National Volunteering
VSO provides support for the promotion and development of local and national volunteering. Through this work, VSO aims to promote active citizenship and empower people to understand, affect and own the development of their own communities.
What is national volunteering, and why support it?
National volunteering is simply people volunteering within their own country. International volunteer sending organisations increasingly agree that national volunteering is a powerful tool which reflects a more contemporary approach to volunteering. VSO believes that people working together out of community responsibility and shared commitment is a powerful force that can make a major contribution to reducing poverty and promoting development. National volunteers work in many areas, from Health to Education, but since community participation and voluntary action can play a major role in strengthening civil society, VSO sees all our national volunteering work supporting the Participation and Governance goal.
VSO's national volunteering work so far
Although VSO has supported National Volunteering activities for a number of years, it officially became part of our strategic approach in 2002. We do not run national volunteering programmes; rather we use our expertise to support partners to run their own successful volunteering schemes.
VSO supports more than 100 national volunteering partners in over 20 countries. Our support focuses on working with organisations to develop existing volunteer management processes, and supporting partners to research and develop new programmes that use national volunteering in an innovative way to deliver sustainable development.