The wave effect: The power of volunteering

“The wave effect: The power of volunteering” is an 8 months EVS project that will be implemented in Cagliari (Italy) by the youth association TDM 2000 and will involve 4 young volunteers coming from Hungary, Serbia, Ukraine and Portugal. x
The project aim is to encourage the inclusion and intercultural dialogue and support active participation of young people through 3 main activities that will involve members of the local communities of the hosting organization.
In the activity “International Summer Week 2018” the volunteers will support the association in the organization of one of the biggest intercultural festival in the Mediterranean area. The event gathers every year more than 150 persons from all over the world, fostering the intercultural dialogue and stimulating the encounter between different realities, cultures and lifestyles promoting tolerance, respect and personal growth and favor the overcome of stereotypes through the understanding of other cultures.
In the activity “Creating Solidarity” the volunteers will work in activities for the promotion of cultural diversity and tolerance and they will present their own culture, emphasizing the importance of preserve cultural differences and diversity and the importance of the acceptance of both self and others, for a peaceful and democratic coexistence in our island, that is now more than ever crossroad of cultures and welcome country for the Mediterranean people. The target groups will be youth from immigrant communities and local youngsters which are not exposed to the cultural exchange and which are more and more involved in acts of racism and exclusion.
In the activity “Shape your mobility” the young volunteers will support the Association TDM 2000 in the informative activities for local youngsters about mobility and non-formal education opportunities provided by the European Union, through thematic workshops and meeting. The events and workshops will be organized at regional level in order to reach also young immigrants and young people with fewer opportunities, which will be informed in order to actively participate in the European mobility opportunities dedicated to them.

The activities are designed to help the volunteers to develop transversal competences essential for their personal and professional future.
The volunteers, thanks to their participation at the informative activities organized by our association, will inspire the local youngsters, with their positive attitude, and they will promote the voluntary work as tool for the social and personal empowerment. The fact that our awareness and informative activities are organized with the cooperation of EVS volunteers increase enormously the overall impact and
their contributions and witness, like a wave, lead to a change of behaviors and attitudes in the youngsters with whom they enter into contact.

The project objectives are:
– Support the personal development of the young people that participate in  our activities, increasing their awareness about the importance of active citizenship;
– Provide to youngsters tools to extend their experiences and personal and professional competences;
– Foster youth cooperation, making them more aware about their key role in the construction of a multicultural and inclusive Europe;
– Spread the European program opportunities as tool of international mobility essential for the intercultural learning and to encourage the active participation.

These objectives are perfectly integrated with the Erasmus+ priorities and Europe 2020 strategies and are linked with needs-asses in our community in this delicate historical moment.
Through the three main activities described above and the cooperation of the volunteers in the daily actions of the hosting organization, the project will have a big impact in the local community and in the volunteers, which will develop experiences and gain new competencies through the voluntary service and the work in a dynamic and multicultural environment that encourages the cooperation and the exchange of ideas.
The visibility of the project results will be ensured by the synergic work of the 5 organizations involved in this project, and through the use of multimedia tools and the dissemination of the materials created during the whole project, the impact will be extended also in the Partners’ communities.

Volunteers’ profile
– Age between 18 to 30 years;
– Volunteers need to have a genuine interest in social work, social inclusion, and carrying for the children and be willing to learn and expand their skills on these issues;
– Video and graphic skills;
– Previous experience in the third sector;
– Active, open-minded, creative, innovative, responsible and motivated;
– Basic level of English (being able to make herself/himself understood by the others – able to communicate);
– A great deal of resilience;
– Flexible and non-judgmental approach to people and work;
– An understanding of appropriate technical equipment and relevant editing software;
– Interpersonal, communication, research skills;
– Creativity and the ability to think outside the box;
– Problem-solving and organizational skills;
– The ability to prioritize your workload and to work with strict deadlines;
– Analytical skills and ability to absorb, extract and present information in a clear and understandable way;
– An interest in people/building rapport, able to handle inter-actions with sensitivity, empathy and diplomacy.