Are Gap year placement/end of 6th form volunteer trips safe for 18yr olds.

[soul2000]

In the wake of the horrific acid attack on the two girls in Zandizbar is it reasonable to think that these trips are to dangerous for well meaning young and often naive students/pupils to undertake these trips unsupervised or not in a collective group with proper secruity.

No.
Thousands and thousands of kids do this every year - how many incidents have you heard of in the last 12 months?

Would you stop them crossing the road if you'd heard about a fatal accident?

At what age should people be allowed to travel on their own then?

I can see where you are coming from, my dd2 is muttering about doing a similar sort of volunteer trip after A levels, i woukld not be happy with her going unless in a organised group. doubt I could stop her though

But this was a proper organized trip so even then there is a risk.

If my children wanted to do one of these trips i would try to steer them away from certain countries but in the main i do thing they are a good thing to do.

Every year on these trips you hear of some poor students who volunteer in these delveloping countries being involved in car crashes being mugged and being in life threating situations or worse being "KILLED" by being in countries that are unable to give them proper secruity or safety. I know it is amazing and great for young people to volunteer in these poor and delveloping countries but there needs to be more safety and secruity on these gap /volunteer trips. because these countries are often 3rd world they are unable to provide the medical/secruity and standards of well being that these students require.

Problem is, we call them students and they are all someone's baby,but they are adults.I agree with cantspel,I will encourage my dd to apply to one of the 'safer' areas,but i wont deter her from going.

PolterGoose I was a CSV 20 years ago and it is fantastic. However, I worked with ex-offenders leaving prison so it necessarily a safe option. Bad things can happen anywhere.

BTW OP lots of majority world countries have fabulous healthcare if you have insurance and can afford it. I have been sick in a couple of these countries and my care was second to none.

these countries are often 3rd world they are unable to provide the medical/secruity and standards of well being that these students require sounds a little considering these students are going to try to volunteer and help the local people. Do the local people not require healthcare and security or is that just foreigners?

*isn't. Note to self: must proof read.

Every year on these trips you hear of some poor students who volunteer in these delveloping countries being involved in car crashes being mugged and being in life threating situations or worse being "KILLED" by being in countries that are unable to give them proper secruity or safety

Don't be an idiot.

Students get "KILLED" in the UK too you know. Teenagers get run over, stabbed, drink too much, drown etc People are also "KILLED" on trips to 'safe' places like Ibiza or whatever, falling of balconies, car crashes drink, drugs, drowning. Oh, much the same as in the UK or these horribly unsafe developing countries.

Maybe we shouldn't let ANYONE go ANYWHERE or do AMYTHING until they are 40. That would solve it eh?

These gap-yah group trips are big business and are on the whole exceedingly well run and risk assessed.

I work in a school where we get 18 yr old gappies every year from Australia, they come via the agency latitude. Great experience for them, but I would recommend doing it via a reputable agency/charity rather than going solo.

Young people get killed in their own homes.
Young people get killed abroad.
In posh rich countries.
In non posh poor countries.

Wrong place, wrong time.

It happens. Very very very rarely. When it does, it's a tragedy, clearly. But of course we shouldn't stop letting our young people out.

What I don't think should be happening is young people taking on these placements in the spirit of somebody going on a school trip: this is all safe because the grown-ups will be looking after me. They should know about the possible risks and then they should make an adult decision about them.

This is where you can do a lot as a parent: make sure that your offspring realise that they are now moving into a grown-up world where they have to think for themselves and do their own risk assessment.

I wouldn't stop my DD doing such a trip, if she wanted to, but I would encourage her to do it at 21 rather than 18 when she would hopefully be a little more worldly wise.

Of course there's a risk; there's always an element of risk in travelling. There's also an element of risk in just going outside your front door. Or never going outside your front door.

You can take a certain amount of action to mitigate the risks - e.g. take all your travel jabs and anti-malarials, make sure you've got a basic knowledge of first aid and so on, as well as basic stuff like not walking round with a bulging wallet overflowing with notes in different currencies half out of your pocket or something really daft like that. Travelling with a group will generally be safer (and easier), and there are plenty of registered charities and other groups.

I couldn't afford to go travelling till I was in my late 20s, but I'm not sure there was that much less risk in the travelling I did do before then, which was mostly cycling round bits of Britain, quite often on my own, and I was doing that from 16 (to be fair, my mother later said she can't imagine how she allowed it at that age, but I always had permission at the time, and they knew my plans.)

If young people are going in a group, then they're as likely to be as safe as is possible. If you've done a good job at bringing them up, they should do okay. You can't remove all risk, but avoiding tricky situations, or getting yourself out of those which turn out to be unavoidable is part of gaining maturity, and ideally, it's just the next step on from where you've got them to in life so far.

But there are many, many different 18 year olds...

Personally I flatly refused to allow DS1 to do volunteer work abroad ie. in any one of the many flyspots existing in this world when he was considering it.

In addition to my fears for his safety and well-being it was horrifically expensive and, quite frankly, I didn't see the point of spending £4k for him to be equally ineffective abroad than he was at home.

He went off and joined the Royal Navy instead but at least I know he's being well looked after when he is abroad.

Two of my contemporaries at school died on gap years, but what killed them was car crashes. That's by far the most likely cause of death or injury, especially in Africa, but being older or more sensible won't keep you safe from road crashes if you aren't driving (and will only help a certain amount if you are) and a well organised trip won't necessarily be able to keep you safe either - the problem is the roads and the other drivers.

(And yes some people do die on the roads in the UK, just like some people get murdered in the UK, but there are orders of magnitude of risk involved).

That's a reason to never go abroad, VeryDull but it is no more or less likely to happen to young people.

Yes, I agree MrsTP, that was my point. An older person in their own hire car is a little bit safer perhaps but only a little bit.

I couldn't of done it. At 18 I felt very mature but not enough to travel. Even now at 23 I couldn't imagine travelling outside of Europe on my own.

I'd encourage my DCs to go on a gap year, but I agree with Cory, that they need to understand that the year is not in the same spirit as a school trip. There are dangers involved and they need to be sensible about them and not take risks that are avoidable.
I also wouldn't be paying for them to do it, if they want a gap year then they need to get a job and pay for it themselves - firstly, they are more likely to think twice and be older than 18 before they can afford to do so, and secondly, they will have some experience of following orders while being held responsible for their own decisions and of life in general, outside of school.

On a complete tangent, there is also the issue of whether these gap years are just a holiday for the young person and they do a sum total of bugger all for the school, reef, housing project they are assigned to. I had a lovely Cameroonian lecturer who asked, pointedly, "if I have a PhD, why do you think you can come to my country and 'help' with your A levels? Why do you think your skills and knowledge are better than African people's?"

I had to break the sad news to my dd that a good friend had died following a tragic incident I also warned her to be on her guard follow a tragic incident which resulted in a girls death near her university. My sister has a friend from uni who was brutally murdered. All these occured in the UK during every day life not doing higher risk activities. Things happen everywhere and we can't wrap our dc up in cotton wool for life.

I knew a girl I went to school with who died, along with 4 other young women, in a coach crash on her gap year.

Whilst obviously coach crashes can and do happen all over the world, including back here in the UK, there were several preventable circumstances that contributed towards the crash, and ultimately resulted in the death of the women.

The driver had been working 10 hours with no break
The driver was reportedly driving too fast and with little attention to the road
There were no seat belts on the coach

However the age of the women (18-26) was irrelevant. It could have happened to any tour group of any age.

I think young people who go on these gap year projects do genuinely want to help the community. How much help they actually are able to give to the community, I'm not so sure about.