A. Context of the project: Description of the organization, usual activities, and the local community that the activities are held

Host Organization: Compagnons Batisseurs asbl is a non-profit organization created in 1953. It is recognized as a youth organization by the ministry from the French Community of Belgium. This association proposes different kinds of voluntary activities to youngsters: leisure activities for and with disabled people, work camps in Belgium and abroad (during week ends and during the summer), short, medium and long term voluntary services.

All our activities aim to help the young people to develop their abilities in order they integrate actively the society as responsible citizens. The realisation of these activities would not be possible without the participation of a network of 350 Belgian volunteers, 100 volunteers from abroad during summer holidays and team of 4 employees.

The EVS volunteer will be implied in the activities of accompaniment of lightly handicapped people. Currently, we organize 6 weekends of accompaniment during the year. Moreover, during the holidays, a ten-day trip is organized in Belgium with international volunteers who look after the handicapped people. The other ten-day trip is organized in abroad. The volunteer will take place in these activities.

Context of the project: The organization of leisure-time, during the weekend or holiday camps, for lightly mentally handicapped people for three aims:

• To make young volunteers discover the world of the mentally handicapped people by leading them to take an active part in the weekend or the holiday trips.

• To relieve the parents of mentally handicapped adults for one weekend or a longer period during the holidays by looking after their child.

• To propose mentally handicapped people diversity of animation and make them discover different qualities of the life in a festive and relaxed atmosphere.

Local Community: The social background of the handicapped people and volunteers is heterogeneous. Open-mindedness to any socio-economic difference is one of the proposed values during our activities. The volunteers come from different cities in Belgium and also in Europe. They are generally between 18 and 30 years-old. The handicapped people come from French Community in Belgium and Brussels. They are adults who are between 18 and 50 years-old.

Compagnons Bâtisseurs is located in Marche-en-Famenne, which is a city in the countryside with 16,000 residents. It is located 107km away from Brussels, the capital, 58 km from Liège, and 49 km from Namur. There is a train station which enables to reach Brussels in 2 hours; Namur and Liege in 1 hour. Moreover, the city is 360 km away from Paris, 117km from Luxemburg, and 187 km from Köln. The train takes you Paris in 4 hours and London in 5 hours. There are the buses in order to reach the small villages around.

The preparation period of all of the activities will be in Marche-en-Famenne but the activities take place in all over Belgium and abroad during holiday trips. The volunteer will have the possibility to visit other cities. By contacting our volunteers who come from different cities of Belgium, the volunteer will be able to visit Belgium during his/her free-time.

http://ec.europa.eu/youth/evs/aod/hei_form_en.cfm?EID=20000078201

Experience regarding EVS: Compagnons Bâtisseurs Association follows the EVS process since 1997. It is a sending, hosting and coordinating organization. Compagnons Bâtisseurs wants to continue in this way, promoting a European awareness to his public and increasing placements. Above all, we want to promote this opportunity to youth with fewer opportunities. We'd like to prepare them before their departure and to insure the follow-up during the project. It is also important for us to integrate this public to long-term projects in our country.

The life in community: The volunteer will have a community life during the weekend and the holiday trips with handicapped people. Within this framework, we ask the volunteers to take part in the common tasks, to respect all the members of the group and to have hygiene (in particular, not of consumption of substances).

Motivation: Our motivation is to sensitize the young people in the world of the handicap, to offer open-mindedness to the differences and discovery of the richness coming from this difference. To offer to the team a new point of view and the multicultural aspect by the arrival of a new volunteer coming from abroad. Another aspect of our motivation is to offer help to parents of young handicapped people in their search for external activities. That will make it possible to offer moments of relaxation, discovery and socialization for the young handicapped people.

Training opportunities: We will offer him the opportunity of being integrated into our training cycle of animators. This training will enable him to be sensitized with the management of group, the techniques of animation and the organization of activities. We will also offer him to observe and to be informed professionally by the coordinator of the weekend. This will enable him to understand better the attitudes of the handicapped people. The role of the volunteer in the organization will be initially to assist the coordinator and to be informed and then to transfer this information and experience to his personal project.

B. Activities suggested to the volunteers (international) with the explanatory notes

Activities suggested to the volunteers

General role and tasks for the volunteer: The work will be varied. The volunteer will be continuously supported so that he/she will play an active part in the project and participate fully. We present a description of the different aspects of the work below. They can be organised according to the skills, interests and abilities of the young volunteer.

The volunteer will assist the project leader during activities accompanying mentally handicapped adults (weekends and a 10-day trip)

• In the preparation: planning menus; searching for accommodation; organizing the logistics and planning cultural and sports activities as well as visits to specific tourist attractions

• During the activity: active participation in welcoming and looking after the group (including volunteers and disabled adults). This will involve implementing the activities identified in the preparation (activity planning, tasks for supervisors, meals and accommodation).

• In the evaluation: A meeting following the weekend (or trip) will be organised with the project leader to evaluate the strong and weak points of the weekend (or trip) and the changes that should be made for future trips. In order to keep parents as partners involved in the project, and bearing in mind the difficulties that the disabled adults have in reporting their experiences, the volunteer will need to transmit the main points of the weekend. In order to do this the volunteer will have the use a computer, a video camera, a camera… and his or her imagination.

The volunteer could also help us to develop our new projects, which include organizing weekends abroad for the disabled adults; and organising days and evenings for the disabled people who live nearby. These kinds of activities could include entertainment, local traditional festivals and new activities around.

Personel project: Within this defined project, the volunteer will have freedom to develop his own project.

C. Target group

The volunteer that we would like to accommodate within our organization has to have the following features:

- Interest in the world of the mentally handicapped people.

- Knowledge of French more than basic (none of the handicapped people expresses himself in a foreign language).

- Basic knowledge of the computer programs (Word, Excel, and Internet).