Ethical Travel : Gap Year Blues
Story Highlights
- Christian English in Buddhist Thailand
- The organisations that can make it happen
- A happy ending in Mexico
- Rich kids out of water
This debate is by no means new but it is important and before you make your mind up, it might help to know both sides of the argument. I opened the floor to the travellers and employees who’ve passed through the doors at St. Christopher’s and found out what pushes their buttons.
Cherie didn’t do a conventional gap year but she did work her way around the world, doing jobs that were popular with the gap year kids.
She found that teaching English was a skill that translated into employment in Thailand. She gave it a try at a school in the Chiang Mai mountains, but soon found out that helping children with their language skills wasn’t all peaches and roses.
“I thought I was doing a service but after a while I discovered that if the kids wanted to attend the school, they had to leave Buddhism behind and convert to Christianity.
“To me this wasn’t right. All children should have the right to an education, regardless of their religion.
“There I was teaching the Lord’s word out of a translated bible. I’m a Christian myself but I don’t believe that anyone should have to choose between their religion and an education.”
Picking the right placement is obviously important and the first port of call for many travellers searching for this, is the internet.
The main players on this stage are Voluntary Service Overseas, The Volunteer Site, Teaching English as a Foreign Language and Raleigh International.
Voluntary Service Overseas were brave enough to tackle this debate and even agreed that gap years are at risk of passing their sell by date and becoming the next form of colonialism.
VSO also argued that gap years: “Tend to focus on how British youngsters can help poor communities overseas, rather than what we can learn from them.”
The organisation also promoted their own gap year program as the solution. Shameless promotion, a legitimate new scheme for those who want it or a bit of both?
More importantly why can’t ‘youngsters’ do both? One individual who helped a poor community and learnt something was Jon.
He went out to a school in Mexico and managed to set the whole thing up without paying the £1500 that an average two month placement would cost with an external organisation.
“It was really quite simple. I knew that teaching English would cover my costs when I was out there and I knew I could get to the place with a cheap flight from the internet. This way I didn’t have to pay a rip off fee to another organisation and I could help educate and fundraise on my own terms.
“I set my own agenda, didn’t give out doses of religion with my English Literature and I think I did help.
“When you’re out there you learn about what really goes on. I became quite a sceptic, thinking that the majority of the kids would only use the English I taught them to get ahead as an illegal immigrant in the US, then one kid came along who changed my mind.
“He’s using what I taught him to study at university. We’re still in touch and it’s nice that I could help him get there.
"In my opinion, gap years are clearly playgrounds for rich kids and they are undoubtedly the ones who gain the most from the experience. They are generally the preserve of private schools boys and the placements are often over-priced.
"Rich kids going abroad is nothing new. Think about the 'grand tour' of Europe in the 1700s and then colonial expansion. Even George Orwell writing about living with poverty in Paris was a frickin Eton toff, just pretending to be poor while he was on a slightly extended gap year.
"Several gap year projects I looked at were definitely far from helpful. The volunteers quite possibly displaced local workers who could have done the job if silly little white kids hadn't turned up to do it for free.
"Some placements were so short that it is hard to see how they benefited the area. Teach a class of kids English on a 2 month placement - yeah right. Most of the teaching projects I looked at didn't even require any preparation, such as courses in teaching skills or a knowledge of the local language."
But what about those rich kids who do the whole thing with a parental expense account? Like everything else there are two sides to the story.
One could argue that Mummy and Daddy would prefer one to have the time of one’s life while one is young.
Alternatively you could argue that as long as someone is out there trying to help, then it doesn’t matter how they got there and how much financial backing they have. If the intention is right and the traveller isn’t just in it for a free holiday that sets them apart during cucumber sandwiches and tea at the Ritz, then where is the harm?
Why not have Sloan Square’s finest out in the midst of Africa, using their heads and hands to bring something to somewhere that doesn’t have much of anything? Why not have those with an abundance of money, spend it on sending their loved ones to a safari where they can help preserve endangered species, instead of spending it on a new leopard skin coat?
This isn’t to say that there aren’t over privileged kids out there using their platinum cards for a shopping spree in Cambodia. But not all privileged children doing this will grow up to be millionaires and receive knighthoods, off the back of good causes that they tell the right people about.
A free travel book goes out to the person who writes in with the best slap down about the person I’m alluding to.
If you don’t agree with something in this article, send an e-mail to submissions@st.christophers.co.uk. The most compelling arguments will be featured in the next newsletter. I also want to hear suggestions about what you would like investigated in April’s Live Your Life Newsletter.
