Voluntary service overseas

Doing some voluntary service overseas is an excellent way to immerse yourself in local culture and, at the same time, ‘give something back ' to some of the countries you visit on your gap year.

If you are taking a career break doing some voluntary service overseas also helps you to enhance your CV and pick up useful new skills and experiences in the process. If your career break is an unpaid sabbatical, and you plan to return to the same job, it may be worthwhile asking your company to sponsor your voluntary work overseas. If you ask the worse thing they can do is say no - and being associated with something as positive and beneficial as voluntary service overseas is great publicity for any company.

Even if you are not on a career break it's still worth trying to get hold of some sponsorship if you're going to be doing some voluntary service overseas on your gap year. You can raise sponsorship money to help contribute towards your voluntary service overseas in a number of ways - from taking part in a sporting event such as a marathon to organising a cake sale at work. When you focus your efforts it's amazing how quickly you can raise sponsorship for voluntary work overseas and it can also be a lot of fun.

If you are going to be doing some voluntary service overseas it's important to choose a project that you're particularly passionate about. Although voluntary service overseas is immensely rewarding it can also be challenging (as well as often being located in a remote corner of the world) so it's important you concentrate on picking a voluntary service overseas project that's right for you personally. When you are in the process of selecting your voluntary service overseas project it's worth putting aside a few hours to read up on all of the programmes available on the website. Alternatively you might prefer to discuss any ideas you have regarding voluntary service overseas with one of Real Gap's team of expert travel advisers (many of whom have done some voluntary service overseas at some point themselves).

We have too many voluntary service overseas opportunities to list in full on just one web page. However, in order to give an idea of the type of voluntary service overseas projects you could get involved with on a gap year, here are a few illustrative examples to help inspire you…

Voluntary service overseas - Wildlife Projects

If you would like to do some voluntary service overseas helping to care for endangered wildlife you are absolutely spoilt for choice. It's possible to do voluntary work overseas caring for a diverse range of endangered wildlife all over the world - from orang-utan apes in the remote forests of Borneo to lions and elephants in Kenya's Masai Mara game reserve.

Voluntary service overseas - People Projects

If you would prefer to do some voluntary service overseas to help disadvantaged or impoverished communities on your gap year there's also a wide range of extremely rewarding programmes available. Voluntary service overseas in this field could involve anything from educating street kids in Rio to caring for people suffering from HIV or AIDS in Africa or Asia.

Voluntary service overseas - Environmental Projects

One of the best ways of being a responsible tourist is by doing some voluntary service overseas to help protect and care for the environment. Examples of this type of voluntary service overseas include helping to raise environmental awareness amongst local people in Ecuador's Galapagos Islands and working as a Conservation Volunteer Australia (CVA) in a remote region of the Aussie outback.

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