Serve the City International

Serve the City International is an NGO that works to create a sense of community by organising and facilitating volunteer projects to help people who are underprivileged or disadvantaged. There are over 40 cities in Europe in which a Serve the City team is active or starting. (https://www.servethecity.net/cities/). Serve the City started in Brussels in 2005 and is growing into a strong movement of leaders who share the same vision and values, have global connections, and leading teams who act locally. In 2016 Serve the City International was formed, but the movement had already spread by that time to many cities. It is a high priority of Serve the City is to be truly accepting, open, and welcoming of all people. Our target groups differ from city to city, as each team has to determine what are the priority social concerns in their own city. However, many cities would share a common concern for the following: people who are homeless; migrants, asylum seekers, and refugees; people who are disabled; people who are elderly; children in need; and victims of abuse. Each local Serve the City team builds partnerships with local NGOs to create and lead projects that would give people the opportunity to volunteer. Often these divide into two categories of opportunities: volunteering events; and weekly groups. In a volunteering event many people, sometimes a hundred or more, serve in various projects on the same day. Each of these projects are organised to provide assistance to local NGOs. Volunteers have many projects to choose from, which also highlight the individual preferences and abilities of the volunteer, not just the needs of the people we are seeking to serve. In this way, Serve the City provides a starting point for people who would like to get involved in volunteering, and connect them to the communities that have a need. Weekly groups develop in partnership with the same, or similar NGOs, so that a team of volunteers can consistently serve the same people or context on a weekly basis. In this way, we seek to move towards neighbourhood transformation - neighbours addressing needs and building relationships in their own immediate context. Serve the City International has an annual gathering in October, called the International Forum, which takes place in a different city each year. Once a month there is an All City Call on the Zoom platform to keep cities connected. Each city is a part of a national movement or a network. Serve the City Intl helps cities mature through 5 Life Stages: Interest, Starting, Active, Sustainable, and Hub. The goal of Serve the City Intl is to develop national movements of volunteering in a growing number of cities.