The foundation St. Franziskus Heiligenbronn is an ecclesiastical foundation under public law. It performs a charitable mission based on christian-catholic principles, in particular for people of all ages with impaired senses, elderly people in need of care and for children and young people.
The foundation is represented at 10 locations in southwestern Germany, attends and conducts about 1.350 people in need and employs about 1.200 staff members. The Foundation is a registered non-profit organisation for care of the disabled and elderly people as well as youth welfare. Most of the staff members are trained in vocational fields like: geriatric care, inclusive education, residential care, nursing, special education as well as administration.
At the location of Schramberg the FoundationSt. Franziskus is running various sheltered workshops and enterprises for disabled people: a brushes manufactory, a basket manufactory, a bakery, a plant centre, and a farm shop.
In the department for vocational training disabled people are trained and prepared according to their abilities by work education instructors. The offerings for integration in the labour market comprise placement in private enterprises too.
The teaching staff of the assistance and special needs department are qualified specialists in Social or Therapeutic Pedagogy and apart from their theoretical knowledge they are experienced in practice. According to requirements of disadvantaged volunteers they will develop and carry out an individual concept for reinforced mentorship.
Volunteers with special needs could be accepted after consultation with the hosting as well as sending organisation to find and to agree appropriate opportunities of voluntary activities. According to the nature of disadvantages a preparatory visit will be planned.
Learning opportunities
During their voluntary service the volunteers will get non-formal qualifications as well as key qualifications in the areas of character-building and social and linguistic skills. They get to know different ways of life and learn to deal with disabled people. They learn organisational structures of daily care for disabled people and how to find their place in it.
Volunteers will get to know during their activities social needs of people with disabilities.
The self-reliant offering of activities for disabled people will pass on self assurance and confidence in their own skills to volunteers.
Volunteers can take part in a language training for European Volunteers arranged by the coordinating organisation. The aim of the language training is the command of oral every day speech with a special focus on the terminology of child care. Through language training the volunteer should be enabled to manage typical situations of daily life they will be confronted with during their voluntary service.
Apart from language learning the language training serves as a weekly meeting for European Volunteers from several EVS projects situated in the region.
Every month a day of studies will be organised vor the volunteers, where the volunteers can seek advise for their choice of occupations in future, meet counselors from universities and colleges, visit the European Parliament in Strasbourg, go on excursions, or take part in cultural events. The content of this program will be discussed by the group and participation is left up to the volunteers.
Tasks:
The host organization provides continuous monitoring, including easy access to the contact person (Tutor), regular dialog with the volunteers, in which the options for personal development and the interests of the volunteer are being discussed.
To prevent crises from occurring in the first place, volunteers will be given any training necessary for them to carry out their tasks.
Volunteers will be informed about their rights, regulations in the host organization, consequences of unacceptable behaviour.
In terms of risk and crisis prevention it is very important to keep all persons involved in the project informed to be able to act immediately in the case of a crisis.
However if problems occur, volunteers have different people to contact and discuss problems with. The different people are pro-active in seeking area of concern and actively finding solutions to the issues arising.
The line manager in the respective working group is on hand daily for problems, the director of the hosting organisation is accessible for volunteers every day and the co-ordinator is available by e-mail and phone at every time but meets the volunteers weekly or biweekly during language training.
Weekly during language training volunteers can meet participants from other EVS-projects from the region to exchange experiences.
Volunteers wil have the opportunity to stay in contact with their family and sending organization via e-mail or telephone at least on a weekly basis.
This organisation is willing to involve volunteers who face situations which make their participation in activities more difficult, from the following categories for different types of project:
For the selection of the volunteers we will need:
– Europass CV with picture (made in the last month)
– Motivational letter, writing that your sending organisation will be “Building Bridges”. We ask all candidates to send a specific letter of motivation – why they want to volunteer with us rather than just a general EVS one.
Remember to write in the motivation letter that your sending institution is “Asociación Building Bridges”.
All documents written in english you can send to: asociacionbb@gmail.com with subject “St.Franziskus Heiligenbonn, trabajo social, Alemania».