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April Snapshot: The Humanity Exchange

March 31, 2011 By 1 Comment

WHO THEY ARE

April’s Snapshot organization is The Humanity Exchange. Volunteer Card is very excited about our new partnership with The Humanity Exchange (THEX) because they are a top-notch volunteer abroad organization. THEX fosters leadership in international development through volunteer, internship, and language learning programs. They describe their mission like this:

To provide an impactful experience abroad for volunteers, while contributing to development in partnership with local communities.

One unique thing about THEX is that it is a social enterprise that operates as a business with social objectives, combining the best practices of for-profits and non-profits. THEX places high value on social good while managing to keep administration costs low. As a result, the average cost of volunteer programs are 20%-60% lower than most similar volunteer-sending organizations.


WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW

  • Humanity - THEX believes that it is up to each of us to take action and work with our fellow human beings. THEX’s programs contribute to local development efforts and volunteers rise to the ultimate challenge of living, working, and learning abroad. THEX connects volunteers to the realities of the human condition abroad.
  • Integrity – THEX builds on years of experience, and is committed to providing the highest quality experiences abroad with the utmost of integrity.
  • Mutual Benefit – THEX programs do not impose on communities. Volunteers are only sent when and where they are truly needed. The communities receive volunteers because they truly want a helping hand and to learn from the cultural exchange, not for any other reason. This avoids the experience of a volunteer feeling like they are “being babysat.”
  • Preparation – THEX  always provides pre-placement support and cultural education. This ensures the best possible experience for both the volunteer and the community.
  • Volunteer Opportunities – The Humanity Exchange has over 25 programs currently available in several countries.


HOW TO GET INVOLVED

  1. Use the program finder to find an opportunity that suits you. Keep these things in mind: type of volunteering, location, duration.

    Read about THEX volunteers and their experiences. Check out the blogs and reviews pages.

  3. Apply. Once you’ve made a decision, you can fill out an online application.
Filed Under: Snapshot of the Month, Volunteer Abroad, Volunteering Tagged With: , ,

Burma Earthquake: Updates from the Scene & How to Help

March 29, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Although it hasn’t been getting much news coverage, there are hundreds of broken hearts, homes, and families after a magnitude-6.8 quake struck near the Lao and Thai borders on Thursday. So far over 75 deaths have been reported, but there are fears the death toll is actually much higher.

Unlike Japan, Burma is ill prepared to deal with natural disasters, says the BBC’s Rachel Harvey in Bangkok. “Communication systems and infrastructure are poor and the military government, still in charge until the handover to a new civilian-led administration, tends to limit the flow of information,” the article says.

Volunteer Card’s sister non-profit, Venture Expeditions, works closely with people in Southeast Asia, particularly in Thailand and Burma. Our president at Volunteer Card, Ryan, just returned from visiting a couple months ago (you may remember the post about his trip here.) Many of our staff have visited this area and built relationships with people who live there, so the current tragedy is especially heavy on our hearts.

One of our friends in Burma, Solomon, has been sending updates and photos. He describes the difficult military and government situation like this:

Oh our government is not easy, they send the Army to every villages and try to push out all the help, so that villagers will suffer, they are very strict in the City area, but open some doors for us to helping the people in the remote village.   We have to send application for to help villagers, can not immediately go in and help…we got permission to get in to 9 villages.  And we were able to bring First Aid to 3 villages, all together 105 families we were able to help them to survive for one month.  We still need money for another 6 villages, it is around 210 families living in these 6 villages.

Here you can see kids at the children’s homes House of Love and House of Faith. All the children have received tents and are sleeping outside to be protected from aftershocks.

The fifteen families living in Ta Pu Village have lost everything after the whole village  has been destroyed. Here you can see a friend of Solomon’s, Yo Saw, visiting the village and bringing some food for the people.

Staff members distribute food packs and blankets to survivors.

 

The UN said medicine will be sent to the affected areas as soon as possible with an assessment team in co-operation with the Burmese Red Cross Society.

Other relief efforts are also gearing up – World Vision said that at the request of the government, it will provide 250 households with basic necessities, such as food and water. Read more here.

How you can help:

If you’d like to donate money with the knowledge that it will get to trusted individuals we have personal contact with, those in the U.S. can make a tax deductible donation through the non-profit Venture Expeditions. Please make checks payable to Venture Expeditions, with a memo “Burma Relief” and mail to the following address:

Venture Expeditions
511 E. Traveler’s Trail
Burnsville, MN 55337

Filed Under: Current events, Volunteering Tagged With: , , ,

Volunteer Story: Marine & Terrestrial Conservation in Kenya

March 28, 2011 By Leave a Comment

A huge thanks to Paula for sharing her volunteer story!

