Many people may still be unclear about the purpose of the International Voluntary Service (IVS) movement and how to get involved in IVS activities.
Thus, this workshop helped to gain knowledge and empower young people to engage better with other young people and introduce those who know least to the IVS movement.
Correlation with ICON
The workshop titled ‘ICONic YOUth: From Local to Global’ was designed by the CCIVS Youth Committee and was held online via Zoom on 27 September 2024 as part of the dissemination efforts for the ICON project which focused on one of the areas, community building. Designed by young activists and with the young changemakers in the spotlight as the speakers, this workshop used the Human Library concept where the speakers shared their unique personal IVS journey. Participants were able to dive into different speakers’ stories and got an opportunity to better understand the overall concept of the IVS movement.
The main takeaways
At the beginning of the workshop, we had a little quiz about IVS as our ice-breaker, followed by the IVS knowledge-sharing session led by Linndberg Ruballos, CCIVS Financial and Administrative Officer. He shared the overview of IVS, who CCIVS is and the core concept of IVS activities. From the history of IVS to what IVS activities are like nowadays, it was shared in a compact presentation and understandable. At the end of his presentation, we answered the questions that we received from participants before the event.
In the Human Library session, participants were then divided into two breakout rooms with two speakers in each room. There were four young speakers from the CCIVS Youth Committee and ICYE Youth Engagement Committee.
Ian Tawanda Mugowa, a member of the CCIVS Youth Committee was partnered with Marcela Fallas Diaz from ICYE Youth Engagement Committee. Ian’s topic was focused on his activism and the African youth in IVS. Meanwhile, Marcela shared how she coped with various new things and culture shock during her long-term voluntary experience and how IVS transformed her to see new perspectives.
In another room we had Mette Lund from ICYE Youth Engagement Committee who not only shared her personal experiences but also invited the participants to explore how youth leaders can drive change within organisations and engaged the participants in reflecting on their roles and the essential qualities of effective leadership. In the same room with Mette, there was Zaid Daana, the member of CCIVS Youth Committee who shared the topic on the challenges of ensuring volunteers’ safety while organising and planning on a workcamp in Palestine. He shared the process of how minimising risks starts from before the volunteers arrive and explained the measures he and his organisation took to ensure safe transportation and the importance of ‘Plan B’ in the context of many activities in Palestine getting cancelled due to safety reasons.
This workshop may not instantly make the participants understand the whole thing about IVS but it can be a starting point for them to create their own IVS journey. We thank all of the participants for joining our e-workshop and we hope to see more ICONic YOUth soon in another event to learn and empower each other!
Author: Hani Nurlina