Types of projects
CCIVS members organise different types of voluntary service projects. The common feature is that they engage the energy of the volunteer on a full time basis for a given period of time. In fact a distinction is made between voluntary service and "volunteering", which can be on an ad hoc basis for a few hours a week while remaining a student, worker or whatever other socio-professional category (for a definition of "voluntary service" and "volunteering" refer to the website of our partner AVSO: http://www.avso.org/voluntary/voluntary_general.html).
CCIVS specifically represents international voluntary service (IVS). IVS projects involve 3 major stakeholders: a national organisation, a local partner, and international volunteers. Each of them has its specific area of work and involvement, from international to local level.
Projects can be sub divided with regards to their duration:
- short term projects or workcamps
- medium or long term projects or individual placements
Short term volunteer projects (or STV):
The most common form of STV projects are so-called international workcamps. They usually bring groups
together 10 to 20 people from different countries and of different backgrounds, who will live and work together while working on a local non profit making project for a duration of two to four weeks.
Workcamps can have a special theme and include some discussions or side events, but the main feature is the idea of people developing their own cultural microcosm while concretely learning to live together. The group may be assisted in terms of board and lodging, work program and general frame of the project but the basic idea is that they have to organise their daily life, work and leisure time together and thus overcome cultural barriers and stereotypes. Workcamps usually have a camp leader or coordinator and may have a local correspondent or technical advisor depending on the project.
In the case of a typical international workcamp the volunteers arrive individually from their respective sending organisations and the group is constituted once the project begins on the spot.
Medium term and Long term volunteer projects (MTV and LTV):
MTV projects usually are defined as projects lasting between 1 to 3 months and LTV projects are projects beyond this duration rarely exceeding 1 year. Most of the time they are individual placements. This means that one person is sent from a sending organisation into a project defined by a host organisation. CCIVS members usually don not require any specific professional skills from volunteers; the idea is to integrate the volunteer into a project, which is useful for the local stakeholders but requires a certain amount of flexibility from the local host as well in order to integrate the specific profile and capacities of the volunteer.
Several CCIVS members use the European Commission's Youth in Action Programme to host and send volunteers under the age of 30 in the frame of a European Voluntary Service or EVS. An EVS usually lasts between 6 and 12 months but can also be shorter. For more information about the EVS programme please visit: http://ec.europa.eu/youth/youth-in-action-programme/doc82_en.htm
Projects can also be subdivided with regards to the area of work or theme they are touching
Some "typical" areas of work include:
- Social projects with children, elderly people or any kind of public with fewer opportunities (examples),
- Environmental projects involving simple manual reparation work or awareness raising campaigns (examples),
- Re-construction projects of public infrastructure like schools or wells. Such projects are often based in countries of the global south (examples),
- Preservation of cultural heritage (examples).
Please also refer to the Training Kit Nr. 5 on Voluntary Service of the Council of Europe for a more in depth definition and background about voluntary service projects: http://www.youth-partnership.net/youth-partnership/publications/T-kits/T_kits
In recent years organisations have developed more and more new and innovative approaches to projects in terms of duration and theme. Weekend workcamps for returned volunteers in their home country in order to involve them more with their sending organisation, group projects, where groups are constituted before departure and travel together, projects reserved for families from different countries or projects focussing on senior volunteers.
