Fourteen fully funded European Solidarity Corps placements are open right now across 8 countries, and the lives behind them could not be more different. You could be building a nursery for fifty children deep inside a Tanzanian nature reserve, raising an off grid community kitchen from earth and wood on a Greek hillside, bringing creative workshops to children living in a Greek shelter, running horticulture and animal care at a pedagogical farm in Portugal, living inside a working eco museum in Italy where every house tells a story, or promoting human rights and volunteering through podcasts and workshops on the island of Sardinia. From rural France to a city cultural centre in Poland, from a peace NGO office to a nature rich German kindergarten, this is one of the widest ranges of volunteering life we have gathered in a single post.
Every one of these fourteen placements is a European Solidarity Corps opportunity, which means the funding is real: travel within the usual distance bands, accommodation, food, local transport, insurance, pocket money, a mentor and language support are all covered, for volunteers aged 18 to 30. A few carry eligibility rules worth checking before you fall in love with them, and those are flagged below. The deadlines run from 31 July to 21 August 2026, so there is time, but the best placements move fast.
What's in this batch:
14 Fully Funded ESC Volunteering Placements · 8 Countries · Deadlines from 31 July to 21 August 2026
🩷 ESC Volunteering Opportunities
🇧🇬 Bulgaria: Community Action and Social Inclusion in a Team 🤝
📅 Deadline: 31 July 2026
Join an international team of volunteers and make a real mark on a local community. Together with young people from different countries you will organise community activities, non formal education workshops, awareness campaigns and initiatives promoting social inclusion, equality, active citizenship and solidarity. You will work closely with local youth, schools, community centres and civil society organisations, all while sharpening your teamwork, communication, leadership and intercultural skills. A chance to learn, build friendships and drive meaningful social change through collective action. Open to applicants from 🇮🇹 🇩🇪 🇫🇷 🇹🇷 🇵🇹 and 16 more. Change made by a team, not a solo act.
🇬🇷 Greece: Creative Support for Children in a Shelter 💙
📅 Deadline: 2 August 2026
Work closely with children who have lived through difficult conditions, at a shelter that offers them stability, care and a real sense of belonging. Your part is to strengthen the kids emotionally and socially through non formal education: creative, experiential workshops that build self expression, trust and self confidence while developing individual skills, teamwork, language and new knowledge. Training in teaching English and in child protection comes with it, plus steady support from the staff so you feel prepared and confident in your role. Open to applicants from 🇧🇪 🇩🇪 🇮🇹 🇵🇹 🇸🇪 and 3 more. Steady presence for kids who have had little of it.
🇵🇱 Poland: Creative Workshops at a City Cultural Centre 🎨
📅 Deadline: 3 August 2026
Bring a city's cultural life to life across seven district branches serving kids, young people and adults. You will run native language and English speaking clubs for the local community, help organise concerts, family events and workshops, and lead your own extra classes in graphics, photography, filmmaking, music, cooking, sports or board games. Add promoting events through videos, photos and posters, spreading the word about European opportunities, and organising your very own special event from your own idea. A real playground for anyone into cultural animation. Open to applicants from 🇮🇹 🇭🇷 🇱🇻 🇵🇹 🇷🇴 and 24 more. Seven venues, and room to run your own thing.
📋 New to ESC volunteering? Everything you need to know, how it works, who can apply, what costs are covered, is in one place. Read the complete guide →
🇹🇿 Tanzania: Building a Nursery and Reforesting a Nature Reserve 🌳
📅 Deadline: 5 August 2026
Join a team of fifteen volunteers on a mission deep inside a Tanzanian natural reserve, supporting local communities. Together you will help a village build a nursery for fifty children who currently walk six kilometres through the bush each day to reach kindergarten, and support a seed bank and conservation project collecting, storing and replanting tree species to strengthen the ecosystem. This one is for nature lovers ready for a genuine digital detox: surrounded by wildlife, working daily with local communities and learning firsthand about community resilience and forest restoration, in a multicultural team. Open to applicants from 🇩🇪 🇮🇹 🇵🇹 🇹🇷 🇵🇱 and 26 more. A digital detox with genuine purpose behind it.
