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Globe Aware coordinates, organizes and leads volunteer vacations, service vacations, working holidays and service trips to two Peru locations (Andes & Cusco/Machu Picchu), Costa Rica, Thailand, Cuba, Nepal, Brazil, Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, India, Jamaica, Romania, Ghana, Mexico, and China .
Click here for a list of programs, dates and costs.
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What is a Volunteer Vacation and Service Vacation?
Globe Aware trips are professionally planned and lead. You do not need special skills or the ability to speak a foreign language. Globe Aware employees lay the ground work prior to your arrival; accompany you during your volunteer vacation, and assist with transfers and departures.
- Globe Aware's volunteer vacations are appropriate for solo travelers, multigenerational family travel, corporate or custom groups.
- Immerse yourself in a new culture.
- Meet new people in remarkable, interesting countries.
- Experience a life-changing adventure. Help communities by working on meaningful projects. Click here for dates and costs.
Globe Aware Volunteer Vacations - Signup Now
"Globe Aware has been a leader in... shorter volunteer vacations" - USA Today
Click here to view a trailer from a documentary on one of Globe Aware's programs.
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Tax-deductible vacations
Globe Aware is an American and Canadian-registered non-profit charitable organization. All volunteer vacation program costs, including (for American citizens) the cost of airfare, are tax-deductible. Globe Aware is a 501 (c) (3) tax-exempt charity and tax receipts are provided to all volunteer vacation participants.
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The deadline for the 2011 GO! Volunteer Abroad scholarship application is September 15th, 2011. The award for each GO! Volunteer Abroad scholarship is $1,000.
- Volunteer abroad scholarships are awarded each academic year. The award for each scholarship is $1,000.
- GO! Overseas will judge entries based on the following criteria: Creativity of writing sample, displayed analytical thinking, and passion for volunteering.
- The GO! Volunteer Abroad Scholarship is open to participants in volunteer programs in the upcoming year. Recipients must be successfully accepted into a volunteer abroad program. The sole purpose of this award is to assist in the funding of participation in a volunteer abroad program.
- Outstanding scholarship submissions will be posted on the GO! Overseas website. All recipients will be required to participate in a pre-departure and post-return interview.
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By Nicole Davis
Ever feel as though we’re running out of time to save the environment? Try taking a vacation to solve the problem. In the span of one week you can make a significant change. Volunteer vacationing has become a style of travel so popular, it now has a nickname, voluntourism. We’ve cherry-picked trips that allow green vouluntourists to work in fabulous countries like Peru or Thailand. You’ll be so captivated by your surrounding you’ll hardly notice you’re working.
(Note: Prices don’t include airfare)
Bring Cleaner Energy to a Peruvian Village
Even if you can get away only for a week, you still have enough time to do good in an exotic locale. Kimberly Haley-Coleman understands the average do-gooder’s time constraints, which is why she created Globe Aware in 2000. Instead of two or three weeks of international work, her non-profit offers week-long vacations that include unique projects and side trips in seven fantastic destinations.
In Peru, for instance, volunteers stay in a facility in Cusco where they teach children English and computer literacy. Or they can travel to rural Andean villages, which often lack electricity and running water, to build adobe stoves for cooking – a huge environmental – and health saver since they use only a fraction of the energy of traditional wood fires. This also eliminates carcinogenic smoke exposure, which can be the equivalent of smoking three packs a day.
Like every Globe Aware trip, the extracurricular activities are just as eye opening: Volunteers can visit Machu-Picchu and other ancient sites, as well as explore the cobble-stoned, streets of colonial Cusco.
The non-profit offers other eco-minded vacations too. Like the trip to Laos, where volunteers build wheelchairs from recycled parts for locals victimized by landmines; and a Costa Rican restoration project in a national forest reserve.
Duration: one week
Cost: $1050 to $1390 including accommodations and meals
Contact: www.globeaware.org
Before You Go
Before signing up to volunteer halfway around the world, its worth investigating your potential job, the job’s organizer, and your financial concerns. David Clemmons, industry expert and director of volunteerism.org, offers a few pointers.
