The Experience of International Service Learning: Project Vietnam

Abstract: International Service Devils (ISD) is a non-profit volunteer program established and run by students at Arizona State University, Polytechnic Campus. Since 2013, International Service Devils has volunteered in Costa Rica, Guatemala, and India. This blog, written by Kali Richmond and myself, shares the experience of how we as students have established a new volunteer program in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. We have described in an entertaining fashion, our entire learning process from the brainstorming and organizing, to the results of the trip itself. This includes the struggles that we had to overcome with planning and finances, as well as crediting the people and organizations who helped us along the way to overcome those obstacles. We established 2 volunteer projects as well as completed multiple community analyses for the possibility of starting a school and providing scholarships to deserving children through the Young Dreamer Network. This blog is accompanied by an approximately 15 minute video of footage and photos taken during our time in Vietnam. The video shows both the volunteer aspect as well as some of the cultural experiences that we experienced. The purpose of this documentation is to encourage international service learning as a source of experience and education for University students, and to show plausibility of setting goals similar to ours and being able to achieve them. We hope that our writing can help students get an idea of what it takes to be a leader in international service learning programs, and that our experience can help prove the worth of volunteering abroad. We want to inspire fellow students to travel with the mission to learn from wherever they go and be able to give back to those communities, as this has provided us with immense personal growth and new perspectives on education and culture.