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NGOabroad
International Careers & Volunteering |
International
Volunteer Programs
Africa |
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Almost every site in Africa has a broad range of opportunities: from
beginner to seasoned professional.
After our whirlwind tour of Africa, we expanded programs and built
others. New directions & where many
people are needed are highlighted below. Email answered Questionnaire &
we can find one that is right for you.
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Generating Income: "Teach a
person to fish"
Half of
Sub-Sahara Africa lives on less than $1/day; 75% of Africa lives on
less than $2/day.
In cities, people sell trinkets, pens, or bananas to passers-by but
earn little.
In the villages, farmers have land to grow food but they may not
make money.
Africa is betwixt & between an agricultural subsistence & a solid
cash/ market economy.
We need people that can:
BUSINESS
--Teach about eCommerce and Fair Trade to help build wider markets.
--Teach marketing, accounting and book keeping.
--Business developers, entrepreneurs, and small or home business
owners
who can dream up income possibilities
& help “make somethin’ outa nothin'”
& mentor regarding the nuts & bolts
of building a small business.
--Business brains of any kind. If you had a successful Lemonade
Stand, we want you!
--We also need Business Brains who can build enterprises to sustain
these NGO’s.
--Grant writers are also needed to ensure many organization’s
sustenance.
--People that have or want to get micro-finance experience.
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AGRICULTURE
--Farmers & agronomists who can help improve soils, terrace
hillsides, compost
--Teach bee-keeping, animal husbandry (goats, chickens, rabbits)
--Teach how to diversify & generate agricultural income all year
long
--Teach how build food dryers & to preserve or dry produce
--Experience in tropical agriculture very helpful
--Teach about farmer's associations & cooperatives
--Teach about finding international markets & linking to eCommerce
--Teach about how to handle competition
--Students, field hands & people with 30 years experience all
welcome!
"Give a person a fish and they have 1 meal.
Teach a person to fish and they have food the rest of their life." |
c.Wintry Whitt-Smith |
Education is the ticket out of poverty.
We need:
--Tutors!!! – help with homework in any & all academic subjects
You don't need a college education. Patience & laughter are more
important.
--Teachers –reading, math, science, writing, computers,
English, primary, secondary, sports
Educating
girls uplifts society.
The UN & World Bank now
believe that if you want to uplift society, you must educate
the girls. Girls have been left out of education, but here the girls
take center stage.
So important is this, we now have several opportunities to help
educate girls.
Older women shyly ask, “Can you teach me too? I never got an
education.”
We have expanded our girls' education programs so we need you!
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Kids & Youth:
Abandoned, AIDS Orphans & Trafficking
What is Africa going to look like in 10 or 20 years?
An entire generation is growing up without parents; with parents
lost to AIDS, civil war, drugs & alcohol, or abandoned because their
parents could not afford to feed them. Other kids live on the street
or by foraging at the garbage dump.
Abandoned kids are prey for prostitution rings, traffickers &
child labor.
Trafficking of humans has now surpassed the trafficking of drugs as
the most lucrative underground trade. It takes more than a village
to raise these kids. We need:
--People
that love kids! from students to grandparents.
--Tutors, tutors and more tutors.
--Vocational trainers:
Carpenters, masons, computers,
blacksmiths, music & the arts
sewing, basketry, beadwork, soap
making, catering, animal husbandry
--Sports trainers: soccer is most universal. Swim coaches needed.
--Job & theatre coaches to enact job interviews or difficult
situations.
--Youth counselors, social workers, psychologists, counselors
--Therapists with a specialty in family reunification, parenting
skills,
grief counseling, children of
alcoholics
--Writers for communication/advocacy program: write
feature articles |
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Health
There is ~1 doctor/10,000 people in most parts of Africa.
The poor rarely can afford medical care.
Hospital workers, barely or rarely paid, live by extorting money
from dying patients.
--One of our hospitals is begging for medical experts of any & all
kinds.
--Village medicine: Doctors, nurses & nurse practitioners for
villages.
--We need a nurse or nurse-midwife who can train Traditional Birth
Attendants
to monitor labor & delivery and
evacuate for C-section if necessary
--We need midwives, nurses & paraprofessionals in several maternity
clinics
--Great fit for nursing & medical students & grads:
1) Work side by side with one of our most dedicated doctors
2) Health campaigns & education
A large part of improving health is teaching.
Almost every home has one mosquito net. What
about the people sleeping on the couch?
Many men still consider a condom an affront to
their masculinity.
