Voluntariado en una granja de Bélgica para 4 meses

Dates

1 april for 4 months

Description

Since 2011 De wissel owns a farm located in Rural area. This place is called Centrum Molenmoes and it is hosting different kind of projects: the day centre Rizsas from 2009, from 2011 the project Stretch-it and since 2013 Equicanis.

In the centre we try to maintain the environment in a creative and ecological way to promote nature based experiences and networking with the local environment. A garden was developped in 2012 by the principles of permaculture, a pool was rehabilitated to be a more interesting place, a baking oven was build to bake bread and many other small projects were born in centrum Molenmoes.

Centrum Molenmoes is hosting since 2012 an EVS-volunteer with main task gardening and other environmental tasks. This volunteer willl be a link between youngsters attending the day-center, the local volunteers in the garden, the local habitants around the project and new project close by or further away in Europe.

Ecology, gardening is a common thing all over the world which makes it interesting to have some intercultural experiences in our environmental project.

The target group of Centrum Molenmoes is a divers group of people out of the society: youngsters, volunteers, local neighbours, companies, . The main aim to have this mix of people on the centre is to bring the youngsters from rizsas in contact with the society and show them different aspects of life without imposing them.

The context of the project

The project is located on a small farm 12km from Leuven in a village Wezemaal, called Centrum Molenmoes. This centre is organised by De Wissel. The farm consists of different rooms for different workshops ( music, movie, sewing, herbs, cooking, art, wood, painting, …), a garden, forest, a pool and some chickens. This is the project where the volunteer will be involved. The project is surrounded by fields and nice nature reserves for walks.

The volunteer will live on the project in Wezemaal,  Wezemaal is a village 12 kilometers from Leuven in the Flemish part of Belgium. Wezemaal is part of Rotselaar. You have to note that the farm is located outside the centre of Wezemaal in rural setting. There is a village centre at 2km with a bancomat, bakery, little shop.

This rural setting is located in the region Hageland, know for its little hills, wineyards and nature reserves. The surrounding is very nice for walking, running, cycling. Although it is located very rural you have very good connection to 2 cities.

The nearest city is Aarschot, app 6km, where you have a swimming pool, cinema, library, train station and buses to get to other parts of Belgium. By bike it takes you 20minutes to get there and with the bus only 5 minutes. The bus is riding every hour in the week.

Leuven is located a bit further. It takes you 20 minutes with the bus to get there. Even in weekends you have on friday and saturday a bus till 2h30 in the night. Leuven is a student city with lots of shops, bars, library, sport centre… and all what you need.

In Centrum Molemmoes there are sleeping rooms for the volunteers. This is your private space.

Kitchen, living room and bathroom is in common with the project and/or other volunteers. The volunteer must be able to live independently. He/She will get a budget to do the shopping. In the kitchen everything is available to cook. In the week you have several buses to Aarschot or Leuven, on sundays every 2 hours. During your stay in Belgium, the bike will become your best friend to get easily to different places nearby.

The volunteer will live together with 3 other international EVS volunteers. These volunteers are working in another project of De wissel. She/He has to be aware that she/he will live in an intercultural setting. Sharing the house with others means that some agreements will be made either to make sure the volunteer has his privacy and also that common space are kept clean for use of others.

Proposed activities

From the moment the volunteer arrives she/he will be supported to find his/her way in Belgium and the village he/she lives. We will take care that a network is created around the volunteer, so that his/her social life can develop easily.

The volunteer will have the opportunity to learn about: local networking (the centre is developping different ways to network with the neighbours, partners,…) gardening and growing vegetables (get in touch with the vision of permaculture) taking care of the environment

Have the opportunity to develop an own project and experience personal growth in this experience.

Social youthwork in Belgium and youngsters living in a shelter the role of EVS volunteers in the host organisation.

The volunteer will be part of the crew consisting of youngsters, social workers , volunteers and locals. The volunteer will take care of the environment of the farm. feeding the animals on several days and make sure they live in a clean environment taking care of the garden (weeding, cleaning, sewing, planting, comp…)- even coördinate the gardenwork:

from September to November: weeding, harvest, cook with vegetables from the garden, develop a system that harvest is used by people, covering beds for the winter

December to Februari: repair garden tools, organise the shed, make plant and seed shedule, develop inside activites according to environment

March to august: seeding/planting, weeding, harvest and take care of the harvest and develop own experiments develop activities related to environment, animals and garden where youngsters or others can participate assist and develop activities for the locals on evenings/ weekends ( movie, discussion by fire in tipi, workshops)

Keep a diary of Molenmoes environment by facebook (posting foto’s, announce plans,…)

The volunteer is free to develop new projects related to garden and environment. In summer there is the possibility to develop a camp for the youngsters.

take care of the environment: repairs things, clean up spaces, collect woods, cut the grass, … help and/or coordinate volunteer teams who come to the centre for helping Being a support in welcoming groups:

make sure the space is clean before and afterwards prepare some food/a soup for the group

Profile of the volunteer

A volunteer with sence for ecology, eager to explore together with us the possibilities of nature, knowledge of environmental issues.

