African Diaries

What is EVS?

The aim of the European Voluntary Service is to support young people's participation in various forms of voluntary activities, both within and outside the European Union. Under this Action, young people take part individually or in groups in non-profit, unpaid activities.

 

With a budget of €885 million for its seven year duration, the Youth in Action programme set out to achieve five main objectives, tackled through five main actions: Youth for Europe: encouraging active citizenship, participation, and creativity; European Voluntary Service: promoting solidarity through voluntary activities abroad; Youth in the World: promoting partnerships and exchanges among young people and youth organisations; Youth Support Systems: supporting youth workers and organisations to improve the quality of their work; Support for European Co-operation in the Youth Field: supporting policy cooperation and dialogue.

Progress was regularly reviewed, with results published on the website of the Education, Audiovisual, and Culture Executive Agency.

 

The programme is estimated to have supported around 8,000 projects and provided opportunities and experiences to around 150,000 young people and youth workers every year. An evaluation of the programme was carried while it was underway and the results, published in 2011, suggested that from 2007-2009: more than 380,000 people participated in the programme; 42,700 projects were submitted; 21,800 projects were granted. A further review, to determine the success of the programme as a whole, will take place in 2016. In addition to the evaluation, the European Commission regularly monitored the programme to gauge satisfaction levels, as well as the potential success rate of programme, publishing the results in a monitoring survey.

 

How does it work?

An EVS project is a partnership between two or more promoting organisations. These organisations are responsible for recruiting volunteers for their project. Volunteers participate in EVS through a Sending Organisation in the country where they live and a Receiving Organisation that receives and hosts them during their period of service. Projects last from 2 weeks to 12 months, and as a volunteer you can work in a wide range of fields, such as culture, youth, sports, children, cultural heritage, arts, animal welfare, environment and development cooperation. At the end of your EVS period, you will receive a certificate confirming your participation and describing your project – theYouthpass. You will receive free accommodation, food, insurance and pocket money. The only thing you might have to pay is a small part of your travel costs.

 

Why EVS?

Going on an EVS project to another country is not a decision you should make lightly. If you take some time to reflect, plan ahead and stay motivated, the likelihood of disappointment during a project is much lower!Before committing to the European Voluntary Service (EVS), there are a few questions you should ask yourself: What is my personal motivation? This will support your inner drive while completing your project.Which area do I want to commit to? We all have personal interests, so be realistic and honest with yourself.How long am I ready to commit myself for? (This includes finding the project, preparation, administration, training, the service itself and follow-up)How much time do I have?Don’t focus on a specific country, but rather on a region. Look at the projects from the perspective of what you want to learn. Remember: EVS is not a job or an internship, nor a work placement, humanitarian mission, language course or holiday! What others say“It was a challenge to move on to a foreign green and rainy country where I didn't know anything, not even the language. I am happy to realise that I made it. I even learned more than I was expecting. I was very free in my projects so I worked in different topics: being with the service users, organising activities and events, working with other volunteers, doing statistics, helping to update the website of the organisation, etc.”Agathe Friquet from France, was 22 when she participated in an EVS project from July 2010 to June 2011. She worked in the Backlane Hostel, one of the Depaul Trust’s shelters for homeless people in Dublin (Ireland). If you already have a project...Gather all the information available about the country and the project, particularly if this is your first experience of living in a different country or if you are going to a remote location. Don’t hesitate to ask the Sending/Receiving/Coordinating Organisations everything you are wondering about related to the project. If you need more information, try contacting your National Agency, the Executive Agency or the regional SALTO Resource Centres for Eastern Europe and Caucasus, the Euro-Mediterranean region, and South East Europe.

 

Volunteering in Europe

Voluntary activities play an important role in Europe, but the situation differs from country to country. Check out the volunteering scene in Europe:  what's going on, how many people volunteer and how old are they?

 

Definition of volunteering

According to the European Youth Forum an activity can only be defined as volunteering if it is:undertaken of a person’s own free will and involves the commitment of time and energy to actions that benefit others and society as a wholeunpaid (although it can involve reimbursement of expenses directly related to the activity) for a non-profit cause, primarily undertaken within a nongovernmental organisation, and thus clearly isn't motivated by material or financial gainnot used to substitute or replace paid employment.

 

Volunteering and the EU

The history of volunteering in Europe differs from country to country. While some countries have longstanding volunteering traditions, in others the voluntary sector is still poorly developed or has yet to emerge. According to a 2007 Eurobarometer survey, three out of ten Europeans say they take part in voluntary activities. Some estimates place the total number of EU volunteers at 92 to 94 million adults (23% of all Europeans over 15). There has been a general increase in the number of active volunteers and voluntary organisations in the EU over the past ten years. In 2011, the European Commission launched the European Year of Volunteering to celebrate the efforts of the estimated 100 million Europeans who take part in voluntary activities. The year also aimed at making volunteering easier for people and improving the quality of volunteering in Europe.The Commission is also working to improve and promote volunteering among young people, particularly to encourage volunteering across borders. The European Voluntary Service is the best known programme helping young people to volunteer abroad.

 

Young people volunteering

A survey from 2011 found that around a quarter (24%) of young adults in the EU had been involved in an organised voluntary activity in the last 12 months.At the individual country level, the highest proportions of young people who had volunteered were found in in Slovenia, Denmark, Ireland and the Netherlands. In Poland, Greece and Hungary, roughly one in six of young people had been involved in such a voluntary activity. We know that volunteering is strongly influenced by the history, politics and culture of a community and a country, but you can help change the tradition and boost volunteering in Europe. You might even be taking part in voluntary activities without even realising it: lending a hand at your local sports club, helping out an elderly member of your community or picking up litter in the forest or on the beach. In fact, sports and outdoor activities are the main volunteering sectors in Europe, followed by education, arts and music or cultural associations.