Alternative or Complementary Medicine
--Chinese doctors or Acupuncturists
There are Chinese medical hospitals
in some countries. They want money.
So let’s set you up at our office or
do house calls.
--Yoga, shiatsu
Yoga contributes to good health by
stretching muscles & stimulating circulation.
Yoga would be a big first step. So if
you are interested in teaching yoga
or anything alternative, we ask that
you offer something more familiar first |
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c. David Zimmerly |
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Transforming the
Slums:
Planting the Seeds of a New Life
How many of the world's people live in slums? One billion.
Improvement of urban habitat
has been on our radar for years.
Our new director will do anything to improve life in Nairobi.
We will provide locals that will assure your safety if you join us:
--Help plant trees & urban gardens!
Turn wasteland into farmland; coax seeds to grow
--Help people grow $: teach crafts, trades & business skills
...launch micro-finance to help lift people
out of poverty
--Engage youth: our future lies in their hands.
Musicians, soccer coaches, athletes, cooks, poets & more are
needed!
Also: for those that prefer rural instead of urban, join the
director in her home village on side of Mt Kenya! same
programs, different site. |
Refugees:
Rebuilding Lives
In the 1990's, there were 7 million too many refugees on the African
continent.
We have intentionally built our program in a refugee community out
of harms way
but where you can really make a difference. We need you:
--Teach children & adult literacy.
--Teach computers. Math & Accounting. Vocational skills. English.
--Musicians. Drama. Sports. Photography. Web design. eCommerce.
--Writers & journalists to teach writing. Human rights
trainers.
--Teaching practical skills to help people make a living:
--hair cutting, auto mechanics, carpentry, crafts. Marketing to
sell crafts.
--Appropriate technology. Water & sanitation engineers.
Construction. |
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Gulu: from Hell to
Healing
Joseph Kony & his Lord's Resistance Army have wrecked havoc in Gulu.
Kids would flee to avoid being kidnapped & forced to fight or be
"wives".
Gulu is quiet now. Kony will not show his face or he will be taken
to an International War Crimes Tribunal. Aid workers report: "I
still say that the riskiest thing you will do is to ride in a
vehicle or cross the road."
Our new Director, another of Our Best & The Brightest, asks your
help:
--Ordinary people who can do extraordinary things!
--People that love kids!
--People that can teach or tutor literacy or schooling
--Art therapists, social workers, psychologists, youth workers
esp. with experience with sexual abuse & assault, trauma, PTSD, EMDR
--Health educators, nurses & nursing students, medical students for
clinic
--Parents, grand parents, foster parents for parent support groups
--People to educate about child rights & preventing abuse
--People
to teach reconciliation & peace building skills
--Farmers
(esp. dairy); Nutritionists
-- People with business skills or interest in micro-finance
esp. who can assist with developing small enterprises..baking, hair,
crafts |
A former volunteer had these wise words about working in Gulu:
"The most important quality for working here is a good dose of
humility. The people you are working with have learned how to thrive in
a very challenging environment and have much to teach you. ...No
romantics need apply; the job is not easy....it is very challenging.
Good candidates: very independent, very comfortable with being thrown
into new situations, very humble in their style of entering into a
community, and realize that they are the LEARNERS in this situation."
Rooting Peace
in Post Conflict Africa
This organization was built from the ground up to ensure that peace
prevails in their post-conflict nation. They understand the
importance of "capacity building", human rights & eliminating
corruption, literacy & building livelihoods to ensure peace. We need
you:
--Community organizing & development
--Program & project management
--Leadership development, capacity building
--Youth & women's empowerment
--Micro-finance & business development
--Literacy & adult education
--Agriculture & rural development
--Water & sanitation
--Conflict prevention & resolution
--Teach skills: sewing; crafts; mechanics; carpenters; tourism
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c. Dave Tacon |
Journalism is
critical to democracy & equality.
on hold due to human rights threats to one of our colleagues
a) Women & Journalism
Help research and produce TV news about women’s
concerns:
e.g. widowhood – a woman is reduced to nothing after her husband
dies –
No status, no land, no money and dispossessed.
This issue is being talked about all over Africa.
e.g. women & micro-finance: the new engine of economic growth
e.g. when there is no doctor: healthy pregnancy, labor & delivery
b) Youth: Make Music instead of Trouble
Engage youth in social concerns by helping them make music rather
than trouble.
Our partner is a makossa musician and journalist.
c) Print,
Radio & TV Journalism
You can not speak out in most African news or you risk being shut
down.
