The Aisling Project – an after-school initiative working in Ballymun – was set up in 1997. Currently five projects, in various areas of Ballymun, work with more than 100 young people aged from 8 – 15 years. The Aisling Project, for the young people, takes place Monday to Thursday from 2.30 to 6pm during the school year, with a full three week summer project during the month of July. One of the projects geared towards secondary school students - “The Transition Programme” - operates slightly different hours -Monday, Tuesday and Thursday from 4pm until 7.30pm.The main aims of the Aisling Project are to prevent early school leaving, benefit the community and advance education by running an after-school intervention project for children at risk. This intervention provides purposeful activity in a caring, secure environment in an attempt to meet the young people’s developmental needs. The service provides a hot meal every day, homework supervision and a range of developmental activities – drama, art, music, swimming, sports, gardening and arts and crafts etc. The project will be based on the social and personal development of the young people through activity based programmes.This EVS project aims to develop links with other parts of Europe so that young people from different countries will have an experience of different cultures. The participants will learn more about the Irish culture as they immerse themselves in it, and also about youth work practices within an Irish context. The young people that we work with at Aisling Project will learn about their fellow Europeans – gaining an insight into Spanish, Italian and French cultures in a way they may not have the opportunity to otherwise.Our intention is to provide the participants with many opportunities to gain valuable experience and skills in working with young people and in living abroad - under the supervision of a coordinator, and with the support of colleagues and a mentor. We hope that this personal and professional development will lead to increased employability following the project.The project will have 5 participants from various programme countries. The participants will all have a demonstrated interest in working with children, a belief in helping young people achieve their true potential and be aged between 21 and 30. We are open to candidates of all backgrounds, including those with fewer opportunities, providing that we have the capacity to cater to their needs and provide a quality project that will achieve the objectives outlined in the Erasmus + Programme Guide, meeting the needs of both the participants and the organisation.The participants, along with other members of the team, will assist the children with homework, and provide other developmental and purposeful activities thought to enhance the young person’s ability to remain in school, their developmental progression and their resilience to everyday stresses and challenges. They will be involved in the day-to-day planning, implementation and delivery of the activities described above. They will also have the opportunity to plan and develop their own programmes for the children that interest them, with the support of their supervisor and colleagues. The paticipants will be asked to complete some office work at different times.They will work from 11.00am until 18.30pm Monday to Thursday and 11.00am to 13.00pm on Friday The volunteers will work during Irish school term and will be off for the school holidays. However they will be asked to work extra hours from time to time to cover residential trips, summer projects and outings during the school holidays. We hope that this project will provide the participants with invaluable experience of working in the youth field, develop their intercultural awareness and provide them with skills for living in an unfamiliar place. We also hope as a result of the participants being in the project, the young people we work with will have a broader knowledge of Europe, and experience of other cultures.