Once in a lifetime trip disguised as fundraising for Charities

[staveleymum]

Don't get me wrong - I'm all for people raising money for Charity. People asking for sponsorship for things like Marathons, 1000 miles walked in a year, midnight walks, etc. I'm also on board with Red Nose Day, Children in Need, PTA fundraising, kids clubs fundraising and everything else that seems to constantly need money to run.

BUT I just don't get fundraising for things like hiking up Kilimanjaro or funding a trip to Borneo (for a 16 year old) to build a school or some such similar. Both these events need to raise £4,000 so they are on facebook, justgiving, etc trying to raise the money. My issue is that of the £4,000 needed how much will actually go to charity. This covers flights, accommodation, food, guides, etc - surely this is just something that they want to do as a personal thing and wrapping it up in Charity and getting others to pay for it?

I'd love to walk over Sydney Harbour Bridge but I wouldnt dream of masking it in Charity and hoping others will pay for it with perhaps 5-10% of the money raised actually going to the Charity?

I know I don't have to sponsor but I'd rather just give the donation directly to the Charity. AIBU?

I get so sick of this at work...I'm climbing Mount Kilimanjaro for X charity. Can you please sponsor me to reach £4K so I can do this challenge. WTAF?

No, you are going on holiday and I'm reporting you to HR for chugging your colleagues.

If you want to help a charity and climb Kilimanjaro pay for it yourself - and ask for sponsors to donate to a charity directly. You'd be better served offering some free time to a local charity, food-bank, homeless shelter or school, and not appearing to grab money so that you can go off on a 'jolly', that seems like some sort of bucket list shit.

Pay the fees yourself and get donations after you've made sure you can pay for 'your place' on your supposed charity trip.

User, I'd love to know what you do as you obviously have a vested interest in the voluntourism sector.

I am a teacher/TA

My interest in volunteering is I have done it for decades, in the UK and out of it

teaching abroad in schools that do not have the resources to put a full timetable together wihtout volunteers is one of them.

I have also volunteered in hospitals/schools/prisons/brownies-guides-cubs-scouts etc/ conservation ( UK and abroad)/children's homes(uk and abroad)/respite homes/ soup kitchens/ hostels for homeless people/ emergency shelters (uk only) psychiatric units....etc

I am also a foster carer.

I have taken my DC on two six week stints abraod, the school we visited both times only have afternoon lessons if they have volunteers, they only had us, those two years we went, (July/August both years, no one in between)

We know of the school privately,through a the sister of the head teacher who lives in London, and set up a charity to support the school.

This is the school we are currently sponsoring a little girl at, she is an orphan, very clever, hard wording academic child, who writes to us and emails regularly, and of course the sister of the head visits regularly and brings us updates.

We pay for her to have school dinners, and provide all her clothing and educational equipment, school bag, paper, calculator , etc as well a sa little "birthday fund" and "college fund"

The birthday fund isn't specific to her, all sponsors who pay into the birthday fund get their money divided equally between all the children, whether they are specifically sponsored or not, we saw it in use whilst we were there.

The college fund is specifically for her, although whilst visiting we saw how college funds were used for other young people.

Apart from that I am about to take my third school group abroad, this summer ( to a different country)

I get nothing from this at all - a whole month of strenuous work and worry about the 20 teens I am allocated, keeping them safe and usefully occupied in a remote jungle.....I am not paid for this. However the fundraising the children have done does cover my travel, and food ( accommodation is free from the charity)

The children will be surveying areas of rain forest which this country does not have the resources to monitor and survey for itself. They will also be doing tree planting, and similar conservation work. physically hard work, and not without risk.

They will also be visiting schools, and teaching science and music in the afternoons to children who would otherwise only have morning lessons, and have never had either a science or a music lesson. These lessons are voluntary, but I can guarantee the school children will be fighting to be fist in the front row!

I do it because of the benefits to the uk teenagers, first and foremost - the growth in maturity and confidence as they work and plan for their expedition are huge. They have organised and given cookery lessons, school fayres, concerts etc.

There is a benefit to the local population, but that is not my primary responsibility, that is up to the charity to organise. My responsibility is to keep my crew safe, happy, well behaved and help them take full advantage of the opportunities they have both to be of service, and to learn, and enjoy themselves.

We are taking 30, ( of which I personally will oversee 20) inner city London kids, who never leave their borough, even to see the houses pf parliament, or anything like that, have never heard of St Paul's cathederal, never get on a different bus route, never do anything other than football and x box, have mostly be brought up by non working parents, often single parents on benefits, fathers in prison, etc.

They will come back with so much more confidence and knowledge and understanding of the world, and such higher self esteem,

That is why I do it.