***

Two years ago I ventured to Kenya for a year to volunteer my services, share my privilege, participate in a multi-cultural experience, and conduct environmental conservation and sustainability research during a 6-month expedition with Global Vision International. We lived on a remote island in the Indian Ocean without running water or electricity. I participated in various marine (primarily cetaceans) and terrestrial (primarily the Angolan Black and White Colobus Monkey) conservation and research projects.  As part of a BTEC certification program I was hands-on with the team building and daily planning of environmental research surveys, emergency action planning, risk assessments, base management, expedition logistics, and data entry supervision. Our expedition team also taught English classes and workshops at Mkwiro Primary School. I also consulted and served as Project Manager on various capacity building, development and community projects  including writing a Swahili to English translation manual

After the expedition ended, I remained in Kenya after being offered the opportunity to intern with CORDIO-EA. There, I worked to update their website and, as Project Manager of the “Schools to the Seas” program, I was blessed with the opportunity to share the magnificence and beauty of nature and the marine environment as well as water safety instruction with local school children.  I also developed curricula and trained teachers to become environmental educators and stewards.

I feel honored to have taken part in such a special project and hope to be able to continue to do work that makes such a positive contribution to society and future generations. So, the next leg of my journey was to come to Honolulu, Hawaii where I am in the last semester of getting a Masters degree in Global Leadership & Sustainable Development. I plan to head back into the world to apply my communication and service-leadership skills to make a humble yet tangible contribution to humanity by encouraging, inspiring, and promoting global justice, cultural sensitivity, and the principles and values of sustainable development in an academic setting.
Filed Under: Volunteer Abroad, Volunteer Stories

Our Employees are Cool

March 25, 2011 By Leave a Comment

With so much heaviness in the news lately, here’s something fun to look at over your lunch break.

Volunteer Card’s IT guy, Tim, has become a bit of an Internet sensation the past week. You may have heard of him…the guy who built a retractable kitchen island controlled by his iPhone.

We can’t make this stuff up. See for yourself:

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: ,

How to Give to Japan Earthquake & Tsunami Relief: Part 2

March 21, 2011 By 3 Comments

We are overwhelmed with the number of you who are broken for the people of Japan and desire to give your money, time, and service. The extent of the devastation is only increasing.

While volunteer opportunities are still forthcoming, here are some updates from organizations working on the ground in Japan.

THE SALVATION ARMY – Three emergency service relief teams are currently working in Sendai, “where about 1,000 meals were served to evacuees….Another team went to the Mito area and unloaded bottles of water, biscuits, blankets, diapers, and tissue boxes for distribution to evacuees.” You can donate $10 to the Salvation Army’s efforts by texting “JAPAN” or “QUAKE” to 80888.]

AMERICARES – AmeriCares is working primarily to help provide shelter for survivors. Americares “is in direct contact with local officials, evacuation shelters and hospitals treating the injured and caring for evacuees in Miyagi, Fukushima and Iwate to determine health needs.” They are also organizing the donation of basic hygeine items. You can donate to Americares efforts through their secure website here.

SAVE THE CHILDREN – Emergency response teams have set up “child-friendly” spaces in affected areas to help preserve the welfare of children, who “are always the most vulnerable in a diaster.” Text “JAPAN” to 20222 to donate $10 to Save the Children for Japan relief.

SHELTER BOX – A response team is delivering emergency shelters and lifesaving supplies to families in hard-hit areas. Government officials in Iwate Prefecture have requested 500 ShelterBoxes to families who lost their home. Visit the Shelter Box website to make a donation.

ALL HANDS VOLUNTEERS – All Hands has experts currently assessing the needs in Japan. If you are interested in volunteering, you can sign up here to receive notification as soon as volunteer opportunities become available.

HANDS ON TOKYO – Our friends at the HandsOn Network have been in close contact with their colleagues at HandsOn Tokyo. Here is the information just as it appeared in the HandsOn blog post:

Our HandsOn Tokyo affiliate is continuing to monitor the situation and will be identifying volunteer appropriate activities. For now, you can register your interest to volunteer for potential upcoming volunteer opportunities related to the relief and recovery of earthquake and tsunami impacted communities by registering with HandsOn Tokyo.

