ESC: Volunteer @ Sea

Horizon Educatief is a nature education organization, perfectly located near the beach in Ostend, Belgium. Horizon Educatief inspires people to discover and appreciate the versatility of our coast. Horizon Educatief works around the pillars: nature/environment and coastal heritage. All our activities link sustainability and solidarity in the widest possible context. Creativity and experience-oriented working are central to the range of guided workshops, training and tailor-made packages we make. Horizon Educatief focuses primarily on education, but also works tailor-made for other target groups. Most of our groups are primary school groups between the ages of 6 and 12. We are constantly evolving and our looking for new audience to bring our message too. In the future we want to organize activities for the deaf, blind, people with a mental disability, BME groups, ... We love the sea ourselves and want to pass on the same passion for the sea to our participants. That is why experience is central to all our activities. For example, we do not tell about the fishing, but let the participants go into the water to fish shrimp. We do not tell about the wind, but let them make works of art on the beach with colored chalk that is blown away by the wind. We have now developed more than 30 different workshops for all ages (main focus = school groups). There are workshops on ecology, biodiversity, fisheries, climate, renewable energy, coastal heritage, navigation, marine litter ... In addition to our workshops from our regular offer for school groups, we also organize activities for families with children, team building, (summer) camps, awareness campaigns, ... The staff of the organisation includes 2,3 fulltime workers. Additionally there are a lot of volunteers who work at different levels in the association.