They have to have a little something inside of them to put their names down for this in the first place, but life for so many of the children in my school is so narrow. A lot of the culture in London is similar to what I expect it was like hundred of years ago, never look outside of your own village once, etc

Strongmuumy, does that answer your question

but if I hadn't seen the benefits to the local populations we visit, I wouldn't do it. It would be pointless. The whole POINT is these uk teens come back Knowing they have given something to the world, through their own effort and personalities.

if they came back without that, there whole exercise would be fruitless, I keep doing it because I know it is of value to our host communities too.

We are taking 30, ( of which I personally will oversee 20) inner city London kids, who never leave their borough,
User I am believing your version less and less, you clearly see situations very differently to most people. You protest and ignore too much. Yes there are children who never leave their borough, I too have worked with them, but finding 30, older teenagers who can go, even at a huge school, bullshit. But these are the children who need support themselves, not taking back to the country they've escaped from to help. Many of those children sadly have a far better understanding already of of the world than I ever will having experienced civil war, genocide, etc.
I don't like the current climate for charity, no matter how much damage is being done, how much money is being wasted, so long as it is done in the name of charity it must be for the greater good.

Thank you user. It answers my question. While I have no doubt that your intentions are honourable and I think some of what you've done is amazing, not all of it sits comfortably with me. You're a trained teacher and offering your services for free is fabulous.

It's great the UK kids get so much out of the trips you do and I'm glad you're taking kids who are not well off here as it may be a once in a life time experience, but the priority MUST be the developing country you're visiting. Inexperienced children doing jobs that professionals should be doing can't be right and you're not helping the country in the long run in my view.

User I am believing your version less and less, you clearly see situations very differently to most people. You protest and ignore too much. Yes there are children who never leave their borough, I too have worked with them, but finding 30, older teenagers who can go, even at a huge school

its not unusual, you don't stay in school groups, anyway, you mix up. The students we take are 16-18, yes, many schools can find ten students from each year prepared to do this, it isn't such a huge number. ( remember, it it takes about 18 months to organise one trip, so they would be 14-16 when they put their names down, and 16-18 when they go - not sure if that makes a difference to your calculation!) but the thirty in my group will be from 3 different schools, that is mostly children who put their name down at MY school, but have since moved school for the sixth form, plus several from another school too.

But these are the children who need support themselves, not taking back to the country they've escaped from to help. Many of those children sadly have a far better understanding already of of the world than I ever will having experienced civil war, genocide, some of these children are the ones who benefit the most! But if they have refugee status, etc, it is not always possible to get the visas.

Strongmummy, I think you are right to have reservations, but we will disagree (respectfully) over our final conclusion, to me, the volunteering I have seen here and abroad is MOSTLY beneficial, ( not always, certainly) and to you, it isn't. But thank yo for reading and considering my poit of view as well. x

scardycat, "the rest of the world" is not all one place! You can travel for a lifetime, and still learn more about it from the next single trip.

"It costs £700 and yes it will be an amazing experience for him. I dont however think it will be less of an experience fo the family who will get their first home ever"

Woiukdnt it make more sense to raise the money and send it to the people who can then invest that money into the local economy, thus making jobs for their neighbours and a house for themselves.?
If your child want to learn to be. Builder, there's many many local builders who would likely be happy to take on an apprentice to teach him. Thus giving him proper qualifications, leading to a new local business in your neighbourhood and give him the means to earn his own money which he can then spend to go to any country he wishes to build as many houses s he wishes

Yes exactly. I'm boggled at the idea that Mexico is so lacking in skilled, semi- skilled and even unskilled labour that they have to ship over UK 15 year old school boys.

There is something cultural in this thread which is different elsewhere, and hard to put into words, but I will have a go!

"Charity" can be a dirty word in the western culture, seen as patronising to give, and shameful to receive,

That is not necessarily the case n poorer cultures, where charity is a real needed cornerstone of your life.

in fact in can be quite the opposite.

As well as (pragmatically) being seen as a necessity, even an entitlement, it is almost the other way around in some cultures.

The receiver is blessing the giver, by accepting their charity.

far from being disenpowering, this is can be neutral, even empowering to the reciever.

I have not explained it very well, but just trying to explain that charity isn't seen as an insult, or degrading, in other places the way it might be in the UK.

Are we getting too you User? Do you not like that we aren't all praising the giving to receive nature of your work? All those years hard work so everybody can see how wonderful you are and MN is saying the opposite?

Are we getting too you User? Do you not like that we aren't all praising the giving to receive nature of your work? All those years hard work so everybody can see how wonderful you are and MN is saying the opposite?

What a weird thing to say! why would I feel got at? There are a few ignorant abusive know-it-alls on here, as there always are on Mumsnet, but I'm not bothered by them. I am just sitting back with my cup of tea stroking my cat and enjoying the discussion.

