Project Environment
Schloss Haus is situated in Wartberg ob der Aist, small but well developed. The institution is rigth in front of the bus stop- where are good bus connections to Linz (only 25 km far away), the capital of the region. Wartberg is a rural municipality with about 4000 inhabitants. There are some food shops, bakeries, tobacconists`and drug stores.More possibilities for shopping and cultural possibilities are given through the near distanceto the capital of the region (Linz). More about Wartberg ob der Aist at http://www.wartberg-aist.at
Proposed Activities:
We will offer him/her the chance to have an insight into the structure of a governmental social organisation. We´d like to give him/her the opportunity to collect knowledge and experiences as much as possible with hosting him/her in our organisation through the European YOUTH IN ACTION Programme.
The volunteer will get insight in different areas in the institute, and will therefore learn more about the following areas:
Creative structure (different workshops with ateliers, music workshops, handicrafts as pottery / knitting/ painting….) ...most of the workshops are very creative and the most important thing is that the volunteer is there with the clients and try to help them, and by the same moment learning about the situation and the support of people with handicaps and their daily activities and possibilities for occupation..
We want to have european volunteers to promote the european input in our organisation, and to give our clients (especially those who can`t leave the building anymore) the chance and opportunity to have contact to peple from abroad, so that they can fresh up and widen their horizon through discussions, meetings, plays and cultural exchanges. This could happen though a presentation of typical music from the volunteers country, singing together typical songs, cooking typical food, making a picture collage from the volunteers home country, and the exchange of cultural habits…
Some of the clients are from the "war-generation", and due to their war operation, they still know some words from a foreign language; this freshing up and widening of the foreign vocabulary would be a great chance for intercultural memory training!
Not only the communication with the clients would be an enrichment for the EVS volunteers, as there are several young austrian volunteers and staff members; so it will be easy for the EVS volunteers to get in touch with real austrian people, customs, mentality, language and much more!
Furthermore we want to offer the EVS volunteers our several cultural activities; where we celebrate different cultural customs, celebrating the circle of a year…so that they get a real insight in our culture, what would help them a lot to understand Austrians. So, through this EVS project we hope that we can contribute to minimize prejudice and fear of contacts, offering intercultural learning and communication on both sides!
The volunteer should assist in several and different areas of the creative-sturcture ( if they wish they can get insight into the area of personal care too). As already mentioned the creative structure offers a big variety of different workshops, ateliers, activity and possibilities for occupation, and the daily programme differes from one workshop/atelier and group to the other.
Possible tasks of the volunteer could be as following:
Meeting with clients and exchange through common activities; so it would be rather easy and quick for the clients with mental handicaps to open barriers, start conversation, building relationships and to join this intercultural society; and that`s the basic for intercultural exchange.
So possible different tasks for each volunteer are:
Joint preparations and draw up of different handicrafts and handwork (knitting, sewing, know carpets); Guide clients to draw and paint on wood, and to prepare together wooden plays or presents; Pottery: Support of the manual ability and the conscious feeling of different raw materials - to express inner feeling; Singing and motion plays with music; making music together with typical musical instruments for handicapped people or from the country of the volunteer; sign language (the volunteers gets the opportunity to learn more about sign language and its use); company to excursions, holidays and cultural events (so it would be possible for the volunteer to see more from Austria too); preparations for the different festivals during a year (so the volunteer will learn more about our cultural habbits); organisation and realisation of different cultural events from the volunteers country; making and presenting his/her country with photo exhibitions; discusssions with the clients for minimizing the relation deficits of some clients; society games; walking and shopping with the clients; cooking and tasting different meals; input of different ideas from the volunteer! So, the options to create a personal project are really big and just up to the volunteer!!
We are open and happy about any idea and initiatives that are coming from the EVS volunteer, and we will try to support every idea and do our best to realize his/her ideas.

Volunteers Profile
We would be happy to receive a volunteer who has a stable personality,maturity, open mind and tolerance. German basics would help a lot in this project. Motivation for working with elderly and handicapped people is a necessity.
The coordination Organisation (Verein 4YOUgend) will inform about vacant EVS places through different "channels", networks and already good working networks…..but are always open for "new" partners….We select volunteers together with the workers from our projects. Together we want to make sure that the volunteer has motivation to come our project and also that we have enough support to give to volunteer.

It is important that the volunteer expresses his/her real motivation on the topic of the project, and not just telling that he/she wants to go to Austria…we will check and cooperate close with the sending organisation to be sure, that the applicant fully understands the meaning of the project!
Another important fact is to be sure that the volunteer will understand that the project is not in a city centre but in the country side!!!

Risk Prevention:
The contact person in the project for the volunteer has already a lot of experience for looking after EVS volunteers; and there will also be a network of all the people with whom the volunteer is working with; so that we can check from different sides that the volunteer is feeling well!
We would like to be sure, that our volunteer have safe feeling during whole project and that is why it is important to cooperate with sending organisation all the time. That is why the volunteer have also a mentor and working group who can help him/her in every situation. If there is some crisis during the project, we start to solve them together. There won't be any situations, that the crisis won't be solve somehow.
It also very important to have strong ans honest cooperation between sending and hosting organisation. That will guarantee that volunteer have big support from both sides.

http://ec.europa.eu/youth/evs/aod/hei_form_en.cfm?EID=32000282001