Six Months Or Longer Abroad
With ijgd you can also go abroad for a longer period of time. Usually our voluntary services abroad have a duration of 10 to 12 months, while the minimum amount of time spent abroad is six months.
Young people between the ages of 18 and 26 can take part in an international voluntary service for young people. They can work abroad in a social or cultural establishment for a year. Volunteers there will get involved in common welfare and thereby make intercultural, sociopolitical and personal experiences. The formation of a supporting initiative is necessary for the participation of the IJFD.
The European Voluntary Service (EVS) offers a chance for young adults between the age of 18 and 30 to become involved in social, cultural or ecological institutions in Europe. This programme is an initiative of the EU, put in place to promote solidarity, active European citizenship as well as a mutual understanding between young people.
"weltwärts" (world-bound) is a voluntary service concerned with development policies. This voluntary service is not a form of development aid, but rather a learning service giving young people an intercultural exchange and enabling insight into the interrelations between development policies. Young people aged 18 to 28 will receive an insight into global dependencies and inter-dependencies.
In the context of "weltwärts" as a voluntary service concerned with development policies, the ijgd also connects with deployment projects in Eastern Europe and Central Asia. The service usually lasts for 12 months. "weltwärts" aims to promote commitment for the "One World" through the support of deployment sites and local projects, as well as through development education in Germany.
By the way: often we are contacted by interested persons who would like to participate in a voluntary social year (FSJ) abroad. However, we do not offer these anymore, as we now have the above mentioned voluntary services, which are explicitly designed for projects abroad. The voluntary social year is a programme for deployments within Germany.
What do we expect of you as an applicant?When we select the applications we are not interested in your school report grades or your school leaving certificates. However, before you apply for a voluntary service you should evaluate your basic stances.
Please answer these following questions honestly in your own interest.
- Are you prepared to consciously and seriously open yourself to a voluntary service with all its demands that you will have to deal with like fixed working hours, auxiliary activities, limited decision-making power?
- The participation in a voluntary service requires your willingness to be committed both during the application process as well as later in a non-profit project. Will you be able to keep your motivation up during all this time?
- During the voluntary service you will be away from friends and family. Will you and can you be independent, search for leisure options on your own, create your own contacts, deal with loneliness and cope with daily life on your own?
- Will you be able to open yourself to cultures different to your own, to reflect your own values and norms critically, to view things unknown to you without judgement, and maybe even to eat foods that may not taste nice to you at first?
- Especially in the beginning a voluntary service will be strenuous physically and psychologically. Are you capable of dealing with such a strain?
- The languages that you may already speak might not be sufficient in your host country in order to master life and work here. Are you motivated to learn a new language (maybe even a new script) before and during your visit abroad?
- Participation in seminars (before, during and after the voluntary service) is compulsory, but the time here should be useful to you too. Are you prepared to actively take part in the organisation and implementation of the seminars?
- Are you prepared to let yourself in for the uncertainties and adventures of a voluntary service abroad? To let yourself be confronted with "strangeness"? The only certainty is that it will be completely different from what you had expected!
If you can answer these questions with a "yes" then you seem to be ready for a voluntary service abroad. Then ijgd is the right place for you to be and we eagerly anticipate your application!
Are there some questions that you were not able to answer with "yes"? Then we advise you to talk to friends and family and to think about other forms of stays abroad or about the possibility of some other sort of involvement within your country.
