BOOK REVIEW: Learning Service: The Essential Guide to Volunteering Abroad
Globerovers Magazine talks with Claire Bennett about her newly-released book: Learning Service: The Essential Guide to Volunteering Abroad. Claire lives and works in Kathmandu, Nepal, and freelances as a trainer and consultant. She is passionate about global education, ethical travel and ensuring good intentions are put to good use. The book is co-authored by Claire Bennett, Joseph Collins, Zahara Heckscher, and Daniela Papi-Thornton
Q1. What inspired you and your co-authors to write Learning Service: The Essential Guide to Volunteering Abroad?
I was living in Cambodia and working with Daniela Papi-Thornton at her educational travel company PEPY Tours, when the idea came to us that we should write a book. Cambodia is a popular volunteer destination, and we could see clearly that some volunteer programs were not delivering the promised changes. We saw tokenistic projects, made up entirely to meet the demands for volunteering – painting walls, digging holes, building schools for communities that already had one. Even worse, some of these projects were actually doing harm – disrupting children’s education, undermining healthcare systems, openly fuelling corruption.
We joined forces with two other co-authors to write a book aimed at helping those well-intentioned volunteers to think more critically about the issues they were engaging in, and to try to ensure they have a long-term positive impact.
Q2. Can you give an example of volunteering doing harm?
The starkest example is volunteering in orphanages. There is evidence from all over the world that orphanages are being set up as profit-making enterprises, lured by the lucrative voluntourism industry.
Children can be separated from their families, trafficked into orphanages, and wilfully neglected or abused because it caters to a demand from tourists who want to volunteer with vulnerable children. Ultimately, housing children in orphanages is an outdated solution that shouldn’t be incentivised: interaction with short term volunteers is never going to be in the best interest of a vulnerable child.
Now available at Amazon.com
www.learningservice.info
Q3. Can you explain the approach to volunteering that you introduce, that you call “learning service”?
Learning service can be distilled into a simple key idea: If you want to help, you have to be willing to learn. The book leads you through a process of learning – learning about yourself (your goals and motivations), learning about the context of international volunteering, and learning about and evaluating your options. It then leads you through how to be effective before, during and after a volunteer experience.
We basically say that if you can embrace learning as one of the primary purposes of volunteering, you will be much better placed to make an impact on the world – through volunteering and through other actions you take in the future.
Q4. Who do you think should read your book?
The book is written for anyone who is considering volunteering overseas – both as a way to explore and unpack the issues surrounding it, and as a guide for how to do it well. But more than that, it is a handbook for anyone interested in exploring global affairs, travelling responsibly or getting involved in international development.
We wrote the book in a colloquial style, with lots of short sections and bullet pointed lists of things to think about – more like a conversation than a treatise. We also included hundreds of firsthand stories from volunteers and people hosting them all over the world, to ensure a diversity of voices and perspectives.
We believe that true service is not about what you do on a few weeks’ vacation but is actually all about how you live your life. Ultimately, Learning Service is a manifesto for anyone interested in doing good in the world.
Follow Claire at:
facebook.com/learningservice
twitter.com/Learnser
instagram.com/learning.service
www.learningservice.info
THIS BOOK REVIEW APPEARS IN
Globerovers Magazine December 2018