Launches “Volunteer Vacations” Program
© 2014 Diversity Rules Magazine and Global Volunteers. All Rights Reserved.
www.diversityrulesmagazine.com
Global Volunteers, a private, non-profit organization partnering with local leaders in communities around the world to provide crucial services with the aid of short-term “volunteer vacationers,” has launched International LGBT Volunteer Vacations and People-to-People Programs. These ground breaking programs will engage lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people in meaningful short-term exchanges with local partners worldwide. The first “volunteer vacations” trips will send LGBT “citizen ambassadors” to countries on five continents including Costa Rica, Italy, Greece, Peru, and more, offering LGBT tourists an opportunity to promote tolerance and understanding around the world as they enjoy an unconventional vacation.
“For the past 30 years, Global Volunteers has promoted understanding between different races, ethnicities, cultures and religions as part of their mission to create a more peaceful and just world,” said Linda Schlapp, Director of LGBT Programs and Development. “The creation of an LGBT-focused program – the first of its kind in the field of volunteer vacations – will help build bridges and understanding for the communities where our LGBT citizen ambassadors are able to make a difference,” concluded Schlapp.
As laws evolve to promote LGBT acceptance worldwide, Global Volunteers’ LGBT Volunteer Vacations and People-to-People Programs will unite LGBT people to encourage a culture of understanding and mutual respect. Working and sharing side-by-side with others from different ethnicities, cultures, sexual orientations, gender identities, and religions, participants and the local community learn that ultimately, people are all more alike than different. The result not only benefits the partner communities, but facilitates a vital, vibrant exchange of ideas and cultures that chips away at the barriers of prejudice and fear.
Among the many potential opportunities available to LGBT Volunteer Vacationers:
* Support a childcare center for children of single mothers in Ecuador
* Teach students conversational English to students in Italy or Peru
* Help maintain a friendly center for handicapped youth and adults in Greece
* Help improve the conversational English skills of young, visually impaired adults who are in training for professional massage therapy careers in Vietnam.
Additionally, LGBT cultural activities scheduled during the program, potentially including outings to local LGBT establishments and speakers from the local LGBT community, will provide opportunities to learn about the successes and challenges that LGBT communities face each day. Program participants and the local community can incorporate what they learn into their everyday lives – leading to long-term friendships and partnerships within the global LGBT movement.
For more information about the LGBT program or for a complete catalog of LGBT vacations, go to: www.globalvolunteers.org/lgbt.
Global Volunteers, a private, non-profit, non-sectarian, international NGO organization, has sent volunteers around the world since 1984. Working in consultative status with the United Nations ECOSOC and UNICEF, Global Volunteers helps deliver Essential Services to partner communities in 19 countries on five continents. Global Volunteers engages teams of short-term volunteers to work on long-term community development projects. Participating at the invitation and under the direction of local community leaders, Global Volunteers service program team members engage their curiosity, generosity and compassion to help create a foundation for world peace through mutual international understanding. More than 30,000 volunteers have served in 32 countries through Global Volunteers during the past 30 years.
___________________________________________________________________
Subscribe to Diversity Rules Magazine TODAY at:
www.diversityrulesmagazine.com/subscribe.html
Diversity Rules Magazine is now available in the APP Store at:
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/id711407008?mt=8
Diversity Rules Magazine is also available in the Android Market!