- Volunteer with an established organization (like the ones we’ve suggested). If yours offers fewer than 20 trips a year, or serves fewer than 200 volunteers a year, you may find yourself a victim of its inexperience.
- Determine if you have the right skill set. If you’re not a numbers person, you probably don’t want to collect data for a field research team – even if you’re in the Caribbean.
- Ask about the intensity of labor. Will you be spending a full day under the African sun doing backbreaking work? Or will you get afternoons off?
- Speak to former volunteers about their experiences. If your organization can’t produce one, there’s probably a reason.
- Make sure to ask what the other volunteers are like – are they mostly retired? College students? Church groups? – to find a group you’ll be most comfortable with.
- And finally, because you will be donating your time to a charitable cause, it’s possible you can write-off your entire vacation. But before booking that first-class flight, ask your accountant if its tax-deductible.
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- Category: About
- Published:
By Nicole Davis
Ever feel as though we’re running out of time to save the environment? Try taking a vacation to solve the problem. In the span of one week you can make a significant change. Volunteer vacationing has become a style of travel so popular, it now has a nickname, voluntourism. We’ve cherry-picked trips that allow green vouluntourists to work in fabulous countries like Peru or Thailand. You’ll be so captivated by your surrounding you’ll hardly notice you’re working.
(Note: Prices don’t include airfare)
Bring Cleaner Energy to a Peruvian Village
Even if you can get away only for a week, you still have enough time to do good in an exotic locale. Kimberly Haley-Coleman understands the average do-gooder’s time constraints, which is why she created Globe Aware in 2000. Instead of two or three weeks of international work, her non-profit offers week-long vacations that include unique projects and side trips in seven fantastic destinations.
In Peru, for instance, volunteers stay in a facility in Cusco where they teach children English and computer literacy. Or they can travel to rural Andean villages, which often lack electricity and running water, to build adobe stoves for cooking – a huge environmental – and health saver since they use only a fraction of the energy of traditional wood fires. This also eliminates carcinogenic smoke exposure, which can be the equivalent of smoking three packs a day.
Like every Globe Aware trip, the extracurricular activities are just as eye opening: Volunteers can visit Machu-Picchu and other ancient sites, as well as explore the cobble-stoned, streets of colonial Cusco.
The non-profit offers other eco-minded vacations too. Like the trip to Laos, where volunteers build wheelchairs from recycled parts for locals victimized by landmines; and a Costa Rican restoration project in a national forest reserve.
Duration: one week
Cost: $1050 to $1390 including accommodations and meals
Contact: www.globeaware.org
Before You Go
Before signing up to volunteer halfway around the world, its worth investigating your potential job, the job’s organizer, and your financial concerns. David Clemmons, industry expert and director of volunteerism.org, offers a few pointers.
- Volunteer with an established organization (like the ones we’ve suggested). If yours offers fewer than 20 trips a year, or serves fewer than 200 volunteers a year, you may find yourself a victim of its inexperience.
- Determine if you have the right skill set. If you’re not a numbers person, you probably don’t want to collect data for a field research team – even if you’re in the Caribbean.
- Ask about the intensity of labor. Will you be spending a full day under the African sun doing backbreaking work? Or will you get afternoons off?
- Speak to former volunteers about their experiences. If your organization can’t produce one, there’s probably a reason.
- Make sure to ask what the other volunteers are like – are they mostly retired? College students? Church groups? – to find a group you’ll be most comfortable with.
- And finally, because you will be donating your time to a charitable cause, it’s possible you can write-off your entire vacation. But before booking that first-class flight, ask your accountant if its tax-deductible.
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Press Releases and News
Everything You Need to be a Better Journalist
By Al Tompkins
April 1, 2007
Vacation Volunteerism
USA Today found that a small but growing number of Americans are coupling their desire to help others with their desire to travel. In fact, the new phrase "voluntourism" has been born.
