Volunteering in Iceland 2016

In July, 19 students and two members of staff, embarked on an amazing trip to Iceland as part of the Volunteer Abroad extension study. The trip was the culmination of 9 months of hard work, with students having to fundraise to pay for the trip throughout the year.

Students travelled to the remote East of Iceland and volunteered in a beautiful village located in a fjord. The students worked extremely hard and undertook 5 days of environmental volunteer work.  This included removing Alaskan lupins which are an invasive plant species, clearing up the local coastline and digging the foundations of a traditional Icelandic greenhouse.

The group also took in the amazing and beautiful sites that Iceland has to offer, visiting waterfalls, glaciers and geysers.

All of the students who took part in the trip were a credit to the College and should be really proud of what they achieved.

Concordia have organised four fantastic trips for our students over the last few years, with destinations as diverse as India, Vietnam and Iceland. I continue to be impressed with the dedication and organisation of Concordia. They have a genuine commitment to ensuring that students have a unique volunteering experience and undertake meaningful work.

For example, in India our students lived in a rural village alongside the local community and volunteered at a local school. The local community were so welcoming and we had the privilege of eating in villagers houses and learning first-hand about Indian culture. Our students had also fundraised in order to buy the Indian primary school children a pair of shoes, pens and school books.  Our students gained an enormous amount from the trip and not only learnt about a new culture, but also developed leadership and team working skills.

On all of the trips and projects that we have worked with Concordia, their support prior, and also during the trip, has been outstanding.  The leaders that Concordia sends to accompany the group have been excellent, and any issues have been dealt with swiftly and professionally. 

Michelle McGrath,

Teacher, Esher College

Concordia first Group Project in Vietnam!

Concordia ran its first ‘Group’ project earlier this year to Vietnam with students from Ashington High School, who are based just north of Newcastle in Northumberland. As it was a new project Fiona went along to help set the project up and help our partner, SJ Vietnam, with some Health and Safety training.

(In the picture: Fiona arrives in Vietnam…by bike?)

I thought that by arriving in Vietnam in February I would escape the cold UK winter but was a bit surprised to find the evenings cold and even some rain! However when the sun did come out it was lovely to get warm. It was great to meet up with friends from SJ Vietnam again and they were very excited about having their first UK group coming to Vietnam.

The group volunteered for two weeks at a school in Hai Duong City, which is about 50km away from Hanoi in the north of Vietnam. We all arrived at the end of the Vietnamese ‘Tet’ festival which is like the UK’s Christmas holidays so the school was very quiet the first day. This was quite nice as it allowed us all to acclimatize to our new surroundings and get to know where everything was.

(Above: a street view in Hay Duong City)

Our quiet was soon over when all the school children came back and we were all a bit overwhelmed by our welcome. The Hai Duong Children’s centre has around 1000 children, with over half of them living at the school in the orphanage and the rest of the children have some type of disability linked to the ‘Agent Orange’ bombings during the Vietnam war in the 1970’s. It was thought that over 50,000 children have disabilities linked to these bombings in Hai Duong area alone.

(Below: Fiona with one of the Children in the orphanage)

Our group, which consisted of two teachers, one support worker and five students, was raring to go and all got really involved in the life of the school. Our day was divided into three slots. We would spent one slot in with the baby orphans helping to feed and playing with the babies (who were just lovely), the second slot, teaching English to the children and the 3^rd slot doing environmental work around the school, like painting the railings etc. The work was tough but very rewarding too.

Our accommodation was in the school and we slept on bunk beds with no mattress under mosquito nets. All the children also sleep on the bunk beds but just on grass mats. We ate local food which was rice, meat and tofu and no knives and forks to be found so we all got good with chop sticks.

The project was a real success and the group had a great time. They did find the living conditions tough and living in a noisy school quite challenging but it gave them an amazing experience that would stay with them for a very long time.

Our partners in Vietnam really believe in volunteering and cultural exchange. It is wonderful to see a country that has suffered so much in its recent past putting so much energy into being so positive, it really was inspiring. If you want a challenging and fulfilling experience then volunteering in a Vietnamese orphanage is a real must. Fiona J

(Fiona Callender, Volunteer Programme Manager, February 2009 Vietnam)

(In the pictures: the volunteers teaching and with local hosts in Vietnam)

Projects available in Vietnam

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