Village Volunteers Blog
Life before Lenana
This post is written by an iron-willed young woman who refused to let go of her dream of getting an education. Anne Barbara Simiyu is currently a student at the extraordinary Lenana Girls' High School in Kitale, Kenya, run by our partnering organization Common Ground...
Jeff in Kenya: Stepping out of one comfort zone to create a whole new one in Africa
By Jeff Loehring I decided to venture to Kenya on September 4, 2013. I had never traveled outside of the United States...so arriving in Nairobi was eye opening and exciting, to say the least. My blood was pumping as I tried to take in the environment around me. No...
Being the Change: The remarkable story of the Weiss Scholarship Fund
By Brett Weiss On June 8th I took off from O’Hare Airport on my fourth trip to Kenya in the last 6 years. I was joined by Emily Egan who is a Religion Teacher at St. Viator High School in Arlington Heights, IL. I am a Social Studies Teacher at Bartlett...
What it’s like to be at Mountain View Eco Farm, Nepal
In 2013, a wonderful young man named Sterling Dragoo, a gap year student, was the first of our volunteers to go to Mountain View Eco Farm in Nepal. We are so grateful for this warm and poignant piece that Sterling wrote about his volunteer experience at...
Dear Volunteer – A handful of practical guidelines for volunteers
Over the years Village Volunteers' partnering organizations have shared their knowledge and experience of working with volunteers, and this has helped us greatly in refining our volunteer program. We've come to the core understanding that through our partner programs,...
The men in our lives: Our partners who champion women’s rights
I met Joshua Machinga of Common Ground for Africa in 2001, Joshua and I knew almost immediately that we would work together to support local farmers as we shared a deep concern for the erosion of sustainable farming methods. But what also struck me was his...
Empowered mums = Empowered communities: Some examples that make this claim seem very believable
At the outset, this article does not claim erudition on the vast subject of the importance of girls' and women's education in the 21st century. Nor is it an endless ramble of facts around women's education for the reader to digest, like the fact that if all mothers...
Soil matters: An undervalued life support system
By Joshua Machinga The chronic diseases of our era—from heart disease and diabetes to cancer and obesity—have their roots in nutrition. But it’s easily overlooked that nutrition has its roots in agriculture, in the very soil the food is grown in. Healthy soil grows...
The Maasai Girl Child
By Sharon Simaloa Leina I count myself lucky to be a millennial. It is a privilege to be part of a generation that reaps the benefits of centuries of work and struggle around gender and racial equality. I feel that this stage we have arrived at might be the farthest...
My Volunteer Trip to Nepal
Experience: October 2011 Mary Beth Conlee My experience in Nepal could not have been richer. I loved being at the farm with this group of very dear young men, who went out of their way to show me hospitality and feed me wonderful fresh food! I want to always remember...
When travel trepidation turns to thrill
"So, how did this happen?! When did you decide?" Volunteers are often asked that question when they're heading to or returning from volunteering abroad. Any serious volunteer would embrace that the decision to pack a bag and live in an unfamiliar land for a few weeks...
From Wilmington, Ohio to Kilgoris, Kenya – excerpts from a volunteer’s trip report
A marvelous group of students from Wilmington College, Ohio volunteered at Namunyak Masai Welfare, Kilgoris, Kenya in December, 2014. To catch a glimpse of the kind of invigorating and life-changing experience a volunteer can have at one of our programs, read on …...
The ‘S’ word, and why we choose to use it
A while back an article in The Guardian posed the question - 'Is "sustainability" going the way of "eco" and "green"?' The newspaper spurred its readers to tweet and poll on '#sustywords' that invoke eye-rolling, and 'sustainability' was grouped with banal words like...
We’re old enough to do this
Sometimes you just want to say things out loud - like how much we appreciate working with some incredibly plucky, heroic local leaders and visionaries, how rewarding it is to receive a genuine thank-you from a volunteer who had a life changing experience in Kenya or...
Declaration of the International Forum for Agroecology
Nyéléni, Mali 27 February 2015 We are delegates representing diverse organizations and international movements of small-scale food producers and consumers, including peasants, indigenous peoples and communities (together with hunter and gatherers), family farmers,...
The New Agricultural Colonialism by Phil Bereano and Matt Canfield
*Third World Resurgence No. 292, December 2014, pp 2-4 http://www.twn.my/title2/resurgence/2014/292/eco1.htm The authors are members of the Seattle organization the Community Alliance for Global Justice and activists in its AGRA Watch program...
Inspiration from Ryvanz Mia – Ghana
In 2006, Madam Regina Esime Djentuh, better known as Mama Esi, decided to dedicate her home to orphaned and otherwise vulnerable children. Grace, who had already been living with Mama Esi for many years, was very excited about the opportunity to fulfill her role as...
Volunteering at Mountain View Eco Farm
Joshika and Sahana Volunteering in Nepal - May-July 2014 I spent 5 weeks at MVEF with Govinda and Chetana, along with my friend Sahana. Here, I got the chance to learn a great deal about organic farming and sustainable agriculture, but also hear about Govinda’s vision...
My Mind and Heart Linger by Betty LaSorella
Thank you Village Volunteers for your thoughtful and inclusive vision, and generous insights in bringing local leadership to the forefront of an inspired adventure for the volunteer traveling to Kenya. All along the way, I felt the guiding hand of Village Volunteers,...
My Unforgetable Exerience in Kenya by Katie Sarah
Traveling to Kenya for two months this past spring with Village Volunteers was an unforgettable experience that acted as a turning point for me in my life. I graduated from college a little over a year ago and I’ve since been struggling with what it is that I want to...