An Opportunity to Serve: What motivates young professionals to work outside of their country for $100 a month?

AuthorUndurraga, Trinidad
PositionYouth in the Americas - America Solidaria - Essay

Volunteers with America Solidaria are professionals who give a year of service somewhere in the Americas. Their experience is a unique one, in human, professional, and cultural terms.

Over the last decade, a total of 310 young people between the ages of 23 and 35 from a variety of professions and nationalities (Chileans, Bolivians, Colombians, and Ecuadorans) have accepted the challenge of volunteering for a year in poverty reduction projects in a Latin American country other than their own.

Follow-up with returned volunteers shows that 75 percent of them have continued to work for the public interest after returning to their communities of origin.

The life stories of these volunteers, how they learned about America Solidaria, and their motivations for participating in the project are very diverse.

What is America Solidaria?

America Solidaria is an NGO that seeks to globalize solidarity among nations of the Americas. One of its primary activities is to provide and promote a service of volunteer professionals in the most impoverished areas of Latin America and the Caribbean.

It seeks to raise awareness about poverty in various sectors of the continent, cooperate with local organizations to overcome poverty, create networks of collaboration that integrate the region, and build human capital in a way that will have a positive impact on the development of the societies of the continent.

Arturo Celedon, Social Director of America Solidaria, talks about the "urgent need to see local realities from a global perspective. Poverty on the continent can only be overcome if we join forces and confront it together," he says. "We must make the problems of the continent our own and mobilize ourselves to solve them together. When a child dies in Haiti for lack of a 25 cent vaccine, it shames us all." Arturo is convinced that "we should not replicate the model that we have so far. To change the world, we have to change ourselves. America Solidaria wants to produce a cultural change so we can live on a different continent."

America Solidaria began in Chile in 2002. Today, the foundation also exists in Colombia and has additional offices in Bolivia, Ecuador, and Haiti. Since 2008, Colombians, Bolivians, and Ecuadorans have been participating as volunteers. The number of applicants has grown with time, and the selection process is quite rigorous. Applicants must have a professional degree, experience working in situations of poverty, and the mental and physical...

To continue reading

Request your trial

VLEX uses login cookies to provide you with a better browsing experience. If you click on 'Accept' or continue browsing this site we consider that you accept our cookie policy. ACCEPT