What is it about?

Woods of Wisdom (WoW) is a long-term European Voluntary Service (EVS) project taking place in Latvia for 11 months - year of an adventure together with Adventure Spirit (aka Piedzīvojuma Gars). Read more about principles of EVS here.

Welcome to Woods of Wisdom - an opportunity for diverse and fun experience filled with meaningful and adventurous days. Together with Piedzīvojuma Gars team you will have the opportunity to implement experiential and outdoor education methods in local schools and their daily curriculum, promoting activities for youngsters such as healthcare and well-being, respect for nature and environment, teamwork in classes and overall better results reached working side by side together as a team! Also, one of this project's goals is to develop several long-term partnerships with schools to support youngsters in their personal and professional development.

Your daily work will consist of different team building events for groups and organizing various kinds of events - boat rides, climbing events, hikes, night and day games, slackline events, camps, outdoor cooking, treehouse building and other adventures. Some days might be outdoors, facilitating activities deep into forest, other days might be working with kids in schools, or helping out in the office for activity preparation. You will have the chance to challenge yourself at the level you feel suits you the best.   

For you this project is a chance to volunteer and participate into creation of countless adventurous and educational events, and most importantly, an opportunity to learn by doing together with our experienced team. 

More practical info you will find in sections below

Project dates: end of April 2019 till end of March 2020

About us - your new family

Piedzīvojuma Gars (Adventure Spirit) is a non-governmental, non-profit organization, with aim to develop and promote adventure and experiential learning methods. On daily basis we help teams and individuals to grow, so they can achieve their best while keeping in mind their and others values. Outdoors and adventure is our tool, for others success, and developing training programs is our passion. Every year we help hundreds of young people to find a clear path towards success and happiness. Adventure Spirit often serves as a platform for many experiments and new ideas of our clients and our dear members. Sometimes it`s challenging, but nonetheless exciting to list diversity of the roads taken by our member initiatives. Dinners in treetops, tree house building, dance hikes, 24h challenges, foreign expeditions and many other events are just few of hundreds of projects done by Adventure Spirit and our amazing members. All these events are connected by our core values of perfection, inclusion, safety, cooperation and nature and these are also the values brought to this project.

Where do we work?

Next to our office is our Gravity Hall - room for workshops and trainings. Almost every day here happens some dance or theater training, personal development lectures, poster and repair workshops and other events that you will be able to participate or even lead yourself. 
Our office is located  in Riga center within 5 min reach from all strategically important spots. Here we have comfortable area for work and for planning as well for informal evenings together with colleagues and friends. Next to the office is our storage, where all our equipment is stored (cameras, ropes, bikes, games...) In office we have few work stations for more serious photo/video editing.    
Many of our team building programs are happening in our adventure park, where also our treehouse is located. Here we host youth exchanges and trainings. It is a remote space with very beautiful nature and peace surrounding.

See what we do!

How will we support you in this journey?

We will:
  • Provide you with apartment/room (might be shared) with all necessary facilities (laundry room or washing machine, kitchen e.t.c)
  • Ensure refund for your local travel expenses (up to 30€ per month) as well as provide you with a bicycle for you to get around the city
  • Ensure refund for food expenses up to 160€ per month + during programs and activities we usually also provide meals
  • Give you pocket money up to 90€ per month
  • Hook you up with a mentor, who will share experience and knowledge in order to make your being here more meaningful and powerful
  • Arrange meetings with a coach who will help you to reach your goals
  • Follow up your development and constantly provide you with new opportunities and adventures
  • Make sure that you receive full health insurance
  • Take care of your safety
  • Refund you travel expenses to and from Latvia up to 275€

What experiences you might gain?

Volunteering in Piedzīvojuma Gars can provide you with a vast amount of experiences and practical skills in short so-called "Life skills", however in the end it will be your decision what skills and experiences to gain. Here are just few of many perks of being a volunteer in PG:
  • Event planning and coordinating skills. If you find yourself up to the challenge to take initiative and responsibility to create your own events and/or programs
  • Game development and gamification skills. We like to turn simple experiences into all kinds of games, possibility to learn new and exciting ways how to do that
  • Outdoor activity skills and experiences (hiking, kayaking, slackline, climbing, camping...). We love outdoors, we love adventures and we love camping - a tool we use when working with groups. If you crave for the wild, we can teach you the best ways how to enjoy it
  • Digital design skills (web maintenance, photo editing, graphical design, video editing e.t.c). We like to have nice videos and photos. For games we love nice drawings and diagrams. You feel like learning some digital design skills? 
  • Saws, axes, electricity, screws, nails and paint, those are very beloved things for us, letting us to create our dreams and shape our surroundings. We don`t throw away, we fix. We make new games and materials with tools we have and we build tree houses, cause in childhood we wanted one. These crafty skills can free your mind and break down several borders in your life! Ready to get your hands dirty? We have all the tools just for that
  • Leadership and friendship skills. Group and individual development is our aim. How to be a good leader, how to be a supportive friend and how to distinguish those two, are topics we often find ourselves teaching to others
  • Group dynamics. You will experience this process on yourself, observe others and most importantly you will have the chance to learn to deal with group dynamic processes in everyday situations. Team building games, activities, and many other tools could become an important part of your tool-kit!
  • Youth-work experience is definitely on the list. Almost daily we meet hyper active kids who need small guidance to be more friendly to each other, or lost youngsters who are not always sure where to head their life next
  • Latvian hospitality, traditional cuisine and culture. We will make sure you experience our traditions, taste our best foods, see our best sights, and enjoy a relaxing evening in our sandy beaches. By the way.. Did you know that our sun sets and sun rises last WAY longer than in Central and South Europe and are SUPER colorful?

Ready to be part of this adventure? Check criteria and jump in!

We  are open for almost everyone willing to jump into this adventure. We just need you to compile with few criteria:
  • You are between 17 and 30 years old (at the time  of project beginning)
  • You are ready to commit for this project for 11 months  between 2019 end of April and 2020 end of March (with a chance to have vacation/days off to go home for holidays or just travel around)
  • You are European Union citizen
  • You haven't participated in any other long term EVS program
  • Motivated to work on the individual and group development of young people aged 13-25
  • Willing to continuously learn new things, reflect and evaluate your own development
  • Outdoor and adventures sounds like fun for you