Voluntary Service Overseas
 | |
| Formation | 1958 |
|---|---|
| Founders | Alec and Mora Dickson |
| Type | International development charity |
| Location |
|
Volunteers | 76,000 |
| Website | www.vsointernational.org |
Voluntary Service Overseas (VSO) is an international development charitable organization|charity with a vision for a "world without poverty" and a mission to "bring people together to fight poverty and marginalisation".[1] VSO delivers development impact through international, national, and community volunteers. The focus of volunteers it to develop the systems and conditions for positive social change [2]
As of 2018, VSO worked in 24 countries in Africa and Asia[3]
VSO currently works in the following core programme areas:
- Inclusive Education
- Health
- Livelihoods
And through three core approaches that are relevant to all the areas:
- Social Inclusion and Gender
- Social Accountability
- Resilience
Contents
1 Structure and governance
2 History
3 VSO today
3.1 Partnerships
4 See also
5 References
6 Further reading
7 External links
Structure and governance
Voluntary Service Overseas (VSO) is a company limited by guarantee. VSO operates internationally largely through branch offices. Exceptions to this are:
- Voluntary Service Overseas (Ireland) Limited Company Limited by Guarantee, which is a subsidiary of VSO and incorporated as a charitable entity in Ireland.
- India VSO, which has agreements in place with the independent Indian charitable organisation, VSO India Trust. These agreements permit the Trust to
carry out VSO’s work using the VSO trademark.
- Stichting VSO Netherland, which is a Dutch independent charitable organisation that has agreements with VSO, including a trademark license, and whose accounts were integrated with VSO’s as of April 2018.
In March 2018 Voluntary Service Overseas USA, Inc.was incorporated, and an application has been made to register this entity as a US 501 (c) (iii).
VSO's governing body is the International Board, currently comprising 9 trustees. It also has two youth advisors to the Board. The day-to-day management of VSO is carried out by the Executive Board. The Executive Board has operational oversight of VSO's global work. Each Executive Board member is responsible for a function of VSO: People, Programmes, Business Development, and Finance.
History
VSO was founded in 1958 by Alec and Mora Dickson through a bishop's letter to the London paper,[4]The Sunday Times, as an educational experience overseas for school-leavers, initially only male, before starting university. Volunteers offered unskilled help in return for basic accommodation and pocket money. In 1962, the practice changed to using university graduate volunteers.[5]
By 1980, the unskilled volunteers had been completely phased out and the length of service had been extended to two years.[6] Active volunteer numbers initially dropped to about 750, but by 2003 had returned to about 1,400. Since December 2004, applications to volunteer have been accepted from those between ages 20 and 75, who also must have at least two years' experience in their field.
In the early 1990s, in order to meet growing demand for highly specialised and skilled volunteers from its partners in developing countries, VSO established partner agencies in Canada, the Netherlands, Kenya/Uganda (VSO Jitolee), and the Philippines (VSO Bahaginan).[7] In 2004, VSO launched a partnership called iVolunteer Overseas (iVO) in India with iVolunteer, an existing volunteering program of MITRA, an Indian NGO. VSO's structure evolved to become an international federation which now includes Ireland, China and India as well as the above named countries.[8] International volunteers are recruited through all of these bases, and they can be placed in any one of VSO's programmes (e.g. an Irish volunteer working in Nepal, or a Ugandan volunteer working in Tajikistan).[9]
From 2011 VSO, led a consortium to deliver the UK government's International Citizen Service programme that provides international volunteer placements for 18- to 25-year-olds[10]. The programme, funded by the Department for International Development DFID, now includes Raleigh International and Restless Development and has. In 2016/17 3090 young people volunteered through the International Citizen Service programme. [11]
VSO today
Highlights of VSO today include:
- VSO supports the delivery of integrated, large-scale education, health and livelihoods programmes in a range of countries. Its programmes reached 1.4m people in 2017/18 [12]
- VSO now works in post-crisis situations and has recently responded to disasters in Bangladesh, Nepal, the Philippines and Sierra Leone. Most recently it has supported the establishment of a home-based early childhood care and education (ECCE) in emergencies to support refugee Rohingya communities in Bangladesh [13]
- It supports communities and governments to inform and influence policy diaglogues. It recently supported the development of the Africa Union Gender Strategy and the Kenya Special Education Needs Policy.
- Citizen Led Monitoring is now a key element of VSOs work. In 2017/18 over 20,000 people in Nepal and Uganda were mobilized for awareness raising and accountability on the delivery of the sustainable development goals [14]
- VSO is supporting the creation of national youth platforms in 7 of its countries of operation [15]
- It is playing a leading part in the development of a global standard for responsible and impactful volunteering as part of the Forum for International Volunteering in Development.