Why would anything said here"get to me"? Why would I chat on mumsnet if I din't enjoy it?

What is your problem, you sound like you come on here specifically to try and upset people. Is it "getting to you" that you can't upset me?

I know there are other point raised a few pages back that I haven't got round to, but I'm going out now, I will return later.

I have not explained it very well, but just trying to explain that charity isn't seen as an insult, or degrading, in other places the way it might be in the UK.

Not all of us are from the uk, I can't speak for all the countries or even all the people in one country but I know from living in one of the countries listed in this thread that British teenagers coming as saviors to paint a school or whatever is seen with quite a bit of by quite a few locals. Likewise the "teaching" holidays are seen by some as degrading, their kids are not a tourist attraction.

Actual legitimate volunteers such as medical students, doctors helping out, training along side local medical professionals or actual engineers building wells is always seen as a positive, it's legitimate charity by qualified people that aids the local community with long term goals and structure in place, actual charity work and not a jolly as the short term voluntourism ones really are.

I live in the developing world and a good friend of mine is a psychologist at an orphanage here.

Volunteer students are the bane of the orphanage's life - as well as having no skills/plan which means they have to be babied, a lot of them are clearly here because their parents thought it would be a great experience for them. The orphanage is under resourced, and because my friend speaks excellent English she is usually deposed to deal with the students, taking her time away from the many traumatised children who really need her skills.

These students bring in a lot of money for the orphanage though so they suck it up. But my friend often says that the money would be far better used training locals to teach. In an ideal world the teenagers would raise money and send it for this purpose.

I am sure all these teens have fabulous trips, however I am not sure how beneficial the experience is really. I see many, many grad CVs and honestly when I see this stuff, I cringe. 16 year olds teaching English and building villages, really? okeydokey. They all do seem to have a heightened sense of self importance and entitlement though so if that's the aim, well done. Funnily enough it's always the upper middle class kids that have done this, often from Surrey, frequently from private schools. Make of that what you will.

I'm saddened to read some of the info in this thread though - I was pretty cynical about voluntourism anyway, but wasn't fully aware of the situation.

These students bring in a lot of money for the orphanage though so they suck it up but they are taking the money under false pretenses, though, if they are accepting money to employ these teenagers usefully, than are not doing so, that is down to the management of the orphanage.

but I have come across similar instances of bad management in London schools, schools accepting the money to take far more volunteers than they can actually employ, as I mentioned further up the thread. it is irritating and frustrating, and a drain on every body, not least the volunteers themselves, who get a very shoddy experience.

In fact, what is quite marked in a lot of posts, is that complaints are being made about volunteering situations abroad, and the volunteers themselves blamed, whereas volunteers in the similar situations in the UK are praised and valued.

Why do we want to with hold from other children what we accept and even expect for our children?

user1484226561

if they are accepting money to employ these teenagers usefully, than are not doing so, that is down to the management of the orphanage.

The orphanage is dreadfully underfunded. The children all have lice, their shoes are worn through, they are starved of affection as the staff are run off their feet. The 130 or so children have with traumatic pasts and it's just my friend trying to deal with complex mental health issues - as well as chivvy sullen teenagers along. I doubt the management really give a shit about taking money under false pretences, they're too busy trying to feed and clothe kids. I can't say I blame them.

sounds terrible leaningtower.

It really is. I cried all the way round when I visited and I generally have a heart of stone.

My DS is doing a world challenge and I agree that the majority of the trip is a holiday in my eyes. However, he has got himself a part time job alongside his studies and is funding it himself.
Any fund raising is for the charity and resources they will need for the charitable project they are doing.
I would not feel comfortable asking people to sponsor the trip.

and resources they will need for the charitable project they are doing what charitable project are they doing? ( don't say if you don't want to)

eating - he funding it himself solely from his part time earnings? How much is getting paid an hour and how many hours a week is he working?

For the one at DD's school they would have to earn £80 a week for a year, and that isn't including needing things like working expenses (travel etc) .
Which is 20+ hrs a week at NMW for that age group.
And also you being in a position where you don't need him to earn any money, you can afford to continue to fully fund him. And you don't need him to be saving up for university etc.
Plus you must be in a position where if he doesn't earn/raise enough you are confident you can make up the shortfall. (Or lose the deposit).

I'm not having a go at you personally -like I said up thread luckily my DD wasn't interested - I would have expected her to make an effort to earn the money but would have been prepared to pay for her.

Which is why children from poorer backgrounds are unlikely to get the same opportunity.
Even fundraising is harder - you are unlikely to be able to get the same support from extended family and friends and your community/neighbours are less likely to have a spare £5/£10 to donate.