🇧🇬 Bulgaria: Empowering Youth through Non Formal Education ✊
📅 Deadline: 9 August 2026
Contribute to building a more inclusive and supportive community. Through non formal education activities, awareness campaigns, community outreach and youth initiatives, you will promote social inclusion, equality, active citizenship and the prevention of violence and discrimination. Working with staff and local volunteers, you will support workshops in schools and community centres, organise events, create educational and digital materials, and encourage young people with fewer opportunities to take an active part in society. Practical, hands on experience in youth work rooted in solidarity, respect and human rights. Open to applicants from 🇭🇷 🇫🇮 🇮🇹 🇹🇷 🇷🇴 and 15 more. Youth work with human rights at its core.
🇮🇹 Italy: Living and Working Inside an Eco Museum 🏘️
📅 Deadline: 9 August 2026
Live inside a living eco museum, where every house, street and garden is part of a collective story of memory and sustainability. Working with a tutor and the team, you will help coordinate the booking, reception and assistance for visitors joining the museum's experiential itineraries, manage the logistics of immersive activities and stays in the earthen houses, and keep the shared spaces cared for so the visitor experience stays high quality. You will not replace qualified staff but enrich and expand the activities with your own ideas and skills, actively co designing as part of a real community. Open to applicants from 🇩🇪 🇫🇷 🇭🇷 🇱🇻 🇵🇹 and 11 more. A whole village as your workplace and home.
✍️ Last minute motivation letter? Here's how to write one that actually gets read, and remembered. Read the guide →
🇵🇹 Portugal: Tourism and Youth Centre Work 🏖️
📅 Deadline: 10 August 2026
Split your nine months between two worlds. In the mornings, work with the city's Tourism Unit, supporting and designing events that promote this port city, and getting hands on with communication and social media. In the afternoons, dive into non formal education at a youth centre, helping disadvantaged children with homework while offering a social space to make friends and play. You will also help organise activities and events for young people, including ones promoting youth mobility, and propose your own initiatives. ⚠️ Open to residents of Italy. Two very different halves of one working day.
🇵🇹 Portugal: Pedagogical Farm and Animal Care 🐴
📅 Deadline: 10 August 2026
A dual placement blending education and animal care. At a pedagogical farm, run workshops and cooking sessions with children, get hands on with horticulture, help manage children's camps at Easter and in summer, take part in animal assisted therapy sessions, and feed and care for the animals, all while raising environmental awareness. You will also support the Municipal Veterinary Services in daily tasks, contributing directly to the care and protection of local wildlife. Perfect if you love both education and animals. ⚠️ Open to residents of Italy. For the ones who love both kids and animals.
🇬🇷 Greece: Natural Building an Off Grid Community Kitchen 🔨
📅 Deadline: 10 August 2026
Spend a month with a team building something real with your own hands: an indoor kitchen and gathering space made from earth, wood and care at an off grid, solar powered community that has grown over years into a home for learning and simple living. This kitchen will hold the books and board games and become the spot for rainy days, quiet evenings and movie nights. You will learn natural building techniques from experienced hands, no previous experience needed, only curiosity and a readiness to get your hands in the earth. Life here is off grid: tents among the trees, cicadas through the day and the sea close by. Open to applicants from 🇦🇱 🇧🇪 🇧🇬 🇫🇷 🇵🇹 and 1 more. Build a room people will gather in for years.
