"Trip of a lifetime" half way through A-levels - good plan or not?

[AChickenCalledKorma]

DD1 has the opportunity to sign up for a Camps International trip to Tanzania. It will be for four weeks during the summer holiday after year 12 - ie midway through her A Levels.

She's planning to do Physics and Maths, plus either another science or a humanity - as yet undecided. She will almost certainly also do an EPQ.

We have a few concerns about the trip, one of which is the impact it may have on her studies. There is a massive fundraising commitment which would start now, in year 11 and continue until May of year 12. And then she would be away for two thirds of the long summer holidays. And I have no idea what the expectation is likely to be that she also uses that summer to study and/or complete her EPQ.

She is potentially interested in applying to Cambridge, so A level grades will really matter if she goes ahead with that.

But on the other hand the trip does sound fantastic and it's very likely that at least some of her closest friends will be going.

Just wondered if anyone has any words of wisdom. We intend to talk to the sixth form staff about expectations and whether they think it's a good idea. But as the school is promoting the trip (and it looks great in their marketing material) they may not be entirely unbiased!

I have found as a general rule in life, if there is doubt about whether you should pursue a course of action, the answer is no. It may be no, not now, and later more information comes to light which makes the answer turn to yes.

Etymology23 thank you very much - it's good to have some up to date experience. I'm very conscious that what was true for us 20+ years ago probably isn't true any more.

I must admit that I'm also slightly in awe of your 99% in Physics and you've reinforced what I already knew that NatSci is properly hard. In some ways, the discussion we are about to have about this trip might help DD and us clarify how committed she is to the academic challenge ahead.

I'm particularly looking for any experiences of anyone that's been through sixth form studies and has a handle on how important the summer holiday is in terms of keeping the academic focus going.

I wouldn't be too worried about that. She will have results of year 12 exams by the summer so you will know whether she is on track. DS did nothing whatsoever academically during the summer between Y12 and Y13 and he got A* x 4 and a Cambridge offer without a trip to Africa.
The Sutton trust summer schools are aimed at low income families without a history of HE. There are taster days at Cambridge (book early) and also at lots of other unis.

Korma

I wouldn't assume you're that out of date! Mum and Dad went in the late 80s and we were surprised by how little a lot of things had changed.

NatSci hasn't changed that much in 20 years, at least not in first year. In physics they still teach the same experiments etc as they did in the 80s. Past papers go back to the 90s and are relevant.

For the whole of first year the timetable is still identical to the 80s.

The amount you learn while you're there is amazing, but it was an incredibly hard degree for me, and I think going into the process with your eyes open is important. A lot of people find the pressure difficult. I was extremely glad I had taken further maths, and had to push my school a lot to get them to let me take 5 A levels. Feel free to drop me a PM if you want more info on anything.

It’s fatuous to argue tourism (with or without a bit of volunteering) doesn’t benefit the destination country financially: airport workers, bus and taxi drivers, hospitality providers, food producers, tour guides, souvenir sellers etc etc all benefit in any place where tourists visit.

I too felt uncomfortable with asking others to fund the trip DD did as we can easily afford to pay. So we did. However others who went did raise the funds themselves by working and I take my hats off to them.

And not all include orphanages 🙄

I agree tourism can be extraordinarily good. For some reason these Charity 6th form / gap year / things sit uneasily with me, when there is a big up front commitment to a company in the business of organising these things through schools. But then for others' DCs it is not my choice.

Hard , when her friend has signed up and will be talking about how great it is.

"It’s fatuous to argue tourism (with or without a bit of volunteering) doesn’t benefit the destination country financially"
But nobody is arguing that.

Tourism only benefits places up to a point. Some cities are now beginning to complain that there is too much tourism, and that shops like food shops are being crowded out by ones selling tourist tat.

I think the positive impact of tourism from these visits is probably extremely limited. A tourist industry benefits an area when it brings local jobs and attracts investment for infrastructure etc. These trips make money for foreign companies rather than the local economy. Indeed, as already explained, they may actually take jobs away by getting western teenagers to work for free.

Someone said about most teenagers 'working' to pay for their trip. IME (of being frequently pestered) they are encouraged to raise the money by holding raffles and other events which people give money to thinking that it's for 'charity'. That then reduces the amount of money given to 'proper' charities which don't involve flying a bunch of privileged kids halfway round the world for an 'experience'. I find it all incredibly distasteful.

