GVN has the pleasure of announcing our new Youth Tour program. Designed with 15-17 year olds in mind, this program has been created to allow teens the chance to take part in one of our rewarding volunteer programs. This gives them the opportunity to immerse themselves in a developing country, experience another culture, and foster their personal growth, whilst helping communities in need.

The first GVN Youth Tour will be held in Vietnam. Essentially the Youth Tour is a shorter more intense version of our standard program with the benefits of additional safety measures such as 24 hour supervision, GVN staff guidance, a local translator, as well as village and cultural tours.

As well as taking part in the volunteer program participants will be

involved in a small amount of community fundraising prior to their trip, so that they can contribute to one of the current projects of our partner in Vietnam.

As well as orphanages, volunteers will share their time between a variety of placements including working with babies and children, and working with disabled children, as well as teaching English to community groups.

The Youth program will also incorporate the following educative components:

* Training and Orientation including Vietnamese language, culture and history
* GVN-Vietnam (our local partner) history and success stories, which will help the participants gain knowledge about international volunteering and how it benefits the local communities in the developing world

Volunteers will have the chance to offer their services to disadvantaged people. Typical activities include:

* Teaching English
* Teaching basic life skills
* Teaching sport, art and craft skills
* Cleaning and painting facilities
* Baby sitting
* Helping with physiotherapy
* Providing cross cultural friendship

Volunteers will also participate in the following tours:

* Weekend trip to the small port city of Hoi An to check out the Old Town and do some shopping!
* Day trip to a remote village, so the students can experience the traditional rural culture of Vietnam

Another focus of this program is to get the participants involved in fundraising for the Vietnam Orphanage project. We encourage our volunteers to get their family, friends, and community involved in fundraising so that they too can learn about and contribute to the work we are doing in Vietnam.

By requiring a fundraising portion for this trip we hope to give our youth volunteers a taste for fundraising (and volunteering) so that they can continue to take part in these types of programs in the future. Youth volunteers will benefit from seeing first hand how their funds are helping communities in need.
Volunteers will be required to raise a US$150 program donation which will be included in their program fees. Of course if you are able to raise more than US$150, a larger donation will be more than welcome.