As on the domain will be youngsters with difficult background, we want the volunteer to be aware of his influences to these youngsters. Able to deal with young adults and have social skills to communicate with these youngsters. Being open minded and flexible in this work are very welcome. As he/she is working in the surrounding of youngsters with difficulties, he/she has to understand that all kind of problems he/she gets to know from the youngsters are private and not to be communicated outside the project.

Creative volunteers that have ideas for projects, activities or have knowledge of certain issues that can give an extra dimension to the project are very welcome.

We expect an independence in the work where the volunteer learns to plan his work, takes initiative and can see work and take actions by him/herself.

The volunteer has to be willing to evolve to an independent way of living in the community. There won’t be all the time a mentor to take care of cooking, going somewhere,… We prefer a volunteer that makes the choice for a long term period from August/September to June/July.. This to make sure the volunteer has the time to integrate and build up knowledge, independence and integration in the project. A minimum of 8 months seems required to us toreassure the volunteer can grow and take his time to find his place in this organisation. The garden has a year cyclus and it is appropriate to experience this whole process. As there is the opportunity to involve youngsters in the environmental activities, it is not an evidence to do this immediately. we want to give the volunteer time to integrate, get experienced in his/her tasks, communicate, create projects and go home with a rich experience. We think that experiencing the whole cyclus of one year will be the most successful experience of this project. So we prefer volunteers that go for this long term experience of 1 year!

We will collect all motivation letters one month before the deadline at least. It is important to us to have some conversations before we apply to make sure the match for our project is good. So we don’t accept last minutes candidates.

Where are we looking for:

Interest or knowledge for gardening, permaculture and ecology, the cyclus of nature(seeding, planting, weeding, harvest, compost,…) talent in cooking of creative ways to use the harvest of the garden

Handy to do little repairments

Not afraid of physical work outside

mature enough to organise your work independent after a while and help to coordinate the work

mature enough to deal with the youngsters being on the farm, get along with non-motivated

youngsters with behaviour problems.

able to live in rural setting (not in a city, nearest city Leuven is 12km)

– transport is by bus and bike, train station 6km from the house

– independent in living, cooking, taking care of yourself

– live in community with others, share places in common with others except your sleeping room

😉

– willing to learn Dutch (Nederlands)

Short term:

In the summer we are open to short term EVS to support on the summer activities, the camps and the garden. For this period we are more flexible with our priorities, as we also want to give youngsters with less opportunities the chance to have an EVS-experience.

– able to live in rural setting (not in a city, nearest city Leuven is 12km)

– transport is by bus and bike, train station 6km from the house

– independent in living, cooking, taking care of yourself

– live in community with others interested in outside activities like garden, animals

Able to communicate with youngsters and the team (English or French) willing to take responsibilities and make choices in the activities willing to work with groups of youngsters from different setting, cultures practical arrangements

Food:

The volunteer has to organise him/herself for breakfast and dinner with the budget he/she will get from the project. He/She will get a budget each month for the rest of the food expenses. Lunch will be taken together in the centre on working days.

Accommodation:

The volunteer will have a room that he/she can lock with a key. Bathroom and kitchen are in common with other volunteers and some social workers that have an office there during the day.

There is an internet connection which can be used. the volunteer lives on the centre.

Holidays:

The volunteer has the right to take holiday. He/She should mention this in advance on a staffmeeting so we can arrange it in the schedule of tasks. If he/she wants to take a week off, he/she should discuss this in advance with the team. The volunteer has the right on vacation 2 days in the week (mostly weekend) and 25 extra days during the whole year.

Local Transport:

There will be a bike for the volunteer to go to the shop, the bus or train station. There is a bus passing every hour at 2km from the house.

The volunteer will get an bus pass to travel by bus in whole Flanders and a train cards for excursions.

Language training:

He / She will have the opportunity to have Dutch classes. The lessons will be organised according to the arrival date.

How to apply