VolunTEAMing!

What is VolunTEAMing?

This project was developed in partnership of Sherborne Douzelage, with the Volunteer Centre Dorset, the Gryphon School, and Sherborne Area Partnership in response to European Year of Volunteering. It involves people from the eight towns of Chojna, Poland; Holstebro, Denmark; Köszeg, Hungary; Marsaskala, Malta; Prienai, Lithuania; Sherborne, United Kingdom; Siret, Romania; Tryavna, Bulgaria.

The Main Aims

• Share experiences of volunteering in different countries and learn from their best practices, including showcasing Sherborne and Dorset best practices.
• Provide towns and voluntary organisations with knowledge, ideas, techniques and access to information on how to set up or enhance Volunteering Programmes with funding from U.K. and Europe.
• Provide opportunities to network across the voluntary sector and thereby generates a greater return on resources. This includes Web Site and DVD creation also.

Events

The programme consists of three events which consist of working discussions, exhibitions and site visits involving many local organisations:

1. a youth workshop 14 – 21 August 2011 for young people aged 16 – 20 plus leaders
2. a workshop for adults and leaders of voluntary bodies 3-7 November 2011
3. a conference for Civic Leaders 3-7 May 2012

Each event cascades to the next which builds on the findings and recommendations of the previous ones.

Follow up

Follow up can be maintained through this website, as well as reference to the downloadable reports, DVD’s etc, from this site. Monitoring will take place through the Douzelage General Meeting.

Funding

The activity has been funded by the Europe for Citizens Programme, ref. 514933-EFC-1-2011-1-UK-EFC-NTT, and West Dorset District Council, the generosity of local businesses and the participants and their Douzelage member towns.

Conclusions from the Youth Workshop

The most important individual conclusions reached by the group were as below. More detailed conclusions can be found in the report of the workshop.

• Volunteering is not just for gain, but for giving to others
• Without team work nothing would happen
• Volunteering builds experience and improves communication
• When no one supports us we do not give up
• We can learn a lot from other countries volunteering experiences
• Volunteering is not just for self but also for the community
• We can take the first steps and do not have to wait for others
• Volunteering helps us gain confidence, create self esteem and build self development

Long Term Benefits

We believe that this project will benefit people across Europe. Different ideas of volunteering could also help Local Authorities save money, increase social cohesiveness and foster more inclusive activities in their communities.