Surveys conducted recently by Orbitz, Travelocity and the Travel Industry Association of America confirm that consumers are becoming more interested in vacations with a volunteerism aspect, also known as "voluntourism."
Opportunities that once existed largely with nonprofit activist groups are being adopted by a wide range of travel agencies and tour operators, too. Sally Brown, who heads the Indianapolis not-for-profit group Ambassadors for Children, said the number of travel organizations of various kinds that offer voluntourism trips has probably doubled in the past three years.
Here is a sample of what you can do to help:
Globe Aware, a nonprofit organization, currently offers volunteer vacations in Peru, Costa Rica, Thailand, Cuba, Nepal, Brazil, Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam. These short-term (one week) adventures in service focus on cultural-awareness and sustainability, and are often compared to a "mini peace corps." All program costs, including the cost of airfare, are tax-deductible. [...]
You need no special skills nor do you need to speak any foreign language. Immerse yourself in a new culture. Enjoy befriending people in new and interesting countries and experience the reward of helping them on meaningful community projects.
Click here to view a trailer from a documentary on one of Globe Aware's programs.
Travelocity's annual forecast poll found that 11 percent of respondents plan to volunteer during their vacations in 2007 -- up from 6 percent in 2006. From community outreach such as building homes and schools to environment-related projects, people are simply looking for ways to give back and get more involved in important causes.
Travelocity has created a grant program as part of its Travel For Good initiative aimed at travelers yearning for a richer and more meaningful travel experience and is calling for entries from deserving volunteers. With a growing optimism among people that they can have a positive impact through travel, Travelocity is helping with the launch of the grant program.
Under the Travel For Good initiative, first launched in August 2006, Travelocity began a program called Change Ambassadors to help bring the idea of "voluntourism" to a broader, mainstream audience. Key components of the Change Ambassadors program are consumer and employee grants that will be awarded to people who wish to help others through volunteering, but do not have the financial means to take a volunteer vacation. Travelocity will award two $5,000 grants per quarter to customers and one $5,000 grant per quarter to employees.
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Voluntourism
K. Jill Rigby - Contributing Travel Editor
Getting tired of the same old tourist locales? Longing to travel to an exotic place? Interested in doing something meaningful like painting a new community centre in rural China or helping maintain the habitat of one of the world's rarest land birds, the Kakerori, in the Cook Islands? With so many organizations now catering to those who want to travel and do good, choosing a suitable destination and activity is as easy as flying to Cancun. You’ll have to pick up the airfare and some organizations have nominal program fees (food, lodging, work site transportation, program materials and administrative costs) but it’s all tax deductible. One of the highest-profile non-profits, Globe Aware, offers programs in Peru, Costa Rica, Thailand, Cuba, Nepal, Brazil, Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, Jamaica, and Romania. Like a mini peace corps, the one-week adventures are geared towards promoting cultural-awareness and sustainability. But if it’s the thought of working with orphans that tugs at your heartstrings, you may want to consider Child Haven. Bonnie and Fred Cappuccino, who adopted and brought up 19 boys and girls from 11 countries along with their two biological children, operate out of Maxville, Ontario. Seven orphanages are spread through Nepal, Tibet, India and Bangladesh.
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By: Manya Chylinski
No longer on the fringes of travel, voluntourism has attracted increasing numbers of travelers looking to learn new skills, meet people, and give back to the global community. In a recent Travelocity poll, 38 percent of repondents said they planned to volunteer while on vacation; thats up from just 6 percent in 2006. "People tell me that a vacation with us is the most meaningful experience of their lives," says David Minich of Habitat for Humanity. Here's how to plan one.
THE EXPERIENCE:
Go with your interests when deciding to work with people, animals, or the environment. Most programs don't require you to have any special skills. Despite the short-term naure of these trips, you may complete a significant task, such as building adobe stoves in an Amazon village. "We're not solving the world's problems," says Globe Aware's Kimberly Haley-Coleman. "But volunteers do make a difference."
