Volunteers and their stories
To view feedback stories for a specific programme, please use the links below. Otherwise, scroll down to read some general feedback stories from all of our programmes and get a sense of the experiences WorkingAbroad programmes offer.
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Iceland Wilderness |
Joanne Spencer from the UK, who volunteered on our Statia Conservation Project for 4 months and then joined our Teach in Rural Thailand Project afterwards, has some great news to share!
Its Joanne. I did the Statia Conservation project, and then the Teach in rural Thailand with you.
I am now on a 1 year working holiday Visa in Canada. And planning to travel to South America in 2012 so may well be in touch to see what you offer there.
Whilst in Thailand, on your project I met a guy, and we got engaged this Christmas! So thanks WorkingAbroad!! :)
Kind Regards
Joanne Spencer
Claire Brown, Bsc Environmental Science from the UK writes about her Flying Squirrel Internship in Nevada, USA
My summer internship with The Great Basin Institute Reno, Nevada was valuable work experience. I learned a range of skills from live trapping live small mammals to conducting radio telemetry. Highlights of the trip included locating the first radio collared squirrel using radio telemetry and watching the squirrels glide between trees. The fieldwork was physically demanding however we were often rewarded by the opportunity to have a dip in the cool blue water of Lake Tahoe after a long day of hiking. The internship was not only excellent experience for my future career, it was also an opportunity to make friends from across the globe. I would certainly recommend this internship as it offers a good balance between learning, work and adventure. A typical week would involve four long days working and camping in the field undertaking research, a small amount of time in the office and a three day weekend enjoying the range of adventure opportunities that Nevada has to offer.
Feedback from ex-interns on our Cape Fear River Watch Internship, USA
Testimonials from volunteers and interns with NeVo - Nexos Voluntarios - in Peru
Yvonne Hendrych, a textile professional from Brussels, joined the Teaching in Rural Thailand programme in August 2011 and gives her feedback:
The project was amazing :-)
Everything worked out so smoothly and everyone was so extremely kind and nice to me that I had the most wonderful time there.
Everyone was incredibly nice and helpful and I felt at home right away. Also my host family was amazing. I really found a second family in Thailand and we got along so well even without speaking the same language. My host mother made a great effort to learn some English and I did my best to learn a couple of Thai words. Teaching was great fun but also quite challenging because I was teaching many different classes and all different levels of English. So I always had to first check and then quickly adapt to the level of English they had.
But luckily all the previous teachers kept a teacher’s diary and wrote down their experiences with the students so I could check in advance 
what kind of games or exercises they had been doing. Anyway the emphasis is on conversation. And this is best done through little games or quizzes. Students love the competition and teaming up against each other. It sometimes takes a bit to involve them because often they are very shy. But once they warmed up it was so much fun. I must say I enjoyed all classes and never had a boring moment.
On Sundays I went to temple school to teach the little ones (5-8 years) together with other teachers from Prangku who teach on a voluntary basis on Sundays. All the teachers at Prangku are so committed and engaged and dedicate also so much of their free time to the school and the students. It is really remarkable. 
Big compliment. And the students were just wonderful. They were so nice and polite and really eager to learn English. I can only recommend this experience to everyone who enjoys being with children and to everyone who is interested in getting to know a new culture.
Thank you Working Abroad. This is really a remarkable initiative which offers unforgettable experiences for both sides.
Alexandra Mangold volunteered on the Amazon research project in Summer 2011
My time with Fauna Forever was amaizing. I really had a great time. Everything was organised and I didn't have to worry about anything.
I was working in the herpetology team and the work was hard sometimes, but I absolutely fell in love with the jungle and the animals living in it, so that the work was never too hard.
So all together, everything was well organised, the people were friendly and caring and the work in the jungle was amazing. We even saw a jaguar :).
Cristina Melchion, from Italy, volunteered recently on the Desert Elephants project, and describes her experience
Everything went well! I met a lot of new people, everybody was very nice. I learnt many camping activities like making a fire, 
collecting wood, making breakfast and dinner, and how to pay attention to dangers.
I improved my English, I spoke with local people, I danced with them, I learnt a lot about local culture because I participated in a township tour, I did sandboarding, I had another bad but very interesting experience with local transport (you don't leave until the bus is full!!! so you never know when you leave and when you arrive!).
I followed elephants for two weeks: how amazing it was!!!! We were very very near to them. We managed to build two walls: I learnt how to make cement. I enjoyed the desert and its views....but I, most of all, enjoyed my stay with local and non local people, the people always make the difference, people as friends, as colleagues, as travel mates, always make the difference in the places you visit. I learnt a lot from them. The project is not only an association which tries to make peace in the Namibian desert between farmers and elephants, but I think there is a more profound purpose behind it: learning to share everything, to collaborate, to stay together and learn to face difficulties together, something that in modern society is lost.
So definitely I don't regret my choice this year.....I'm already thinking of what I can do next year!.
Before Harvard, Heather takes a gap year and volunteers with UBELONG in Ecuador and Peru. Stephen, a Cornell health student, becomes a UBELONG volunteer in Ecuador. And two volunteers; Joao and Devon, also give feedback on their time volunteeing in Cambodia.
UVolunteer feedback stories and comments from volunteers in Ghana, Thailand and Costa Rica.
Feedback from several volunteers who joined International Volunteer HQ and worked in orphanages in Nepal and Colombia, childcare work in Costa Rica and taught sports in Ghana.
Peter Ngufor is a 34 year old Computer programmer from London who worked on the South African Wild Coast Schools Computer Literacy project for 4 weeks last summer with Kaya Responsible Travel.
Morgan Shortt writes about her experience arriving in Kallar, Sri Lanka, one week after the Tsunami hit, and how she volunteered there cleaning up and building temporary shelters, and her experiences living with people right after the disaster.
Feedback from various volunteers on the Statia Conservation Project, Netherlands Antilles Caribbean - doing sea turtle monitoring, trail work and botanical garden work.