Description (EN): Volunteering is more than helping somebody else; it’s an education for life, a way of living and an activity with an important world impact. Volunteering offers young people the chance to engage in various activities, to create new opportunities for themselves, encourages diversity and equality, creating new friendships, etc. Volunteering is creating responsibility, increases the potential of an individual or the group by creating real values.
The project will develop the volunteering spirit especially within young people (students in high schools, 15-19 years old) through the following mechanisms:
1.Education for life - by completing the education received in school and family, developing self-knowledge and the desire to learn, developing the will to explore and to discover;
2. Experience in leadership – offering the young people the opportunity to develop leadership abilities and to put them in practice because the volunteering activities are made in group activities and this will offer every individual the possibility to coordinate a group;
3.A way of life – by the principle that are at the core of a volunteer (spiritual, social and personal) you can learn to respect you responsibilities by day to day and become an involved person;
4.Fun with a purpose – though recreation volunteering manages to help young people to achieve their goals in their development (physical, intellectual, social and spiritual). Volunteering contributes to the development of self-esteem, abilities to learn, leadership, team building, adventure and fun. Volunteers learn how to do better choices and to assume responsibility for their actions, in this way they will be better prepared for life.
5.Chalenges for adults –by offering the chance to help the youth, adults have a chance to increase the relationship between generations and really be involved in the development of young people. The adults will be, in their own way, in an ongoing process of personal development through their education and their experiences among the young volunteers.
Specific objectives:
1.Create cabinets in high schools with specific equipment;
2.Training sessions for the teachers;
3.Develop a volunteering community (web platform);
4.Raise awareness in the field of efficient risk prevention and management
The project expected results are: (1) 2 new cabinets from each high school will be equipped in order for the volunteers to learn and practice different measures of intervening in case of emergencies. For the cabinets the necessary equipment will be procured: mannequins, stretcher, medical equipment for learning (masks, manual ventilation, cervical collar, splint, etc.), first aid kit for learning, video projector and interactive smartboard, furniture; Teachers will be trained in order to be able to teach the volunteers; (2) 2 joint partnerships in the field of joint early warning and emergency response with public authorities (1 in Romania and 1 in Bulgaria); (3) One web platform that will host the young volunteer community. The web platform will contain all the documents of the projects, instructions on emergency situation, pictures and information about the organized events and a forum where the volunteers can organize and exchange information in order to better coordinate.; (4) 4 volunteering campaign organized in the eligible area of the programme, Calarasi/Silistra region: 2 pilot actions will be organized in Romania and 2 pilot actions will be organized in Bulgaria (3 days each).
The project budget of 348.921 euro will be invested in technical equipment for the cabinets (mannequins, stretcher, medical equipment for learning (masks, manual ventilation, cervical collar, splint, etc.), first aid kit for learning, video projector and projector screen, furniture.), services for creating the web-portal and services for organizing the pilot actions, training services for the teachers, organizing events and information and publicity services.
The relevance of the project in the programme context is given by its contribution to the programme output indicators: around 17538 people from 2 high schools and 2 NGOs benefiting from flood protection measures covering minim 3,15% of the programme output indicator for this call for proposals (I16), around 17538 people from 2 high schools and 2 NGOs benefiting from forest fire protection measures covering minim 2,47% of the programme output indicator for this call for proposals (I17) and 2 joint partnerships in the field of joint early warning and emergency response developed covering 4,88% of the programme output indicator for this call for proposals (I18). The project budget, 348.921 euro, in comparison with the financial indicator for PA3 represents only 2,61% from the output indicator for this call for proposals (I19).
The concept of volunteering is not an original one in the European Union. For example The Erasmus + Programme has a distinct section called European Voluntary Service where young people can register a volunteer in different areas. There are a lot of initiatives in Europe and at a global level for volunteering, especially for helping people in need in very poor regions like Africa or South America (www.youthpass.eu , http://europeanvoluntaryservice.org/ , http://www.ve-global.org , http://www.atma.org.in , etc). These programmes are a big success and the large number of volunteers have a big impact at a global level and still has a good perspective for growth. Romania and Bulgaria have a low number of volunteers mainly because of the economic and social situations registered in both countries. Nevertheless, after joining the European Union the situation of both countries is improved and the volunteering programmes have a lot of perspective. The YoungVolunteer project aims to take advantage of these opportunities and create a strong volunteering community in both countries.