Partnerships
VSO works with local partners in the communities they work with, placing volunteers with these partners to help increase their impact and effectiveness. VSO also works with corporate partners, such as Accenture,[16] and Randstad.[17] and Syngenta with whom it is working to build the livelihoods of poor and marginalised farmers in Bangladesh [18]
See also
- CUSO
- Doctors Without Borders
- EU Aid Volunteers
- European Voluntary Service
- Fredskorpset
- International Citizen Service
- Peace Corps
- United Nations Volunteers
References
^ https://www.vsointernational.org/sites/default/files/VSO-Annual-Report17-18.pdf
^ https://www.vsointernational.org/sites/default/files/VSO-Annual-Report17-18.pdf
^ https://www.vsointernational.org/sites/default/files/VSO-Annual-Report17-18.pdf
^ Critical Perspectives on Service-Learning in Higher Education. p. 16. ISBN 9781137383259..mw-parser-output cite.citationfont-style:inherit.mw-parser-output qquotes:"""""""'""'".mw-parser-output code.cs1-codecolor:inherit;background:inherit;border:inherit;padding:inherit.mw-parser-output .cs1-lock-free abackground:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/65/Lock-green.svg/9px-Lock-green.svg.png")no-repeat;background-position:right .1em center.mw-parser-output .cs1-lock-limited a,.mw-parser-output .cs1-lock-registration abackground:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/d6/Lock-gray-alt-2.svg/9px-Lock-gray-alt-2.svg.png")no-repeat;background-position:right .1em center.mw-parser-output .cs1-lock-subscription abackground:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/aa/Lock-red-alt-2.svg/9px-Lock-red-alt-2.svg.png")no-repeat;background-position:right .1em center.mw-parser-output .cs1-subscription,.mw-parser-output .cs1-registrationcolor:#555.mw-parser-output .cs1-subscription span,.mw-parser-output .cs1-registration spanborder-bottom:1px dotted;cursor:help.mw-parser-output .cs1-hidden-errordisplay:none;font-size:100%.mw-parser-output .cs1-visible-errorfont-size:100%.mw-parser-output .cs1-subscription,.mw-parser-output .cs1-registration,.mw-parser-output .cs1-formatfont-size:95%.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-left,.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-wl-leftpadding-left:0.2em.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-right,.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-wl-rightpadding-right:0.2em
^ "Volunteering". University of Bradford. Retrieved 3 April 2015.
^ "Good to meet you… Tom Jackson". The Guardian. Retrieved 3 April 2015.
^ "Putting children first: transforming education in Cambodia". VSO Bahaginan. Retrieved 3 April 2015.
^ "Dublin doctor helping Africans most in need". The Irish Times. Retrieved 3 April 2015.
^ "History Voluntary Service Overseas (VSO)". Official website. Retrieved 3 April 2015.
^ https://www.volunteerics.org/sites/default/files/inline-files/Final%20ICS%20Report%202016-2017%20PDF_0.PDF
^ https://www.volunteerics.org/sites/default/files/inline-files/Final%20ICS%20Report%202016-2017%20PDF_0.PDF
^ https://www.vsointernational.org/sites/default/files/VSO-Annual-Report17-18.pdf
^ home-based early childhood
care and education (ECCE) in emergencies
^ https://www.vsointernational.org/sites/default/files/VSO-Annual-Report17-18.pdf
^ https://www.vsointernational.org/sites/default/files/VSO-Annual-Report17-18.pdf
^ "VSO Business Partnership Program". Accenture. Retrieved 3 April 2015.
^ "VSO (Voluntary Service Overseas)". Randstad Holding. Retrieved 3 April 2015.
^ https://www.vsointernational.org/sites/default/files/VSO-Annual-Report17-18.pdf
Further reading
"How a Kenyan VSO volunteer is helping the health crisis in Malawi", The Nation, Malawi, 26 May 2006
"Mica's Lost His family - I Wept For Him", Sunday Mirror, 21 May 2006
"VSO focuses on senior teachers", Education Guardian, January 10, 2006
"Eight Ways to Change the World", The Guardian, 7 September 2005
"Women lead as overseas volunteers", Guardian March 20, 2001
"Brian Deer investigates VSO", London Sunday Times, April 26, 1998
"Meet the VSO Volunteers" Grasya, July 2011
External links
- VSO homepage
- VSO Ireland homepage
- VSO Netherlands homepage (in Dutch)
- VSO Bahaginan homepage (Philippines)
- VSO Jitolee homepage (Kenya)
- VSO Hovos homepage (India)
- VSO India homepage (India)
- iVolunteer Overseas homepage (India)
- VSO China homepage (China)
- Beijing VSO Consulting Services
- Volunteer in the Philippines
