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On Volunteering Abroad
The Nescient
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
So, I'm in college and have figured that if I fail to get an internship, then I should try to volunteer abroad. It is basically a do-goodery/get life experience type of motivation.
The problem: All the volunteer abroad programs I find seem to be geared toward this idea of a "Volunteering Vacation."(one organization actually calls it that) These trips where you go to some tropical location, teach some local kids english for a week or two, and then go mountain climbing/surfing/whatever for the rest of the time your there.
The question: can someone point to an organization that would send me somewhere to actually help out for the summer? Also, can someone explain to me why it is so beneficial to teach english to children that so many organizations are dedicated to that task alone?
other stuff/ not really necessary to the question: I'm trying not to offend anyone with this even though it may seem somewhat pretentious. I realize that wherever I go there will be something cool to do like mountain climbing/surfing/whatever, but it seems somehow wrong when the organization plans for half (or sometimes more) of my time to be spent doing these fun things. Hopefully I've just been unlucky in what I've come across, and the vast majority of volunteer organizations are much better. Is it the case that most legitimately helpful organizations require more than a 2-3 month commitment (like the peace corps)?
The problem: All the volunteer abroad programs I find seem to be geared toward this idea of a "Volunteering Vacation."(one organization actually calls it that) These trips where you go to some tropical location, teach some local kids english for a week or two, and then go mountain climbing/surfing/whatever for the rest of the time your there.
The question: can someone point to an organization that would send me somewhere to actually help out for the summer? Also, can someone explain to me why it is so beneficial to teach english to children that so many organizations are dedicated to that task alone?
other stuff/ not really necessary to the question: I'm trying not to offend anyone with this even though it may seem somewhat pretentious. I realize that wherever I go there will be something cool to do like mountain climbing/surfing/whatever, but it seems somehow wrong when the organization plans for half (or sometimes more) of my time to be spent doing these fun things. Hopefully I've just been unlucky in what I've come across, and the vast majority of volunteer organizations are much better. Is it the case that most legitimately helpful organizations require more than a 2-3 month commitment (like the peace corps)?
The Nescient on
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Now learning English is fantastically useful if it isn't your first language, but I suspect the main reason it is so popular on these sorts of things is that it's a skill most people in Britain/America have and don't need to be taught too much to pass on.
What other useful skills do the average students have? Bugger all? I mean you could do some unskilled manual labour, but so could someone local.
I have no idea about short summer stints. If you can dedicate a year or so or more, look into JET. It's not a given that they'll accept you (maybe about 1/5 of applicants get in last I checked), but you'll get all that useful resume / life experience and get paid to boot.
If you're American, there is always the Peace Corp or Teach for America (both of which are actually very competitive as well).
Some posts are easier than others, but in most cases you will also need several vaccinations. If you see this volunteerism as a long vacation, you should reconsider, the Peace Corps could be quite tough and there is no guarantee that you will be actually accepted.
This past summer I spent a month in Guatemala doing legit volunteer work
Organization was run by former Peace Corps people and they were doing a lot of legitimately good and impactful work, and I got to meet a great number of cool and interesting people
It wasn't a vacation trip, we did homestays for part of the time, learned some Spanish (some people going on the trip had 0 knowledge, I had taken Spanish in high school but not since then, and some were fluent, so it didn't really matter, and you got to learn a lot), but also got a chance to do some fun things on the weekends.
It was definitely a good experience, here's the org: http://www.socialentrepreneurcorps.com/
All the other kids will be around college age, some people were recent graduates... they have a 2 month program and a 1 month program. My group had people from just graduated to sophomore in college. The program was fairly well organized, and you got to do some useful things while learning what a real NGO might do in a developing nation, as well as getting a chance to see life there up close and personal.
Drop me a PM if you got q's... or just ask here too.
I wouldn't recommend looking into the peace corps unless you plan on staying the entire two years. They probably don't like that too much. Peace Corps also takes a looong time to get into. I've been in the process for almost a year now and I still don't have a placement.
When you say volunteer do you mean they pay for everything and you do the work? How do you feel about paying some amount (even if it's for airfare)? How do you feel about getting paid? I once had a roommate from Taiwan and he tried to recruit me to come to Taiwan for a summer and work at an English camp or something, where I would have actually gotten paid.
I think maybe some reason they add in the "fun" stuff on these, is because often the volunteers pay a fee to come and volunteer. Maybe people think if they are paying they should at least have a little fun.
Corcorigan: I don't have a problem with fun. My problem is with the organization I'm volunteering for sending me on a white water rafting trip for half the time I'm with them. this makes it pretty obvious that the volunteering organization is focused more on providing its participants with some feel-goods, than actually doing any good for the country their in.
Fair enough.
I think the ideal would be combining both successfully. Some sort of reef survey on a tropical island?
10 Volunteer Opportunities For Free Travel http://matadorchange.com/10-volunteer-opportunities-for-free-travel/#/