Vision for 2020

This is our Vision...Our vision is of an empowered generation of confident and effective young people, acting as responsible global citizens.

This is our Mission...Project Trust empowers young people to be confident, effective, creative, independent and resilient through a challenging volunteering experience overseas. Acting as responsible global citizens Volunteers make a positive difference to their overseas host communities and share their learning and understanding when they return home. Our volunteering experience is open to all young people with the desire, motivation and aptitudes required to succeed.

These are the values and principles which guide our work...

Supportive and caring: We nurture the potential of the young people we work with and support them through the challenging process of learning by volunteering overseas.

Partnership: Our work is built on meaningful partnerships with schools and youth organisations in the UK and our project hosts and country representatives overseas.

Equality and respect: We treat everyone within our local and global community with mutual respect and sensitivity.

Diversity: We aim to reflect the diversity of UK society in geographical, social, gender and ethnic background. Our volunteering experience is open to all young people with the desire, motivation and aptitudes required to succeed.

Positive social impact: We strive to create and sustain positive impact in communities overseas and across the UK.

Integrity: We are committed to the highest level of integrity in every aspect of our work.

This is what we do...

Project Trust has been organising long term voluntary placements in Africa, Asia and Latin America for young people since 1967, making us the most experienced educational charity specialising in overseas volunteering for school-leavers.

From our home on the Hebridean Isle of Coll, we annually selectaround 300 young people from across the UK for 8 - 12 month overseas teaching, social care and outward bound projects. Working with partners overseas, these projects are carefully chosen to ensure the Volunteers’ skills can be put to good use in their host communities and do not take work away from local people.

Project Trust provides all Volunteers with training and support before, during and after their time overseas, to maximise both the educational value of their experience and the positive impact they have in their projects and host communities.

Volunteers return home with broadened horizons, increased maturity and an impressive range of transferable skills. Volunteers can now receive an accreditationof a Level 3 Foundation Year in Global Volunteering and Citizenship.

Through Project Trust’s Global Citizenship programme, Volunteers are also encouraged to share their experiences and knowledge within their own communities across the UK.

This is our view of education...

Education lies at the heart of Project Trust’s work, we are an education charity.

While formal education provides knowledge and understanding of a range of different subjects, it can often fall short on personal development and growth in the pursuit of exam results.

Project Trust’s approach to education is that a challenging long term volunteering placement overseas allows the young person to develop and grow in a more holistic manner. Their knowledge and understanding of the wider world will grow, whilst they learn about themselves and develop a range of skills.

Project Trust’s skills framework, based on five core competencies, is used to track our Volunteers’ personal development. The five core competencies are:

  • Communication and collaboration
  • Resilience
  • Self-confidence
  • Leadership
  • Awareness

When Volunteers return home we believe in the importance of them participating asactive Global Citizens in their communities - sharing their knowledge and making a valuable contribution to global learning and understanding. In this way Project Trust’s educational impact and reach goes well beyond 300 young people to thousands of people across the UK.

“Being a global citizen widens your understanding of cultures, allows you to appreciate that your way isn’t the only way. Having the ability to belong to a country other than the one you were born in, and make a difference.”

- Returned Volunteer definition of Global Citizenship

For Project Trust,Global Citizenship means:

1.Learning effectively

  • Understanding interdependence, rights and responsibilities

2.Thinking critically

3.Acting responsibly

  • Valuing and respecting others.
  • Contributingto local and global society (for example marking an international day whilst they are overseas and producing a community study)

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Strategic Aims 2016 - 20

The five year strategic vision outlined in this document lays out the road map for Project Trust until 2020.

A key landmark in the next five year journey will be the celebration of Project Trust’s 50th Anniversary from 2017 – 2018.

Over the last fifty yearsProject Trust has remainedtrue to its ethos and approach of long term, structured overseas placements that provide an incredibly journey of discovery for each new group of Volunteers.

The world in which Project Trust operates of course is very different from how it looked in the late 1960s.

A number of prescient challenges are facing Project Trust in 2015 that will impact upon our work over the next five year period and beyond, including:

  • The need to fully embrace the ‘digital age’: with digital communications becoming increasingly important for young people we need to have an effective communications strategy to reach and engage with our audiences.
  • Keeping fundraising targets for Volunteers manageable in a climate that is challenging for charity fundraising.
  • Building relationships with external funders.
  • Increasing numbers of young people we work with who have experienced or are experiencing mental health issues.
  • Being able to provide accessible evidence on the impact of our work at individual, domestic and overseas levels.
  • A ‘back office’ function which needs upgraded and the communicationsinfrastructure on the Isle of Coll.

The strategic aims set out in this document address how Project Trust will tackle these key challenges, and move successfully into the next fifty years.

Six strategic aimsare highlighted below, these are the goals Project Trust seeks to achieve by 2020. A number of cross-cutting themes can be seen as the key threads flowing through these aims:

  • Quality
  • Impact
  • Sustainability
  • Diversity
  • Global Citizenship
  • Profile

Strategic Aim 1)A high-quality and accredited educational experience is provided for our Volunteers.

Project Trust will continue to provide young people with a high quality educational experience which empowers them to be confident, effective, creative and resilient. The accreditation which Volunteers can now gain will be developed further and will be widely acknowledged by Universities. The value of experience we offer will also be recognised more widely through a clearer assessment of the acquisition of soft skills by Volunteers.

Strategic Aim 2)Volunteers will have a positive impact on their host communities overseas.

Project Trust’s first priority is to provide a positive learning experience for each of our Volunteers. We also strive to ensure that our Volunteers have a positive social impact on their host communities overseas and are a valued member of the community in which each of them are based. Project Trust will improve how we measure and evaluate the impact of Volunteers overseas.

Strategic Aim 3)We will ensure our volunteering experience is open to and supportive of all young people with the desire, motivation and aptitudes required to succeed.

Project Trust is committed to widening the accessibility to what we offer young people. A new Bursary Fund will be launched to provide extra financial assistance to Volunteers and our Alumni will help to develop a Mentoring Scheme.

Strategic Aim 4)Returned Volunteers are supported to be active Global Citizens in their communities, sharing their knowledge and making a valuable contribution to global learning and understanding in the UK.

Through working and living for 8 – 12 monthsas part of different communities in Africa, Asia and Latin Americaour Volunteers develop a deeper understanding of a wide variety of global issues. By sharing their knowledge and making a valuable contribution to global learning and understanding when they return home Project Trust’s educational impact goes well beyond the young people we send overseas. Project Trust will increase its global learning outreach to schools within the UK through a programme of visits and the production of teaching resources.

Strategic Aim 5)Project Trust follows a financially sustainable business model with sufficiently high central fundraising to allow for growth.

Project Trust will focus on ways of generating additional sources of income beyond Volunteer fundraising. We strongly believe in the value and impact of our work – on the individual, overseas and within the UK. We will continue to improve how we communicate and engage with our Alumni and work to build relationships with partners across the UK.

Strategic Aim 6)Project Trust is a positive and effective organisation with a learning culture.

Project Trust trains Volunteers to adopt a process of learn, think, act - a useful tool in helping them evaluate and consider situations they encounter overseas. Heading towards 2020 Project Trust will maintain its ethos of responsible, long-term, educational volunteering experiences whilst improving and adapting to remain leaders in our field – continuing to learn, think and act.

If you are interested in hearing more about Project Trust’s vision for 2020 or have an idea of how you or your organisation could be involved please contact John Sharp.

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