Sharing experience

Hard facts:

May 26 - July 5, 2008

• 81 volunteers
• from 14 countries
• 23 sending organisations

Volunteering in:

• Salzburg: Fanzone (35), Youth Zone (15) , Fan Embassy (6)
• Vienna: Youth Centers Vienna (15), wienXtra Youth Information Center (5)

On-Arrival Training in Obertauern: May 26-June 2, 08
Evaluation Training in Vienna (Tulln): July 2-5, 08

This worked well:

• On-Arrival Training: we had an excellent team of trainers (from Austria, Italy, Spain and Serbia) who prepared the volunteers well. Obertauern prooved to be a good location (in the mountains of Salzburg) to get to know each other and be away from the hectic city life.
• Group effect within the volunteers: both groups (Vienna/Salzburg) became a strong team throughout these weeks, they look out for each other, support each other, get to know their cultures and much more.
• Getting to know local sights/impressions: both cites offered "free time activities" to get to know the sights/surroundings of Salzburg/Vienna.
• Coordination between Akzente and Grenzenlos: both organisations are well experienced with EVS since many years and were able to support the volunteers professionally.
• Projects, which were organized in smaller teams.

Here were the challenges:

• Projects, which were organized in big teams (e.g. volunteers of the Fanzone in Salzburg): the coordination experienced difficulties, in particular linked to the intercultural differencies.
• Challenges concerning housing (Vienna) and food (special diets).

Main learning:

It’s great to have the opportunity to do Group EVS at big events like the EURO 2008, but preparation for this kind of Group EVS needs to be done quite differently from "individual long term" EVS, since practicalities, but also learning opportunities have to be envisaged in a different way by the organizers and the volunteers. 

Please see further documentation on www.eurovol.at !