Kimberly Haley-Coleman, Executive Director, Globe Aware was recently featured in a continuing profile series at WorldNomads.com, a popular web-resource with a focus on keeping travelers traveling safely:
1. Who are you? Brief description of trips you offer
Globe Aware is a nonprofit that organizes one week volunteer programs in communities all around the world. Our focus is to promote cultural awareness and sustainability. For us, the concept of sustainability is to help others stand on their own two feet; to teach skills rather than reliance. For example, we build schools in Ghana, homes in Vietnam, assemble wheelchairs for landmine victims in Cambodia.
All of our volunteer programs are designed to be safe, culturally interesting, genuinely beneficial to a needy community, and involve significant interaction with the host community. Globe Aware is not a foundation that focuses on giving out charity, but rather an organization which focuses on creating self reliance.
2. How do you define Responsible Travel?
Responsible travel, for us, means ensuring that volunteers are engaged in empowering the host communities and ensuring they are involved in project implementation so that they know how to do them. It also means letting the local community identify where they think they need help and what kind of solution they want. While Globe Aware’s direct, financial assistance benefits the community economically, it is the the actual involvement and collaboration between the volunteers and the community that is of the greatest mutual benefit.
Responsible travel also means respecting the culture and heritage of the community in which you are traveling. A volunteer’s goal should not be to change the host community, but rather to work side by side on projects the community finds meaningful.
3. What does your company do to make sure it travels responsibly?
We promote responsible travel by ensuring that the communities in which we work are the ones choosing which projects and initiatives our volunteer work on. We do have set requirements for potential projects – that they be safe, culturally interesting, and genuinely beneficial, but beyond that we let the host communities, the experts on their own culture and needs, tell us how we can help them.
Additionally, Globe Aware offsets its carbon emissions with Carbonfund.org, the country’s leading carbon offset organization. Our carbon footprint is estimated at less than 70 tons annually, and we have chosen to support carbon-reducing projects in renewable energy to offset the CO2 that is produced in running our offices worldwide, from powering our offices to the transportation used to get to and from our work sites. This commitment places Globe Aware as an environmental leader in the volunteer abroad community and demonstrates proactive steps being taken in the fight against global climate change.
4. Tell us about a successful initiative. And an unsuccessful one – what did you learn?
A few of our most recent successful initiatives have been the construction of school buildings in rural Ghana. These children in this community did not have good access to education because of lack of facilities. These school buildings have changed that and now these kids are poised to pursue an education and work skills and break free from the cycle of poverty.
Less successful has been promoting projects in communities that are more than 6 hours from the airport of entry. Our primary volunteers tend to be working professionals and they normally only have about a week to take off to participate in a program. Our experience has been that project sites that are too far from the airport of entry tend to be harder to promote to short term volunteers, even if it is a really great project in a needy community.
5. What’s some advice you can offer to travelers wanting to travel responsibly?
Travelers wanting to travel responsibly should learn about the culture of the community they are going to visit before they set off for the airport. When contemplating bringing additional donations, think about just bringing some extra funds with you and buying supplies at a local shop. This helps the community in a number of ways – they get needed supplies and local businesses are generating revenue.
Another thing to consider is watching your waste. Use a refillable water bottle and the like. Trash has to go somewhere and in developing communities there is a lack of sanitation services to responsibly remove waste. Outside of volunteering, travelers should opt to stay at locally run hotels and eat at locally owned restaurants. By helping locally owned businesses you are directly supporting the community and not large international conglomerates that overrun popular tourist destinations. In essence, put your bucks where they count. However, avoid handing out direct monetary donations. You don’t want to create dependency or reliance on handouts.
CNN reporter Marnie Hunter writes a great new feature focused on finding volunteer trips that actually help communities around the world.
The story, (which you can read in its entirety at the bottom of this post) focuses on volunteer vacations and the importance of having a professional, long-term facilitator working as a liaison to ensure projects are high quality, well organized and designed to meet the needs of the communities they are built for.
