“Perhaps travel cannot prevent bigotry, but by demonstrating that all peoples cry, laugh, eat, worry, and die, it can introduce the idea that if we try and understand each other, we may even become friends.”

Maya Angelou

Community Link is now a sending, hosting and coordinating body in the UK for the European Voluntary Service (EVS). This means that if you’re under 30, and live in Europe, we can apply for funding for you to volunteer with us, or with any other European or partner country host organisation.

What is European Voluntary Service (EVS)?

The European Voluntary Service (EVS) is part of the YOUTH programme, a European Union programme that promotes the mobility of young people through international activities with a non-formal education dimension such as youth exchanges, voluntary services, youth initiatives and training of youth workers. EVS offers young people the opportunity to volunteer in another country, normally for a period of six to twelve months. A wide variety of placements can be found in the social, cultural, environmental, and sports sector. Shorter placements of three weeks to six months are available to young people with fewer opportunities or special needs. Each project has three partners, a volunteer, a sending organisation and a host organisation. EVS provides the funding to cover the volunteer’s costs.

Voluntary activities should:

• Take place in another country, be non-profit making, unpaid and not involve job-substitution
• Last for a specified period of time (normally a maximum of twelve months)
• Be planned, implemented and followed up as a partnership between a volunteer, their Sending and their Host Organisation

Where can you volunteer under EVS?

EVS projects can take place in both Programme Countries and Partner Countries. Programme Countries include the Member States of the European Union, the EFTA/EEA countries and pre-accession countries. Some EVS projects can take place in partner regions of the European Union. These are Mediterranean partner countries, Eastern Europe and the Caucasus region, South Eastern Europea (SEE), and Latin America. At least one of the countries involved in a project (either the sending country, where the volunteer is from, or the host country, where the volunteer is going) must be a programme country.

Countries Involved

The Programme Countries are:

• The 27 EU Member States, the European Economic Area (Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway) and Turkey.

The Neighbouring Partner Countries are:

• South East Europe: Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Former Republic of Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia.
• Eastern Europe and Caucasus: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Moldova, Russian Federation, Ukraine.
• Mediterranean Partner Countries: Algeria, Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, Palestinian Authority of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, Syria, Tunisia.

Other Partner Countries, under the ‘Countries of the World’ programme, include:

• Latin America, Africa and the Pacific and Caribbean countries and Asia.

There is more funding available to volunteer within a programme country.

What costs does EVS cover for you as a volunteer?

• Your international travel - covers reasonable travel costs from your home to the host organisation, reimbursed at the end of the project. Available only when you use the cheapest available train or plane ticket (e.g. discount air ticket, or equivalent). A copy of the ticket(s) must be attached to the final report.
• Exceptional volunteer costs - any reasonable and justifiable costs related to the special needs of the volunteer (medical attendance, additional preparation, etc).
• A volunteer’s allowance, fixed per host country, and paid in full to the host organisation to be given to the volunteer weekly or monthly; usually around £50 per month.
• Your accommodation and food costs
• Insurance - all volunteers are insured against sickness, accidents, permanent invalidity, and repatriation in case of serious illness, accident, and death. The insurance also covers civil liability.

What should you do to become a volunteer?

• Volunteering can help you, by acting as your sending organisation if you live in the UK and want to volunteer anywhere abroad. Click here to email us for more information or to apply to become an EVS volunteer.
• If you live in the UK, and want to volunteer abroad, we can act as your sending organisation. Together we can consult the database of approved host placements to find something that suits you, or suggest partner organisations that we’ve worked with before, and apply for the funding you’ll need.
• If you don’t live in the UK, and you want to volunteer with an organisation other than or in a country other than the UK, then click here to visit the EVS website for more information, click here to see a list of the National Agencies; the National Agency for your country can suggest a sending organisation for you. If you’re having trouble finding the information you need, click here to email the Europe SOS Volunteer Helpdesk.
• If you have any other questions please just email us for more information!

European Voluntary Service is a part of the European Commission YOUTH in Action Program (2007-2013)