  • If you are local to Tokyo volunteer opportunities may become available more quickly.
  • If you live outside of Japan, volunteer opportunities may take longer due to need to find proper accommodations and support for international volunteers.
  • If you register your interest to volunteer, as soon as volunteer opportunities become available Hands On Tokyo will send you an email updating you on those opportunities. Until then please do not call as Hands On Tokyo’s offices as they are temporarily closed.

**

Thank you to everyone for your willingness to volunteer and your desire to help. We will keep you informed as updates arise.

Filed Under: Current events, Volunteer Abroad, Volunteering Tagged With: , , , , , ,

Cool stuff here

March 11, 2011 By Leave a Comment
Filed Under: Uncategorized

How to Give to Japan Earthquake & Tsunami Relief

March 11, 2011 By 56 Comments

Photo via CNN/Getty Images

My heart is heavy this morning with news of the earthquake and following tsunami in Japan. Coming at the end of a bad week for me personally, I stood in front of the TV in the office lobby this morning and was promptly handed a reality check.

Our first instinct is to help. For those involved in the volunteer abroad world, our first instinct is to go. But right now we can only wait, and watch. Hope, pray, give.

Here are some of the best, most up-to-date links for resources regarding the relief efforts Japan:

Network for Good: The Network for Good has awesome information on charities responding to the disaster, non-profit guidelines. They’ve also got some excellent tips for giving from Charity Navigator – good enough to repeat.

 

  1. Give to an established charity.
  2. Designate your gift.
  3. Avoid telemarketers.
  4. Research and follow up.
  5. Give online.

On the Network for Good site, you can also give to reputable charities like Oxfam USA and Save the Children.

Global Giving: Global Giving has already established a Japan Earthquake and Tsunami Relief Fund to which you can give online. Paypal is waiving the transaction fees! Awesome. UPDATE: Global Giving now has texting options. Text JAPAN to 50555 to make a $10 donation to the Global Giving Relief fund.

Red Cross: The Red Cross is already mobilized to help in Japan and Hawaii. You can text REDCROSS to 90999 to make a $10 donation right now. The $10 will be automatically added to your phone bill. There was great success with this method during the Haiti earthquake, and we hope to see it again.


UPDATE 3/11 3:30 pm: Check out this great article from the Huffington Post with more options on how to help.

UPDATE 3/12: Thank you so much for your willingness to go and help; we are so encouraged by the number of people wanting to volunteer. It is still too early for organizations to have issued a call for civilian volunteers. Organizations sending teams right now (Salvation Army, AmeriCares, Save the Children, International Medical Corps) are sending pre-assigned emergency professionals. It will likely be weeks before there are calls for civilian volunteers. Right now the best thing you can do is donate money to their causes. We will definitely do all that we can to keep you updated as volunteering opportunities arise. Please see this CNN article for more info. Also, follow Volunteer Card on Twitter for real-time updates.

UPDATE 3/13: Here’s one tangible way you can help: Our friends at Soles4Souls are organizing efforts to send shoes to people in Japan, the same way they did after the Haiti earthquake. Find more info here.

We’ve made it easy for you to donate your shoes at one of our drop boxes around the country. You can find the one nearest you HERE> If there aren’t any drop boxes within driving distance, you can easily ship them to one of our collection centers with discounted rates from our partners at Unishippers.


UPDATE 3/17: If you’re tech-savvy, Crisis Commons is asking for volunteers to sign up to monitor a wiki page devoted to the collection of media links, data feeds and publicly available datasets. More info here.

Filed Under: Volunteering Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

Understanding Your Travel Insurance Coverage: Frequently Used Terms

March 8, 2011 By Leave a Comment

So you’ve purchased your travel insurance for an upcoming trip, but as you look over the description of coverage, your mind is spinning and your eyes are crossing. You raise your hands to the heavens and let out a yell:

What does it all mean?!

We deal with insurance all the time at Volunteer Card and even we get headaches from reading descriptions of coverage. Insurance companies don’t like speaking in Layman’s terms. Let us be your interpreter.

Before we get into the description itself, we’ll start by defining some frequently used terms.

*Note: “You” or “your” refers to the individual who has purchased the insurance coverage.

Business Partner – A person involved with you in a legal partnership and active day-to-day management of the business.

Children/Child – Your unmarried, legally dependent children under age 25.

Coverage Effective Date – Your coverage will begin at 12:01 a.m. on the scheduled departure date or the date and time you start a trip.

Coverage Termination Date – Your coverage ends on the scheduled return date for a trip or your arrival at your return destination.

Domestic Partner – Your opposite or same-sex partner who is over 18, lives with you, and shares your financial assets.

Eligible Persons - Any individual taking a trip for the purpose of volunteer organization projects or non-profit organization projects.

