Project environment
We are a youth centre in the city of Waidhofen/Ybbs in Loweraustria, Austria.

Our organization is a part of the local government. The local government is financing our youth centre. We are a non profit organization.

Our opening hours are Tuesday to Thursday from 16.00 until 20.30 pm and Friday from 16.00 until 21.30 pm, these hours are our main working hours. At this time the youth centre is open for all young people to spend their leisure time there. Within these hours we offer different activities like games, internet, music, sports, art-workshops, etc.

We can also provide information on several topics, like parents, law, sexuality, drugs, school, etc. and we are a counselling centre for young people. In case we can accompany our clients to different authorities.
Overall it is a meeting point for young people aged between 13 and 21 years. All our services are for free.

We are two Sozialworkers employed for the youth center and a artist making weekly art-workshops. Once a week we meet for a teamconference to exchange ideas and arrange new things. Other works we do off the opening time are make plans, budget, organise, advertise, reflect, etc..


Waidhofen/Ybbs is a city in Lower Austria about 150 kilometres west from Vienna.
It has about 7.000 inhabitants and a lot of schools for a little town that are visited by young people from the region. It is situated in a rural countryside between flat regions beside the Danube in the north, and the mountains of the beginning Alps in the south.
In Waidhofen/Ybbs you can find a lot of possibilities of making sports, enjoy the nature and discover a beautiful landscape in the centre of Austria, traditional and modern too.
Infos at www.waidhofen.at

The aim of the EVS project is to increase our activities for young people, to bring in an "intercultural dimension" to our daily work, to broaden the horizon of the team and our visitors and to support our clients on their way to become adults.
  
 
Tasks
Motivation:

Our Motivation to host international volunteers are:
" To develop a common understanding for different countries and cultures.
" Our youngsters should learn, that they are an active part of the European Union
" Our youngsters should learn more about different countries and cultures and they should get more information about the EU and their possibilities especially the YOUTH Programme like EVS

Activities:

The activities are to help us in our daily work, giving advice to young people, organizing different activities like little football matches, sports events, workshops on different topics, providing information and/or just to be there for them.

Very important is to get in contact with the young people and to build a confident relation, for example with activities like tabletennis, play cards, tablesoccer, darts or have a good talk. We would like the volunteer to participate in our daily work with young people.

She/he will be present 4 days a week in our youth centre to assist in our daily work and carry out different activities with our visitors. For Example helping on our little bar to serve antialk-drinks, play games, make sports or artwork and be there for our visitors to have an open ear for there thoughts, ideas and troubles. Of course we also have to look for a fair live together and a good atmosphere.

Furthermore the volunteer should help to plan and organise events, like little football matches other sport events, trips, workshops and so on. She/he should help in the office-work. She will participate in our weekly team meetings, where we discuss and reflect our work. She/he is invited to bring in some new ideas we can offer.

Especially in this context we are looking forward for activities and events in an intercultural dimension like show impressions of the visitors home country, cook special dishes, here local music, try foreign customs. To face up with other European countries, their culture and their way of Cosmopolitan environment and prevent anti-foreignism. But not only in special events, also in the daily communication, our visitors, we ourselves and the volunteer will experience with the geographic differences and equalities.

A typical day could be like this:

10.00 - 12.00 am: organising and preparation for activities
Lunch break - time for team discussions, developing new ideas,…
15.00 - 15.30 pm: preparation for the opening hours
15.30 - 20.00 pm: Opening Hours: have a look what´s going on, help at the bar, play and talk, accomplish the prepared activities
20.00 - 20.30 pm: finish up, statistics, reflection

There will be a close cooperation with the nearby Youth Consulting Service "JUSY - Jugendservice Ybbstal", where another volunteer will be positioned. In Agreement with the volunteers you will work together. In fact you will have quite a flexible working time beside the Opening Hours with in all about 30 hours a week.

Holidays: The volunteer has 24 days (in 12 month) on her/his disposal. We will arrange the holiday periods according to the volunteer´s desires and the possibilities in the youth centre.


  
Target group
The volunteer should like to work and to talk with young people (between 13 to 19 years), even if they are not the easiest to handle with.
She/He should be opened minded and socialize easily.
The volunteer should be able to work in a team and acknowledge orders
Special needs
Our team (social workers) will spend much as time with the volunteer as necessary. We will discuss this with the volunteer and the sending organisation before starting the project. Furthermore we are able to organise support for spezial needs (like dietary and so on)

Due our permises to the location and architectural design we regret that we could not take on young persons with serious mobility problems. Volunteers with fewer mobility problems, for example who are able to walk on stairs, are welcome.