Program Reviews

I had a good time in Argentina, volunteering at Chacras Organization. The coordinator that I worked with from World Endeavors worked with me and my university excellently! The place I lived was fantastic, it felt safe, had places to go and close to transportation. It fit with what I wanted sustainability with Spanish. The taxi ride was set-up to go to the place I was staying at and a laundry machine was in the place which was great!

I've always dreamed to go to Africa. I made my dream come true the 22nd of July 2017.
Thanks to World Endeavors I had the opportunity to choose the right program for me instead of being lost. World Endeavors offers the opportunity to do different kind of activities such taking care of "wild animals" or being a teacher, for example. I was undecided until the end and then I chose to become a teacher for 21 days. It was a great and formative experience. I had the opportunity to challenge some of my fear and to learn the best way to live in difficult situation. Initially, it was hard. It is not easy to adapt to a culture really different from yours but at the end I realized that these difficulties made my a better person and they allowed my to gain some soft skills. I'm sure I'll travel again with World Endeavors... who knows... maybe I'll go to Thailand to cuddle little elephants!

I couldn't ask for a better intern experience than the one I received with World Endeavors. If you know anything about physical therapy in the U.S., you are very limited to what you're allowed to do/see in a variety of clinics while doing your shadowing. In Ireland, however, this was not the case! I had the chance to help write patient notes, become familiar with their management software, and participate in their continuing education programs which detailed cutting edge technology and techniques.

Besides my internship being great, the actual country of Ireland was BEAUTIFUL! The internship was flexible enough allowing me to travel throughout Dublin and the whole country of Ireland. Check out my pictures below!

A typical day went something like this: Leave for the bus by 7:11, board the bus by 7:20 give or take, get off around 8:10 or 8:15 and spend some time in a coffee shop before going to my internship placement, a nursing home, at 9. I was there till 5 everyday assisting the activities coordinators with various tasks to keep residents busy. Activities ranged from doing crosswords, quizzing them on history, reading poems, exercising, arranging flowers, playing cards, serving tea with biscuits twice a day and helping to maintain resident safety. I was able to do a great deal of traveling on the weekends and was able to do everything I wanted to while still doing my internship Monday thru Friday. I was able to take one Friday off as well to do some extra traveling. I grew so much as an individual and came back home much more confident and willing to try new things. One of the hardest parts was having to say goodbye to staff and residents who truly became my family during my 8 weeks. There were a few bumps along the way, but they were always minor and nothing I couldn't handle.

The local support team was not available to help with trouble shooting once we got there. There were no language classes available as promised.

We enjoyed the placement but were not happy with the program's support when we needed assistance.

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The staff at World Endeavors was very helpful and friendly when it came to getting to London. There is A LOT of paperwork to fill out to get a visa and they are very knowledgeable about the whole process. The are a great resource.
My internship itself was a very eye opening experience, I learned more about the film industry in the 2 months, than I did my whole college career.

However, the program is for more independent people. The housing they provided was apartment style, but the building was full of people from all over the world. Mainly Europe, I was the only American in my entire building. Some of my flatmates came to England to learn English, so communication could be hard because they were still learning. The first week or two it was difficult to make friends because of the language barrier. But, we figured it out and made things work.

This is not like a school trip where there are plans made for you to sight see every day, you decide what you want to see and you have to make it happen. This is what I loved about the trip, I had a job to go to 8 hours of the day and then the rest of time I got to see what I wanted and do exactly what I wanted.