The reporter notes that, “a hastily built structure may not benefit the community it’s designed to help,” and that, “a traveler’s biggest contribution may be through cross-cultural exchange.”
Both valid points, these are points also happen to define exactly what Globe Aware is doing and has been doing for years.
Globe Aware employs people within the destination communities and on the ground to ensure volunteer vacationers mesh with the local communities and all parties benefit from each individual trip and project:
Finding volunteer trips that actually help
By Marnie Hunter, CNN
(CNN) — The idea of volunteering away from home seems like a win-win to many travelers: a way to experience and help another community at the same time. But without a solid, well-designed program and reasonable expectations, volunteer travel can do more harm than good.
Showing up in parts unknown, hoping to make a big difference in a small amount of time, is likely to leave travelers and hosts disappointed.
“You’re not going to change the world in a week or two. You’re not going to eradicate poverty in a village. You’re not going to teach a kid how to read,” said Doug Cutchins, a former Peace Corps volunteer and co-author of “Volunteer Vacations: Short-term Adventures That Will Benefit You and Others.”
The key to having a positive impact in a short amount of time is realizing that your efforts are part of a process, Cutchins said. Results are subtle and come about slowly through a long line of volunteers.
“Development is a tricky process, and as Americans we are very, very product-oriented,” he said.
He’s concerned with what he calls “development by monument,” where volunteers want a completed building or another physical representation of their volunteer efforts to answer the inevitable “what did you accomplish?” question from friends and family at home.
“That’s one of the first questions you’re going to get asked, and it’s hard sometimes for people to say, ‘well, I was kind of part of a process, and we engaged in cultural exchange.’ But that’s really the very best way to do it,” Cutchins said.
Daniela Papi agrees. She is one of the founders of PEPY, a non-governmental organization dedicated to educational development in rural Cambodia. PEPY Tours hosts learning trips that help fund the group’s projects.The organization has gone from referring to those trips as “voluntourism“ to calling them “edu-tourism” or “educational adventures.”
“The number one thing that’s going to happen is that you are going to have a new perspective on your country, on your life, on your choices and how they affect the world, on what it means to live in whatever country that is,” Papi said.
The 10 days or so spent traveling and learning would ideally inform participants’ choices and outlook at home, where they will have the largest impact, Papi said.
Teaching English and construction projects are the most common types of voluntourism projects Papi sees in her region. Travelers involved in a construction voluntourism project should ask the operator and organizations involved about the plans for the structure when the volunteers go home, she cautions. Who is going to take care of it, who will work in it, how will they be trained, and who will fund the training?
A poorly constructed school without trained teachers isn’t likely to have the benefits volunteers envision. And in the case of teaching English, who will teach the children when there are no volunteers, and what effect does a revolving-door model of teaching have on kids?
Successful projects start with the needs of the community, voluntourism organizers say.
“We don’t go in and say, ‘this is what your problem is, and this is how we’re going to fix it,’ ” said Catherine McMillan, a spokeswoman for Globe Aware, a nonprofit that develops short-term volunteer programs.
Members of the community should be involved in identifying and addressing areas where partner organizations can help.
The organization you’re working with should have a strong and ongoing relationship with the community, local non-governmental organizations and project leaders on the ground.
“It’s a complicated kind of tourism, because you don’t want to send folks and do something and then not have, not measure the consequences of that action in the long term,” said Erica Harms, director of the Tourism Sustainability Council, an initiative involving the United Nations and travel partners.
Travelers should ask about the program’s history and its involvement with NGOs or other organizations. Find out where the funding is coming from and where it is being allocated. Ask about how the project is supported over time and how the community was involved in its development, Harms said.
And keep in mind that organizing volunteers to help support these efforts is not free. There are costs associated with housing and feeding volunteers, with transporting them locally, with training them and establishing a system of working that allows visitors to contribute for a short period.