💡 What do organisations actually look for in an ESC volunteer? Skills, values, attitude, what makes a strong profile. Read the guide →
🇮🇹 Italy: Promoting Human Rights and Volunteering on a Mediterranean Island 📣
📅 Deadline: 10 August 2026
Be the protagonist of a project built around solidarity, human rights and the power of volunteering. Working with young people from different countries, you will promote human rights, volunteering, intercultural learning and international mobility using digital tools like blogs, podcasts, TikTok and Instagram, alongside face to face workshops and events. It is a path of active citizenship and social inclusion that grows your personal and professional skills while strengthening solidarity in the local community, all on the island of Sardinia. Open to applicants from 🇩🇪 🇫🇷 🇪🇸 🇬🇷 🇳🇴 and 26 more. Human rights work, with Sardinia as your backdrop.
🇬🇷 Greece: Supporting a Youth Centre and Its ESC Community 📢
📅 Deadline: 15 August 2026
Be the link between an organisation and the volunteers it hosts. You will organise activities for the volunteers, run projects and prepare workshops and campaigns, support local youth at school fairs, presentations and school projects, develop the organisation's webpage with fresh information and pictures, edit and publish a newsletter about ESC life, take care of the social media and act as a contact person for partner organisations and incoming volunteers. A hands on, connective role for someone social, creative and organised. ⚠️ Open to residents of France. The person who holds a whole volunteer community together.
🇫🇷 France: European Values and Youth Participation in Rural France 🎙️
📅 Deadline: 16 August 2026
Join an international team promoting European values, intercultural dialogue and youth participation in the South West. You will run creative workshops, facilitate language cafés, promote your own culture and language, support activities on European citizenship, human rights, inclusion and sustainable development, and contribute to digital and communication projects like podcasts, videos and social media content. Along the way you meet children, young people and local residents while discovering French culture and sharing your own, with real encouragement to develop your own personal initiatives. Open to applicants from 🇧🇬 🇭🇷 🇫🇮 🇱🇹 🇸🇪 and 21 more. Slow rural France, with plenty of room for your ideas.
🗺️ Not sure if your country is eligible? The full list of ESC and Erasmus+ programme and partner countries, including many outside the EU. Check eligibility →
🇵🇱 Poland: Communication and Peace Education at an NGO Office ☮️
📅 Deadline: 16 August 2026
Join the Polish branch of an international peace organisation whose mission is building peace through volunteering and education, structured around three pillars: peace with others, peace with nature and inner peace. Working from the office alongside staff, another volunteer and local volunteers, you will support social media management, graphic and web design, organise local events, prepare and run workshops for young people in schools, co lead summer volunteering projects, help deliver local and international trainings, and pitch in on everyday office work. Bring a personal project or initiative and they will do their best to make room for it. Open to applicants from 🇦🇲 🇬🇪 🇮🇸 🇲🇪 🇹🇷 and 30 more. Peace work, from the inside of an NGO.
🇩🇪 Germany: Kindergarten Work in a Rural Nature Region 🧸
📅 Deadline: 21 August 2026
A kindergarten in a nature rich rural region, surrounded by fields and forests, caring for children in its nursery, kindergarten and after school sections. You support the educational team through everyday life, from helping with meals to creative, musical, physical and nature based activities, and you get the space to develop your own projects and enrich the centre by sharing your language, culture and skills. A mentor among the staff helps you settle in and answers the questions that come up day to day. Open to applicants from 🇧🇬 🇬🇱 🇭🇷 🇱🇹 🇵🇹 and 26 more. Small children, big forests, gentle days.
Fourteen placements, eight countries, one shared promise: your travel, housing, food, insurance and pocket money are covered, so the only thing you bring is yourself. The character of each one is wildly different. Some are built around children, from the Greek shelter and the German forest kindergarten to the Portuguese farm and the Polish cultural centre. Some are built around the planet, from reforesting a Tanzanian reserve to raising an off grid kitchen in Greece and living inside an Italian eco museum. Others put you at the heart of a cause, promoting human rights on Sardinia, building peace from a Polish NGO, or driving social inclusion in Bulgaria. A handful come with eligibility rules, two Portuguese placements are open to residents of Italy and one Greek role to residents of France, so read those before you apply. The calendar starts on 31 July and closes on 21 August 2026. Find the one that sounds like your next year, and start your application while the spot is still open.