Emergency Evacuation - Emergency evacuation expenses incurred if you suffer an injury or sickness while on a trip that requires your immediate transportation to the nearest, safest medical facility or to your home.

Individual Coverage Term – The period of time between the beginning date of the insurance coverage and the ending date.

Injury/Injured – A bodily injury caused by an accident occurring while your coverage is in effect. The injury must be verified by a physician.

Insurance Effective Date – Your insurance will take effect as soon as you have provided proof of affiliation, paid for your card, and receive a verification email from Volunteer Card. (Note: You are not required to have received the card in the mail for your insurance to be effective.)

Insurance Termination Date – Your insurance will end 365 days from the insurance effective date.

Loss – Injury or damage you sustain as a result of an event covered in your insurance plan. .

Medical Expense Benefit - Medical expenses incurred within one year from the date of injury or sickness if your initial treatment was received during the trip.

Reasonable and Customary Charges – Expenses that are charged for treatment, supplies, or medical services medically necessary to treat your condition.

Repatriation of Remains - Transportation to return your body to city of burial if you die during the trip.

Sickness – An illness or disease diagnosed or treated by a physician.

Transportation – Any land, sea, or air vehicle required to transport you during an emergency evacuation.

Trip – A period of round-trip travel away from home to a destination more than 100 miles from your city of residence. (Basic Plan – trip does not exceed 60 days; Plus Plan – 90 days; Premium Plan – 180 days.)

Trip Delay – A trip delay of 12 or more hours caused by a carrier delay, a lost or stolen passport, quarantine, natural disaster, injury or sickness of yourself or traveling companion.

***

Hopefully these definitions will help you navigate your description of coverage! Click the links below to see complete descriptions of coverage for all the Volunteer Card plans:

Volunteer Basic Plan
Volunteer Plus Plan
Volunteer Premium Plan

Keep your eyes opened for Understanding Your Travel Insurance Coverage part 2 to come.

Filed Under: About Volunteer Card, Travel insurance Tagged With: ,

March Snapshot: WAVES for Development

March 1, 2011 By Leave a Comment

WHO THEY ARE

March’s Snapshot organization is WAVES for Development. Volunteer Card is proud to partner with WAVES. We are really stoked about the awesome opportunities they have for volunteers. WAVES describes their mission like this:

WAVES creates life-enriching experiences in coastal communities through Education programs that develop youth into healthy & empowered adults and Surf Voluntourism programs that engage travelers & transform their views of the world and themselves.

WAVES is definitely a unique organization that has figured out how to combine their passion for surfing and adventure with doing good for others.


WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW

WAVES is an acronym that stands for:

  • Water - WAVES believes that access to and conservation of water is a necessity for the future of humanity. Through adventure sports, WAVES’ participants develop a special relationship with this resource, one that is easily applied to conservation activities in their daily lives.
  • Adventure – WAVES believes adventure is more than just an adrenaline rush. By strapping on leashes and surfing, participants build confidence, stay healthy and foster meaningful relationships while enjoying the natural environment.
  • Voluntourism – Combining travelers’ passion for surfing with their desire to serve is possible with WAVES’ Adventure Voluntourism Tourism program. Volunteers contribute to community service activities while enjoying the adventure sports they love.
  • Education – WAVES believes that knowledge is empowering. WAVES helps coastal communities use their natural environment to create educational opportunities for youth, encouraging them to become confident, responsible leaders of tomorrow.
  • Sustainability – WAVES believes sustainability contains 4 aspects: ecological, social, political, and economic. Ecological sustainability is the use of, impacts on, and implications for the natural environment. Social sustainability is the initial community participation of the project, the impact on their culture and their willingness to carry it into the future. The political sustainability explores the politics of the destination and other accountability issues of the project. The economic sustainability explores the impact of the money that exchanges hands.

Check out this 30-second video that describes WAVES:



HOW TO GET INVOLVED

  1. Do some research. So you love to surf, but what else? Do some reading on WAVES’ website to make sure you’re a good fit for the program. You can also keep up with the latest news from WAVES.
  2. Go to Peru for surf voluntourism. If you think working with WAVES is a dream come true, check out the current volunteer opportunities they have in Peru and find out more information here.
  3. Fundraise. If you’ve signed up for a trip, WAVES has some great fundraising ideas and options available here.
  4. Donate. If you’re passionate about WAVES’ mission and would like to help out, you can donate securely through PayPal via WAVES’ website here.

Filed Under: Snapshot of the Month, Volunteering, voluntourism Tagged With: , , ,