Volunteer in the Philippines

The volunteer opportunities are in the following areas:

Teaching Programs:

Day Care Centres: Volunteers teach children ages 3 to 5 in a day care centre for 2 to 4 hours a day. They will teach children the alphabet and basic concepts like colours, shapes, sizes, days of the week, and the like through songs, stories and play. This program is not available during April and May.

Elementary and High School: Volunteers on the program teach elementary and high school students in public schools for two to four hours a day. Subjects taught include English, maths, science, health, and basic computer skills (only in schools where computers are available). Volunteers may teach on their own but there will be a local teacher available to assist. This program is not available during April and May.

Health Program: Philippine laws provide for a community health centre in each of its 41,000 barangays (communities). Sadly, not all communities have their own health centres and those that have one are woefully under-equipped and understaffed. Medically-trained volunteers may help in community health centres and hospitals, and may perform medical tasks depending on their skills and qualifications. For volunteers to practice as licensed doctors and nurses in the Philippines, however, they must submit their applications at least three months before their scheduled program in order for their accreditation to be processed by the Philippine Professional Regulatory Commission. They may also conduct trainings and workshops to train the people on hygiene, health care, reproductive health care, first-aid, and other health concerns. Volunteers may also help set up clinics in public schools and train teachers and students to become effective health officers and clinic custodians. Only volunteers who are in their final year of study or who are professional doctors or nurses can participate in the Health Program.

Health volunteers will be asked to live and immerse themselves in the communities where they will conduct medical missions, especially in the rural placements. This is done to give the volunteers a more holistic appreciation of the people they wish to help, their economic activities, culture, values, issues and struggles. At some point in their programs, they will also be taken to both public and private hospitals for them to see the problems of the health sector in the Philippines.

School Building and Maintenance Program: Volunteers on the program will be doing manual tasks of building. Your time will be spent repairing school buildings, painting roofs, walls, chalkboards, desks, teaching aids and other equipment. Volunteers may help in the installation of water pumps. Volunteers may also help in setting up of libraries. Volunteers can start by asking for donations of old books from families, friends, towns, parishes and former schools. You can encourage the use of books by the students through class visitations and regular story-telling sessions. The objective is to introduce to public school students the joys of using a library, which most do not experience until college, if at all.

Volunteers can spend up to one month on the School Building and Maintenance Program. If volunteers want to stay on the program longer, they can elect to combine their time with two or three programs.

Environment Program: The Philippines is one of the world's biodiversity hot-spots. Volunteers have the chance to help out with these placements to promote environmental conservation.

Marine Sanctuary Project: This project has been set up by our partner in San Agustin (Romblon). The town's main economic activity is fishing but its traditional fishing grounds already show signs of fish stock depletion due to destructive fishing practices, such as the use of fine nets and dynamite fishing. This is now being countered by the establishment of a marine sanctuary between the villages of Carmen and Long Beach. Volunteers help in several ways. First, they operate a nursery for the propagation of mangrove seedlings. Second, they help reforest mangrove sites by planting. Third, they also help in implementing the marine sanctuary project with regular patrols, beach clean-ups and education on the needs and benefits of the project.

Counselling Children: Our Philippines partner is developing a project with the Association for the Rights of Children in South East Asia (ARCSEA) and are in desperate need of volunteers who are experts in psychological counselling and rehabilitation. The ARCSEA works not only in advocacy but also directly with victims of Human Rights violations. The main issues they are confronted with are cases of child abuse and the effects of trauma from war. Volunteers in this project will need to be willing to travel to villages in and outside of Manila for visitations. All applications for this project need to be accompanied by a copy of your CV (résumé).