Read more Achievements (EN): The project implementation was finalized on 04.03.2020 and the following objectives have been achieved:
- B3 - Theoretical High school “Mihai Eminescu” (RO) and B4 - “High school “Vasil Levski” Bulgaria have established and equipped two Emergency cabinets for first aid at their premises, which were equipped with mannequins, stretchers, medical equipment for learning: masks, manual ventilation, cervical collar, splint, blood pressure monitor, blood glucose test and first aid kit for learning. Both cabinets are operational and used by the school students for the training courses of using the equipment.
- 2 joint partnerships in the field of joint early warning and emergency response with public authorities (1 in Romania and 1 in Bulgaria) were established - the first partnership from Romania is signed between LB, B3 and Calarasi Emergency Situation Inspectorate and Red Cross Calarasi and the second the partnership from Bulgaria is signed between B2, B4 and Fire Safety and Civil Department Silistra and Red Cross Silistra;
- A project web platform has been developed that hosts an established young volunteer community and can be found on https://www.youngvolunteer.eu/ ;
- 793 people (students and teachers) have participated in 4 Pilot Volunteer campaigns - 2 pilot actions were organized in Calarasi, Romania and 2 pilot actions were organized in Glavinitsa, Bulgaria (4 days each);
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Expected Outputs (EN): The project is proposing an exchange of experience and knowledge, including raising awareness in the field of efficient risk prevention and management in the cross-border area (including training and learning programmes, community-based training initiatives, information sheets, brochures about natural and anthropic hazards) targeted at specific target groups (children/youth, development planners, emergency managers, local government officials etc.).
The project is proposing a contribution to the achievement of programme result indicator with the following outputs:
Joint partnerships created in the field of joint early warning and emergency response;
Awareness raising campaigns for the cross-border population on the hazards and risk and on the measures for their mitigation, management, reduction;
Exchanges of experiences.
The relevance of the project in the programme context is given by its contribution to the programme output indicators:around 17538 people from 2 high schools and 2 NGOs benefiting from flood protection measures covering minim 3,15% of the programme output indicator for this call for proposals (I16), around 17538 people from 2 high schools and 2 NGOs benefiting from forest fire protection measures covering minim 2,47% of the programme output indicator for this call for proposals (I17) and 2 joint partnerships in the field of joint early warning and emergency response developed covering 4,88% of the programme output indicator for this call for proposals (I18). The project budget, 348.921 euro, in comparison with the financial indicator for PA3 represents only 2,61% from the output indicator for this call for proposals (I19) and reported to the programme output indicator is 0,85%.
The volunteering community will be formed out of students with ages between 15 to 19, teachers, parents and friends/relatives. We estimate that each high school from Romanian and Bulgarian will gather at least 5000 volunteers during the project implementation and the monitoring period of 5 years.
The volunteers from each high school will be: around 1800 students (800 students during school year 2017/2018, grades 9-12 and 1000 students from the next generations that will follow), around 200 teachers with families, around 2000 students from other high schools that will be involved in the pilot actions, young people that are the friends or relatives of the students and around 1000 parents that want to support their children and participate together with them in different programmes.
The total number of volunteers generated directly by the high schools will be 5000 x 2 high schools = 10000 volunteers.
It’s estimated that at least a number of 7538 of persons will benefit from the activities of the volunteering community and by the results of the project activities: pilot actions, web portal, information and publicity materials, press conference, technical equipment for the cabinets, etc.
The total number of population benefiting from measures for emergency situations will be of minimum 17538 persons during the project implementation (18 months) and the monitoring period (5 years).
In order to attract the number of volunteers mentioned above the project proposes 4 volunteering campaigns (3 days each) that will be organized involving Romanian and Bulgarian young people/teachers/parents, 2 on the Romanian and 2 on the Bulgarian side of the Danube.
A minimum number of 80 volunteers will be accommodated in Romania from the Bulgarian High School: 80 participants/campaign X 2 campaigns organized in RO X 2 nights = 320 overnights.
A minimum number of 80 volunteers will be accommodated in Bulgaria from the Romanian High School: 80 participants/campaign X 2 campaigns organized in BG X 2 nights = 320 overnights.
The project beneficiaries will ensure all facilities for the young people.
in order for them to practice volunteering (catering, transport, equipment, etc).
The volunteering platform will remain active in the high schools and will be promoted generation after generation. The Young Volunteers will graduate high schools with same very important life lessons and will be able to deal with any emergency situations or help somebody in need.
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