International Voluntary Service
Volunteering for Peace and Social Justice

International Voluntary Service – South West Group

By a happy coincidence of chances, three IVS members all living in the South West of the UK, met at the 2010 AGM in London. With Helen’s (IVS HQ) encouragement we arranged to meet to discuss the possibility of setting up a group in the South West. Our inaugural meeting was held on Saturday 29^th January 2011 in a warm and welcoming Turkish Café in Exeter (a standard I hope we can maintain for future meetings). Pat, Linda and I met and pondered about what we could achieve being only three people.

We decided to focus our efforts on awareness raising about IVS in the first place, but to also keep our eyes and ears open for potential workcamp projects in the SW region.

During 2011 we participated in two events the Exeter Respect Festival on 4^th and 5^th June, where we were joined by another IVS supporter, Jonathon and the University of Exeter’s Part-time Jobs Fair on 6^th October. At both events we were kept very busy with enquirers attending our stall and met several ex-IVS members who were pleased to see activities were still taking place.

Our group has links to Exeter University and the University of the West of England, so we hope to continue to have a presence at both.

We also agreed to try and aim some of our publicity actions towards more senior colleagues, by contacting agencies and organizations working with retired people as a start.

If you live in or near the South West (our geographical definition is quite broad) do get in touch and we can let you know about our next meeting.

Contact: Helen Watts on 0117 956 7337 or helen1962@hotmail.com