Nowadays, Europe is witnessing a dramatic change of demographic trends and an important ageing of its population. People are living longer throughout Europe as a result of improved public health provision, medical progress, improved diet and housing. The expectation of a longer life caused a deep change in lifestyles and needs of seniors.
The Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union acknowledges these changes stating that "the Union recognises and respects the right of the elderly to lead a life of dignity and independence and to participate in social and cultural life" (art. 25).In Europe, the majority of seniors lives in better conditions than in the past but there is still a certain degree of risk of permanent social exclusion due to ageing. The creation of a European society active at all ages needs a strategy that allows seniors to take part in social life also after the exit from the labour market. Seniors represent a richness not enough enhanced in terms of experiences and acquired skills: specific actions at European level devoted to seniors, can develop schemes of social inclusion and active participation in order to change seniors from passive beneficiaries of social protection to active citizens in the construction of Europe.

In fact: we have arrived at the setting up of this network thanks to a series of pilot projects financed by the European Commission (2001, DG ESA - Pilot project on Exchanges of Senior volunteers, 2001 DG EAC - Mobilty 55, 2003 DG EAC - Still Active!, 2004 DG ESA Teaming up!, 2006 DG EAC Conference on senior volunteers exchanges) but also greatly co-financed by several local Governments in Europe who are all involved in the network (in Italy, Austria, Belgium, Germany).

Our idea is to set up a platform where all the organisations can easily exchange information and taking part in a common project-implementing framework. More than 300 volunteers took part so far to a volunteer exchange abroad thanks to European projects, but a good number have left for programmes organised by different local Governments without the support of the European institutions.

We want to create a "European Wide Space" where all the organisations involved, local governments, ngos, universities, institutions working with volunteers will be facilitated in the implementation of their mobility and exchange projects. Aside, but not less important is the setting up of a voice that can advise and give an informed point of view to national and international institutions dealing with active ageing, educational tools, active citizenship and social cohesion. Our meetings and all the forecast tools will be as open as possible both to policy makers and to organisations in order to create an observatory on the implementation of those policies.

Referring more to the educational side, we have remarked and shown that a period of voluntary service abroad represents a relevant learning experience. It is a really mutual educational process: not only the volunteers in a new situation implement theis personal and practical skills but also the local communities who host them will learn from the foreign volunteers. This process addreses not only active citizenship and active ageing but also social cohesion and gives birth in many cases to inter-generation experiences with a potential process of change of mentalities of young people and senior citizens, one towards the others. More so, volunteers who go abroad and the associations hosting them are involved in a process that starts from a preparation period, continues with the actual exchange abroad and ends up with a general assessment of "what can be done next". In other words the volunteers in the most of the cases start to be active in their local communities and often they help to train and prepare other volunteers to the experience. The exchanges were always anticipated by a training period for volunteers and organisations whose development is another aim of this network.

• 1. Website
  1.1 materials such as reports from the volunteers, training course, handbooks, pictures, reports of previous projects, political statements
  1.2 database for placement
  1.3 database of national and regional adresses of contact
  1.4 discussion forum
  1.5 user enquiry on quality aspects

• 2. Discussion platform for learning partnership and other exchange projects
  2.1 exchange of information on existing funding and support possibilities at European, National and Regional level
  2.2 creation of support possibilities at a regional level, incl. public relations
  2.3 specific advice for project setting up and evaluation

• 3 Support for volunteers and organisations (Internet and printed version)
  3.1 language support
  3.2 training programmes for newcomer organisations

• 4. Research actions
  4.1 ex-post analysis on long term effects of senior citizens volunteering abroad included those who already took part to previous pilot projects
  4.2 monitoring of short term impact on senior citizens volunteering abroad during the life of the network

• 5 Annual meetings
  5.1 kick off meeting of members with sessions open to decision makers at European level
  5.2 annual member meeting, including assessment of progress and open conference to report results of first year network to the public
  5.3 annual member meeting, including assessment of progress and open conference to report results of second year network to the public
  5.4 annual member meeting, including assessment of progress and final conference

• 6. Dissemination and public relations actions
  6.1 action towards media: tv broadcasting, radio, newspaper
  6.2 information of players in Grundtvig about the network activities

• 7. Annual progress and assessment report