A. Project environment:

We are a catholic organisation. The aim of our activity is to help people in need. Among others, we work with children and youth from families with social and financial problems.
We have four centres where we organize different activities for those kids, trying to show them various possibilities of spending free time, to help them to use and develop their potential, and - what is the most important - prevent them from drugs, alcohol and delinquency. Apart from that, in the summer time we organize camps for children and youth from poor families living in our city or nearby.
The three centres mentioned above are situated in Gdañsk (Danzig) and are for children (5-16 years old). It is opened every day from Monday to Friday from 8.00 a.m. till 4 p.m. The other one is in Sopot and other young people between 14 and 19 years. There are two groups of 12 people each. Each group meets every day for two hours - from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. one group and from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. the other.
Both cities, where we have our centres, are the part of so called "Tricity" (Gdañsk-Sopot-Gdynia) situated in the north of Poland at the Baltic Sea. Gdañsk is one of the oldest city in our country (over 1000 years) and Sopot is a famous tourist centre. Many people from different countries come here every year. The communication (transport) in all the three cities and between them is very good, so moving from one place to another is not a problem.
Volunteers will live in a flat specially rented for them and fully living up to their needs. There they will have all the possibilities to live and cook on their own.

B. Proposed activities for EVS volunteers:

The volunteer will organise, together with the group leaders working in the centres, different activities for children and youth. She or he will participate in both - preparing the programme and its realization. There are two reasons for that. The first thing is the bigger variety of activities offered to a volunteer. She or he will have the opportunity to work with children and teenagers of different age. Thanks to that they will never get bored doing the same thing all the time and meeting the same people everyday. They will also have a chance to choose what is best and most interesting for them.
We have various kinds of activities in our centres. An important part is photography. We have a small photographic studio where we develop the photos that we take. We are organising an exhibition of our photos. It takes place in the City Council in Sopot and all the citizens could come and see the photos.
Apart from photography we help the children and young people, who come to our centres, in their homework. Most of them have a lot of difficulties at school. The biggest problem are usually such subjects as mathematics, physics, chemistry and foreign languages. The volunteers could be very helpful - especially with the last one ?
We also do a lot of things connected with sport - recently sailing is number one! We have a contract with the Yacht Club in Sopot and during the season (from May till September) we help them. In one of centres in Gdañsk we have a large gymnasium with a climbing wall.
We would like our volunteer to help us in all those kinds of activities. At the same time we are open for their own suggestion and ideas. We are especially interested in things connected with their culture - national dances, songs, food and games for children typical for the country the volunteer comes from. For a few months we have been organising some cooking activities in our centres and both - children and youth - enjoy it a lot. There are also some people especially interested in music. Some of them started to learn how to play the guitar and they would like to continue. Others, especially the girls, love dancing. Anyway, there are a lot of possibilities for a volunteer to share his or her interests and hobbies with our children and youth. The last thing is summer holidays. At that time the volunteer will have the opportunity to take part in different camps for children and youth - as an assistant of a group leader or a person responsible for sport and/or music activities. We go on a different kind of camps as stationery camps with children, walking tours with youth, canoe camps and of course we use the yachts of The Yacht Club and sail on the sea.

C. Volunteer profiles and recruitment process:

Our volunteer should be an active, open-minded and creative person, who likes to work with children and youth and who knows how to get into touch with them (or at least is not afraid of that).
We are especially interested in people who have something in common with photography (we have got a small photographic studio in one of our centres) or/and sailing (we also cooperate with a yacht club in Sopot and during the sailing season we can use some of their yachts).
Such interests as sport, music, dance or any other kind of passion with which You can infect young people are also appreciated.
The information about free places in the project will be given to everyone interested in. Sending Organisation will also participate in the process. During the process Sending and Hosting Organisations will exchange their expectations, questions, doubts and will share with all the information about the establishments, work organisation or just about the realisation of the project. Choosing volunteers is extremely important thing for the establishments so we particularly pay attention to the motivation of the volunteer than to his or her qualifications. We are really keen on people who are truly interested in OUR project and are ready to active involvement in it. Moreover, we will not only concentrate on the qualifications or the experience of the candidate in working with children and youth but also, what we especially look for, the interests and wish to gain new experiences.
Although we are a catholic organisation, the religion of the volunteer does not matter. We are open for people of different faith.

D. Risk prevention, protection and safety:

During the project realization preventing from conflict situations is an incredibly important thing because goodness of each person is essential for us. Not to let such a situation occur, as a Hosting and Coordinating Organization, we take on many different verbal and nonverbal activities to make the work pleasant and peaceful for everybody taking part in the project. Extremely important thing seems to be choosing supervisors for the volunteers very conscientiously, especially looking for his or her fluent communication with others. The supervisor, as a detached person who is not involved in the project, can be invited as a help to solve some conflicts concerning the volunteer.