A wide range of skills, knowledge and attitudinal development can derive from volunteering and Community Education programmes. Individual and groups of all ages and background can participate in volunteer work and Community Education programs to improve their knowledge, learn new skills and build personal or group capacity which allows participants to actively and confidently participate in democratic processes. Volunteering and Community Education therefore can be seen as an important and powerful source of informal learning and training. Knowledge and social skills development can be acquired through different educational experiences such as the undertaking of projects and activities in local community, through neighborhood help or local volunteer work.

Apart from learning volunteering can provide other benefits: skills and experiences gained through volunteer service fulfil a need for relationships, personal growth and development, achievement, or affiliation. For others learning new skills for career advancement or exploring job options through volunteer work is an important motivator. So volunteering can be also an important instrument of social and professional integration. All together volunteering and non-profit community work can be regarded and used as an approach to promote learning and active citizenship.

In our European partnerships "Volunteer Organizations‘ Input to Community Education" (VOICE), ‘Volunteer to learn’ and ‘VoluMe’, we dealt with this topic on a European level. The collected experiences and knowledge are available on this website.

This website is regarded as a resource centre about “Volunteering & learning” and is open to any one who want to contribute, for example about their experiences, how volunteering has offered them new learning and training opportunities, about existing training programmes for volunteers or any information how volunteering had a big impact on personal development and wellbeing of people. Feel welcome to contribute!

The project "Volunteer Organizations‘ Input to Community Education" has been funded within Erasmus+ programme and the other two within the former programme "Grundtvig learning partnerships".