The call for candidates for the European Volunteering Capital 2024 is now open!

The European Volunteer Centre (CEV) competition is a way to giving recognition to municipalities that support and strengthen partnerships with volunteer centres and volunteer-involving organisations in their communities and to celebrate and promote the impact made by volunteers through sustainable polices and programmes.

As a candidate, the city will gain European-wide visibility for excellence in policies and programmes that support volunteers and volunteering. Besides that, the municipality will be rewarded with recognition for its existing practices, and for its ambitious, credible and quality-focused plans for future growth and development in the field of volunteering.

The awarded municipality will be chosen from the candidates by an international jury of key personalities connected with volunteering, representing civil society, the private, for-profit sector, as well as the EU institutions.

The winning municipality will be granted the title of European Volunteering Capital 2024 and will be promoted throughout Europe and beyond. The winners from the previous editions are Trondheim (2023), Gdansk (2022), Berlin  (2021), Padova (2020), Kosice (2019), Aarhus (2018), Sligo (2017), London (2016), Lisbon (2015) and Barcelona (2014).

The application form is online

Municipalities of any size from a member state of the Council of Europe can already fill the online application form which needs to be delivered on June 3th and completed in English providing information on existing volunteering policy and practice in your municipality.

The information given in this form will count the 70% of the final score allocated to each candidate and the 30% of the score will be allocated on a video of maximum of 5 minutes to demonstrate volunteering in the municipality and a physical presentation of ten minutes maximun in Gdansk, EV Capital 2022, on 4th October 2022.

The deadline for the video is on September 9th and it should provide complementary information to that given in the application form and during the physical presentation but at the same time be understandable in isolation having in mind that it will be shared online.

The purpose of the competition

The winning municipality will be announced in Gdansk on December 10th 2022, since the December 5th is the International Volunteer Day. The winner of the 2024 European Volunteering Capital will have the opportunity, under the EV Capital framework, to organise different future actions to contribute to the growth and development of quality volunteering, ensure greater impact of the volunteers on their communities and inspire and encourage other municipalities to do their best.

Those who are interested and want to know the criteria of the jury and the requirments to participate can find it here and sign up via this link.