GVI, Ethical Impact: Internships in Mexico

I completed GVI's marine conservation internship in Mexico for 6 weeks. It was an incredible experience. The staff in base were amazing and I was able to compelted my Advanced Open Water and Coral Reef Restoration Diver speciality while I was there. I was assigned to coral and worked my way up to be able to lead Coral Watch dives where we surveyed the level of bleaching the corals were experiencing.

We would also take part in weekly beach cleans and I helped work in the coral lab too where they're nurturing corals before replanting them on the reef when they're a bit bigger.

On weekends we were free to explore. I snorkelled with whale sharks, dived in cenotes, swam in bioluminescent algae and visited the historic pyramid in Chichén Itzá.

It was truly an amazing experience and I met some wonderful people along the way too!!

Amazing time in Mexico working with many great people. The staff are welcoming and helpful, they are all passionate about conservation and enjoy teaching the volunteers. It brings together a lot of like-minded people which made the whole experience even better. The programs are educational and fun which motivated me to keep going. Day to day operations ran smoothly most of the time, a little difficult when there was a lack of staff. There weren’t as many GVI experiences as we were initially offered.

GVI has taught me so much from learning my open water to monitoring the 91 fish species we study here. We help out with the coral restoration project, spotted eagle ray & coral disease watch project which have all taught me so much about marine conservation. However as amazing as the science is here the people you share this experience with truly make it. You go from strangers to family within a matter of days & make incredible friendships. I cannot recommend this programme more, i’m so glad I took the plunge & booked it!

I came with no dive experience and am now on my way to becoming a divemaster. It was an amazing experience and I highly recommend it to anybody interested. The staff are great people and very passionate about protecting nature. On one of my last dives we swam with a pod of dolphins, I have swam with eagle rays and schools of 30+ barracudas. The best part about this trip was meeting new people from all over the world, enjoying their company, and learning with them. If you are unaware of the human impact on the earth, the staff here will educate you quite well.

I’ve had an amazing time since I’ve been here. The location is absolutely amazing, there’s shops and restaurants close by and not to mention the beautiful landscape. The diving is incredible as well, there’s so much biodiversity at all of the sites and so many amazing animals and sea plants everywhere you go. The programme itself is also run really efficiently and well and all of the staff are super friendly and helpful. Additionally, the opportunities to be involved with the community is fantastic, despite Covid-19. We’ve been conducting beach cleans for the community and large scale cleans involving divers and snorkelers from the community where we managed to gather 228kg of waste in a single morning. Overall, it’s such a good programme that I’m extending for an extra 3 months!

I undertook the community development internship in Puerto Morelos, Mexico. It was an unbelievable and lifechanging experience that really broadened my horizons. I learnt so much about the local community and the developmental challenges to the region; I underwent Spanish lessons and was immersed in a vubrant and welcoming culture, and I successfully completed an ILM-endorsed leadership course. More than all I gained though, the GVI community at the base is so homely and family-like, it felt like I never left home and I was able to make friends for life. I would highly recommend to anyone and look forward to my next program.

I had only done 5 dives before I went however with a lot of support from the team in Mexico I left as a fully qualified Divemaster with 98 dives. It was incredible to be a part of marine conservation specialising in juvenile fish and then later in adult fish. I had the amazing opportunity to be able to help monitor the recruitment of fish on the coral reefs as well as be a part of an international coral watch project to monitor bleaching. Out of the water we also got to assist at a coral laboratory, cleaning coral microfragments for restoration of the reef.

We lived in a "ware-home" with 3 rooms of 8 people and a large communal space. There was also plenty of space to store both the GVI BCDs and regulators along with personal kit.

Having done this internship as part of my university placement year it has made me want to go into marine conservation when I graduate and I wouldn't have found this passion without GVI

At the beginning of this year, I embarked with GVI on the Marine Conservation short-term internship in Puerto Morelos, Mexico. I was lucky to find out about our project on a university page, as I was required to complete an internship for academic credits. Life on base was exceptional; I liked to get up a tad earlier than the bulk of us to go on the beach and admire the sunrise, then we would all have breakfast together and start gearing up for ‘Wave 1’, the morning dive. We used to dive once or twice a day and practiced fish and coral identification, buoyancy skills and first aid skills. When not in the water, the staff held workshops, we helped local marine researchers at the coral nursery, or we simply appreciated the Mexican vibes from the base, the beach or the town. Our staffs were a handful of legends that not only were fun to hang out with but knew their stuff like champs. I could ask them for advice on anything; from diving and scientific skills to where to get a drink in town.
The best about this program was the quality of learning and the opportunity to apply it all in real life. As all volunteers lived together on base we got to know each other pretty quickly and I felt supported throughout. My favorite part was collecting data for Coral Watch. I’m proud that my work contributed to this global database and to the researchers that assess the effects of climate change on the reefs. I’m an international student doing a Bachelors of Environmental Science at Deakin University. I joined GVI to see what it feels like to be a marine conservationist and the project provided me with some valuable answers. I came out convinced of my career choice and more motivated than ever to make it happen. I definitely recommend this program to anyone who’s up for loads of learning in a fun yet challenging environment.