| Major group affiliation: |
- Indigenous people
- Workers and trade unions
- Children and youth
- Women
- Non-governmental organization
|
| Involvement in UN Partnerships: |
Yes |
| If yes, explain in detail: |
CVSA participated in the 2001 International Year of Volunteers forums and events. CVSA has since attended numerous DPI-sponsored NGO briefings and events on volunteerism, sustainable development, the MDGs, and other areas of concern. CVSA reports on these and other areas of UN efforts to our membership organizations and their constituencies. CVSA has before and continues to disseminate information about the campaign to stop global warming and climate change, and the outcomes of world conferences that often are underreported or misrepresented in mainstream U.S. press and media, such as the 2009 General Assembly World Conference on the Global Financial Crisis and Development. |
| Affiliation with other organizations: |
CVSA has developed a network of over 200 community-based, non-governmental voluntary service organizations throughout the US and internationally, which all rely on volunteer participation. Their programs address hunger, access to health care, access to legal justice, disaster relief, ending homelessness, campaigns for living wages, care for the elderly and disabled, environmental protection, sustainable development and the fight against energy and economic policies that cause climate change and poverty, and more. What they have in common is their need for volunteers to participate in their work and a desire to solve these problems. CVSA is constantly expanding our network of real relationships with community-based non-governmental, volunteer-driven organizations that materially serve people and communities in need. In 2003, CVSA was invited by citizens of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) to visit schools and to aid educational development by publicizing the PRC’s need for native English speakers to teach Conversational English to school children in Jiangxi Province. CVSA formalized this program in 2005, establishing the role of a CVSA deputy, a volunteer position filled by a PRC citizen, to act as a liaison between CVSA and PRC school and government officials. CVSA has sustained this program to the present, fostering cooperative relations with PRC municipal and provincial leadership and public school educators. |
| Publications: |
CVSA publishes INVEST YOURSELF-Guide to Action, every two years, a comprehensive catalogue of hundreds of full-time (and part-time) volunteer service opportunities with non-governmental organizations serving people and communities in need and organizing for change, primarily throughout North America as well as projects in the rest of the world. The publication began in 1946 as an annual pamphlet titled “Invest Your Summer” and was primarily about volunteer opportunities abroad to help rebuild war-torn Europe, then expanded in the early 1960s to focus on full-time, year-long volunteer opportunities in areas of poverty and need throughout the U.S. as well as abroad. In 1965 its title was changed to INVEST YOURSELF, consistent with its year-round mission. CVSA distributes INVEST YOURSELF year-round, throughout the U.S. and with some international distribution, primarily through colleges, libraries, faith congregations and youth groups, as well as through direct contact via community-based, grass-roots organizing, such as through information tables in public places, fairs and other events, and through speaking engagements at schools and associations. CVSA publishes a membership newsletter, in print, titled ITEMS, which is published three times a year and distributed to and through its member organizations across the US, as well as through mailings to subscribers and supporters on college campuses, in church and other religious-based groups, and distributed through CVSA’s grassroots outreach and speaking engagements. Member organizations submit articles and suggestions for topics to be written about, and CVSA reports on national and international news, such as UN campaigns and conferences, that are of significant importance to its membership body, that they will not otherwise have exposure to or information about. |
| Affiliation with other organizations: |
CVSA has developed a network of over 200 community-based, non-governmental voluntary service organizations throughout the US and internationally, which all rely on volunteer participation. Their programs address hunger, access to health care, access to legal justice, disaster relief, ending homelessness, campaigns for living wages, care for the elderly and disabled, environmental protection, sustainable development and the fight against energy and economic policies that cause climate change and poverty, and more. What they have in common is their need for volunteers to participate in their work and a desire to solve these problems. CVSA is constantly expanding our network of real relationships with community-based non-governmental, volunteer-driven organizations that materially serve people and communities in need. In 2003, CVSA was invited by citizens of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) to visit schools and to aid educational development by publicizing the PRC’s need for native English speakers to teach Conversational English to school children in Jiangxi Province. CVSA formalized this program in 2005, establishing the role of a CVSA deputy, a volunteer position filled by a PRC citizen, to act as a liaison between CVSA and PRC school and government officials. CVSA has sustained this program to the present, fostering cooperative relations with PRC municipal and provincial leadership and public school educators. |
| Publications: |
CVSA publishes INVEST YOURSELF-Guide to Action, every two years, a comprehensive catalogue of hundreds of full-time (and part-time) volunteer service opportunities with non-governmental organizations serving people and communities in need and organizing for change, primarily throughout North America as well as projects in the rest of the world. The publication began in 1946 as an annual pamphlet titled “Invest Your Summer” and was primarily about volunteer opportunities abroad to help rebuild war-torn Europe, then expanded in the early 1960s to focus on full-time, year-long volunteer opportunities in areas of poverty and need throughout the U.S. as well as abroad. In 1965 its title was changed to INVEST YOURSELF, consistent with its year-round mission. CVSA distributes INVEST YOURSELF year-round, throughout the U.S. and with some international distribution, primarily through colleges, libraries, faith congregations and youth groups, as well as through direct contact via community-based, grass-roots organizing, such as through information tables in public places, fairs and other events, and through speaking engagements at schools and associations. CVSA publishes a membership newsletter, in print, titled ITEMS, which is published three times a year and distributed to and through its member organizations across the US, as well as through mailings to subscribers and supporters on college campuses, in church and other religious-based groups, and distributed through CVSA’s grassroots outreach and speaking engagements. Member organizations submit articles and suggestions for topics to be written about, and CVSA reports on national and international news, such as UN campaigns and conferences, that are of significant importance to its membership body, that they will not otherwise have exposure to or information about. |
| Purpose of the organization: |
CVSA promotes and supports the world of voluntary service and involvement programs, and organizes to maintain and expand the ability of individuals to freely associate with others to donate their time and services to persons and communities in need. CVSA promotes and strengthens non-governmental voluntary service organizations that are accountable to those they serve and that are working to reverse the conditions of hunger, illiteracy, unemployment, lack of access to health care or legal justice, lack of care for the elderly, or that conduct disaster relief in areas of government abandonment, organize around environmental concerns and more. CVSA staff is made up of dedicated full-time and part-time volunteers. CVSA conducts speaking engagements, education and outreach in communities throughout the US to involve more people as volunteers with programs that truly serve urgent human needs, advance sustainable development in the U.S. and abroad, and to promote international solidarity with developing nations. Towards those ends, CVSA produces and distributes INVEST YOURSELF, a bi-annual, comprehensive catalogue of voluntary service opportunities with non-governmental organizations throughout the U.S. and abroad. CVSA promotes full-time and part-time volunteer opportunities as described in the pages of INVEST YOURSELF. CVSA provides its own volunteers with an education about the history of the United Nations, its historic struggles such the campaigns to end colonization and apartheid, and current UN programs such as in the realm of climate change, protection of the right to self-determination and sovereignty of nations, reform of the UN consistent with the goals and principles of the UN Charter and addressing the world financial order, the financial crisis and development. CVSA advances the ability of individuals to choose voluntary service as a vocation, rather than an avocation. CVSA challenges the notion that world forces are too powerfully entrenched to be changed or that people are only victims and observers of their fate, versus the leadership of tomorrow. |
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