Concordia is a non-profit organization that organizes international exchanges and volunteer actions in France and abroad since 1950. Indeed, Concordia has been founded after the World War 2 initially in order to rebuild devastated countries and reconcile European populations.
Through our actions, we want to contribute to the animation of local communities, to promote the idea of peace and encourage an active citizenship, for a society full of democracy, solidarity and participation.
Through popular education, Concordia is promoting its values which are:
- Equality between human-beings: the required condition for openness and tolerance to others
- Individual education for their self development, acquiring knowledge and skills
- Peace between social or cultural communities: this is the founding aim of Concordia. It also implies the free movement of people and ideas.
Volunteering is one of Concordia’s tools in order to implement our educational project. People can choose to serve the community in the association and serve themselves in the same time. µAccording to Concordia, to be a volunteer is to provide some duties, feel useful and improve knowledge and skills.
We consider volunteering as the meeting of a project of general interest and an individual one.
To serve our general project, we use several devices:
- The international workcamp. It’s the best instrument to integrate an international group into a local community within the framework of a project benefiting everybody. The volunteers are led to live together, to experience democracy, intercultural exchange, work and to integrate into local life.
- Middle-term and long-term programs enable our partners to pursue and improve projects which were started by collective short-term activities.
- The local initiative workcamp allows for the realization of a work project by mixing adolescents from the local community, members of the association and even international volunteers.
Concordia is a place to pool the actions of volunteers in a way of a change in the society. It also permits the exchange of experiences, points of view, knowledge and skills.
It’s composed of 8 regional delegations all over the country, more than 20 permanent employees, 200 group leaders and a board of directors of 13 volunteers. Most of all, Concordia is managed by and for its 1300 members.
The delegation Ile de France of Concordia was created in 2007 with the aim of promoting volunteering in urban and periurban context. Volunteers have to contribute to the creation of nearby places where educational, artistic or sporting actions can take place. They also contribute to establish an intercultural connection between members of the local population.
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