Basically it's floppy haired Ugg wearing posh kids having "a life changing experience". Frankly, I am not happy with people in the developed world being teaching aids for kids like mine.

"I was told by a friend’s dad who took part that VSO costs the Uk around £5000 to send someone. It comes out of the Foreign Aid budget. Not sure that is much better than the volunteer tourism being discussed here."

VSO only send people with solid professional experience in the relevant fields - which are often very specialist. Sending a consultant radiographer or public sector financial director to do a specific job setting up new processes and upskilling locals is totally different from sending unskilled teenagers to do manual labour.

VSO only send people with solid professional experience in the relevant field[...]

Also typically VSO volunteers commit to a couple of years, not a couple of weeks. 2 yrs was the commonest unit of time IME.

5k to send a 6th former on a couple of weeks trip with selfies or 5k to send an engineer for two years to build a water supply and train local people to maintain and continue the work.

The same amount of money can go really far for kids just to have a jolly in the summer between the end of school and starting Uni, nothing wrong with having a jolly, I did it for over two years but I didn't exploit anyone, and though my parents paid for my flights, I paid for the rest, as in supported myself for two years.

Camps International pay their MD £183,000 a year
The nine directors pay themselves over half a million pounds a year.
And £150k of dividends to the directors and their families
Multiple companies in the group
They describe themselves as a tour operator
and they have a pretty impressive profit margin ....

(all details from public records at Companies House)

I don’t understand why charities can get away with persuading parents that their unqualified teenagers with little or no experience of manual labour or construction, can make a useful contribution to a construction project overseas in a few weeks.

I don’t understand how charities can persuade people in this country that it’s much better for the people living in poor African countries, when unskilled and unpaid British teenagers build things for them, rather than using skilled locals, or even unskilled local teenagers and thereby building the local economy.

Cambridge won’t give two hoots about Camps International. All it shows is that you have parents who are wealthy enough to send you on a lovely holiday, or that you have been able to do sufficient fundraising to pay for yourself. Neither of these are useful attributes during an Oxbridge degree.

Finally, my best friend from school took a gap year volunteering in Uganda. She smoked a lot of weed (for the first time) when she was over there, and wasn’t the same when she came back. Less mentally sharp, and has suffered from mental health problems ever since which are exacerbated by her weed habit.

simultaneous
Camps are not a charity.
They are a Tour operator - like all the others.
They are a profit making business.

Ta1kinPeece
A lot of these voluntourism companies aren't charities.
They make huge amounts if money selling poverty to westerners who can go and volunteer despite lack of practical skills and feel good about themselves.

And even if you look at some charities (cough Oxfam) the % of money that gets to people in need is not thay large. They do a lot of fly the rich kids to do some life changing challenge. They set minimum sponsorship amounts bit I still can't help but think if they spent less time running life changinh trips for wealthy undergrads they cpuld probably do a lot more.

I think they they talk in such a way that people believe they are charities, and doing something good, when they are not, they are very unethical large companies making millions from very poor people, who are right at the bottom.

The Camps Foundation is a registered UK charity no: 1125858

The Camps Foundation - Charity number 1125858 : Turnover in 2016 £126,710

Camps International Group Limited - Company number 04449971 : Turnover in 2016 £10,592,236

The Charity is just window dressing.
It earns less than the MD pays himself.

Wow Talkin that's really sneaky. I'd have assumed they're a charity from that info without digging into the accounts. Thats awful!

that's really sneaky.

It isn't unique to Camps, it isn't even unique to voluntourism. There are a number of areas where companies have fig leaf charities in front of big commercial organisations. Its definitely worth doing some digging before choosing your charities.

Talkin

I have always assumed something like Camp America is a different kettle of fish to some of the overtly trying to get young people to do voluntary work in e.g. Africa, where the "headline" is - it is charitable. ( re your comment about Camps Foundation ) Am I wrong?

Basilisk

IME Camp America never made any pretence to be a charity - it was more about educational exchange and a chance to see the US. Certainly my contemporaries who did it were quite clear they were effectively assistants/coaches to support the professionals, make a bit of money and some friends and travel.

C8

I agree - thank you - I think it was just the name ( Camp ) Talkin referred to which I was checking. I agree with you I think Camp America is a very different thing .