For the NGO ijgd voluntary services are a tool to achieve a better understanding for responsibilities of the participants for the society and to broaden their scope of action. In this way the European Voluntary service can strengthen their sense of European citizenship and the democratic development in Europe. Additionally the commitment of the volunteers will increase the perspective of the disadvantaged children and youngsters who are living in the hosting projects. Last but not least for us EVS is an instrument of informal learning for the volunteers and we aim to increase their potential. 4 volunteers will participate for 12 month each in this project: 2 from third countries neighboring the EU (Ukraine and Russia) and 2 from participating countries (Croatia, Turkey). The common link between the volunteers is their motivation to work with disadvantaged children and youth and they all possess the required communicative competences. The places where the volunteers will work are: “Westfälisches Kinderdorf e.V.” in Barntrup, information center for migrants in the protestant church in Düren and “Odilia e.V.” in Halle. The aims of all these organizations are: to support disadvantaged children and youth and to increase their chances of integration into the society The volunteers will take part in a pedagogical program which will begin with the preparation and end with the evaluation. Beside the task-oriented training in the hosting projects and the trainings of the National Agency the applying organization will organize three seminars and trainings with the following objectives: to define the educational aims, to induce an intensive discussion about European citizenship and to reflect on the attainment of the learning objectives. By this we want to ensure that the volunteers develop their personal competences, their employability and their sense of civic responsibility. We also want to enable the volunteers to support their hosting projects noticeably in the progress towards their goals by improving the abilities of disadvantaged people. With this project the European idea will become more important mainly for the hosting projects and the volunteers, but also for all other parties involved. In the long run this project can make a contribution to a democratic, fair and vital Europe.