Cutchins says reputable organizations will be up-front about costs, what is included and where your money will be spent.
Globe Aware‘s McMillan recommends looking up nonprofits on Guidestar.org, which compiles tax forms from nonprofits, to see how operators are spending. It’s also a good idea to contact past volunteers or people who are familiar with the organization’s work on site.
Travelers should be realistic about what would make for a positive experience and select opportunities that fit their skills and interests.
“I think there are very few people who would make really bad volunteers. … It’s really about matching the right person with the right opportunity,” Cutchins said.
Cambodia is a remarkable destination to take a volunteer vacation. This South East Asian country’s natural, spectacular beauty and vibrant communities and people amaze Globe Aware volunteer vacationers as well as the fantastic writers at Travel + Leisure magazine.
In the May 2010 edition of Travel + Leisure, writer Nicolai Hartvig features Globe Aware‘s volunteer vacation and volunteer travel program to Cambodia in “Helping Hands: Giving back isn’t just for grownups. Here, T+L’s pick of feel-good volunteer vacations to share with the whole family.”
Build Wheelchairs
Siem Reap, Cambodia
WHY GO Cambodia’s tourism industry may be flourishing thanks to the draws of the Angkor era, but the vast majority of locals still live in poverty following years of civil war and repression under the Khmer Rouge. A week of volunteering will go a long way toward helping people in need, including children and adults injured by landmines.
THE TRIP Week-long programs from Globe Aware (globeaware.org; US$1,200 per person excluding airfare) run in Siem Reap once or twice a month, from Saturday to Saturday. Itineraries are flexible, but volunteers can expect a plethora of activities: think putting together wheelchairs and hand-delivering them to landmine victims, working with local street children and teaching English to Buddhist novice monks. Cultural-awareness and cookery classes are also on offer, as well as built-in downtime—essential for checking out Siem Reap’s unmissable attractions, from the ruins at Angkor Wat to the stylish boutiques that have sprung up in the city center.
Globe Aware featured as “feel-good” volunteer vacation provider
Helping Hands: Globe Aware’s Volunteer Vacations in Cambodia
Giving back isn’t just for grownups. Here, T+L’s pick of feel-good volunteer vacations to share with the whole family.
Honestly, a huge part of me wanting to take part in Globe Aware is the travel aspect. I have always loved to travel and I love experiencing new cultures. But, after traveling to Costa Rica with Globe Aware, my views on travel changed a bit. I can’t begin to say how much I annoyed my mom by telling her that I was done traveling to luxury hotels (she likes that) and sitting on the beach! Yes, that’s nice, but, it’s fantastic to do something real with a vacation.
It’s the most amazing experience in the world to go to a different country, see what it’s like beyond the tourist aspect, and help people there.
Kimmy Trauner
past Costa Rica volunteer
going to Cambodia in July 2010
Today we met the recipients of the wheelchairs our group built earlier in the week. One was a woman now in her mid-40s who had contracted polio about a dozen years ago. She couldn’t walk but could move around on her hands with amazing efficiency. I was walking around taking pictures, when she came over to me and started pointing at herself and at me and at an infant being held by a someone across the room. I couldn’t figure out what she wanted or what her connection to the baby was. Grandmother? Aunt? She vaulted herself into the wheelchair and kept beckoning to me and speaking in Khmer. I finally understood that she wanted me to take a picture of the baby. I learned from the APDO staff that the woman (the “lady in red,” we called her) had desperately wanted a child and, against the order viagra order cialis order cialis professional order viagra professional odds, had finally had one. I think it’s glib to say that people all over the world are the same, because we – especially we privileged Americans – are separated by all kinds of boundaries and differences. But recognizing the fierce pride and love in her face as she watched her daughter, and knowing that I feel exactly the same emotions about my own 16-year-old daughter – well, culture and difference just melted right away.
Barbara