Learn the constraints experienced by African journalists
as you produce and air stories on the radio, TV or in print.
For those who are more fiery, we are currently negotiating with a
investigative newspaper. |
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The
Empowerment of Women
There is a growing consensus that women' concerns deserve attention.
It's good news but an uphill climb.
See also:
Education of Girls & Women
Women starting their own enterprises
Women & Journalism
--Must be
graceful:
able to understand the host community’s beliefs & leave dogma at home.
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Gender Based Violence & Domestic Violence.
"Today was like many others. A woman’s voice screamed out in terror
from
a mud hut in the village. She cried for help and we could hear her
wail uncontrollably while a man shouted obscenities and drug her out
by the hair."
The Director estimates that ~60% of the women in her town are
"beaten like donkeys". Alcohol abuse & poverty compound the problem.
We need:
--Social workers, psychologists, counselors who have experience with
DV
--Community organizers & speakers who can launch community education
--Male counselors who can work with men who grew up in violent homes
--Women’s & men's activists who can help build new programs.
--Vocational trainers.
Grant writers.
--Sports coaches, drama, dance & art therapists |
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"Committed to their mission, "To harness humanity's talent to solve
humanity's challenges",
NGOabroad matched my political organizing skills to a cutting edge
democracy building program.
Volunteering enriched my life in totally unpredictable ways. There is no
organization like NGOabroad."
C. Fitchett
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Democracy Building, Human Rights &
Corruption
History: in the 1960’s, many African countries declared independence
from the colonizer. Founding Fathers became Presidents for Life,
dictators who did not want to step down.
Most African nations are still plagued by bribery, corruption &
extortion:
5% at the top skim off the wealth, while most struggle. These
disparities stoke rebellions.
Human rights work can be
dangerous. Your life can threatened if you speak out.
So we advocate "nibbling at the edges" rather than frontal attacks.
We need people to:
--Teach math,
book-keeping & accounting
so that citizens can monitor
the accounts of governments, businesses or NGO’s.
--Teach human rights to decrease the recurrence of violations
--Political & community organizers. Human rights monitors &
activists.
--Social Studies, Civics & History teachers.
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French Instruction
and/or Immersion
Want to improve your French and would like to do it in Africa?
We have the perfect fit for you: based in capital and university
town or in rural villages.
If you want French instruction, study with Cameroonian woman who has
degree in teaching languages.
You can couple this with volunteering in Cameroon or you can devote
yourself to your French. |
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Many of our programs need volunteers with
practical skills; skills that can help get a job or generate income:
teach sewing, crafts; carpentry or boat
building; bicycle, motorcycle or auto repair; farming/gardening;
bookkeeping.
If your skills, goals or
desired destinations do not fit in these Volunteer Programs, ask for a
Roadmap of Resources.
How the International Volunteer Programs work:
Looking for
a Volunteer Vacation or to Volunteer Abroad? We offer more real &
challenging. More affordable.
Frugal: 1/4th the price of most programs.
See fees & how to apply.
Challenging: harness your skills to tackle real & important
challenges.
Real Deal for "Grown-Ups": other programs offer group
experiences & send a chaperone. We are for volunteers who want
the real deal: willing to do both the grunt work & the glamorous;
able to live humbly & make a real contribution.
Personalized: rather than one-size-fits-all approach,
we believe that if you are really going to make a contribution, we
must match your skills to where they are truly needed.
Flexible Schedule: You can go at any time of year though school
schedules may create some constraints. Duration of your stay can be
determined with the Host Director. Your schedule can usually be
accommodated.
Home Stays keep the cost down & deepen your understanding of
daily life: fetching water, no electricity. Or you can stay at a
guesthouse.
Adventurous: We believe that you can immerse in other cultures
if you are well prepared: Travel & Cultural Consults maximize
health & safety.
Transportation: Some people wonder who pays airfare. 97% of
the time: the volunteer. Your host organization cannot afford to pay
your airfare. 50%
of humanity earns <$2/day. |
A 2 hour Travel Consult is required for people
going to Africa.
Almost everyone asks before "Why do I have to do this?"
and exclaims after "That was amazing!"
"Mary Ellen Waller is an
encyclopedia. She boils down what would have taken me days to
research. All the information provided was tailored
to my specific travel needs. My consult was invaluable, and I
definitely intend to call upon her again for any overseas travel I
do in the future."
See more about usefulness of Consult with
Mary Ellen.
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NGOabroad is a Limited Liability Company (LLC)
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