organizing a similar event in St. Petersburg, Florida - along with colleagues from the Center for Civic Engagement at USFSP - during this time as well.)  For more about the events, see


More about our event together in Tetovo:



blog post about Tetovo event, with media links

And our event together in Skopje:

blog post about Skopje event
More about the UN Orange Day program to draw attention to the need to end violence against women:  http://endviolence.un.org/orangeday.shtml

Lolita and I met by skype with Donna, who was joining us from Tampa Bay

Zonta Pinellas https://www.facebook.com/Zonta-Club-of-Pinellas-County-176656012391537/

Zonta Skopje:  https://www.facebook.com/zontaclubskopje/

 Zonta International:  https://www.facebook.com/ZontaInternational/