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The Valuable Impact of Host Families

How Local Host Families Are Essential for Our Volunteering Ecosystem

Families take different shapes and sizes, but they are universal and something we all have in common. Families contribute to the development of us as individuals, to societies, and even countries at large. Raleigh, Tanzania, also has a massive role in ensuring the projects we deliver to young people and communities succeed. On Raleigh’s development projects, young people always provide work in partnership with communities and local partners. A crucial part of the approach is that young volunteers typically live in the respective district for 10-12 weeks, staying with a local family. These families open their doors and warmly welcome volunteers in.

Volunteer’s Immersion Experience

Initially, cultural immersion seems daunting for young volunteers when they first arrive and are exposed to their new environment. However, we see time and time again the incredible kindness and generosity of the host families playing a pivotal role in making volunteers feel at home. Bonds of trust and respect begin to grow between families and volunteers, which helps both the projects to be sustainable and prosperous and the community happy. The connection between host families and our volunteers is powerful. Volunteers quickly help support the family with chores and participate in family activities and events. “My host family experience was so incredible that it made me see life differently. Yes, I am from a Tanzanian family too, but I have never lived with people who are not of my background. The family I lived with during my volunteering placement taught me many things, especially farming and livestock keeping. They had the love that made me feel at home and always remembers that I have another family somewhere, and I still contact them.”

– Gerald Elia, RTS project Coordinator.

a couple of women sitting at a wooden table, talking

Valuable Insights

Host families can significantly contribute to the volunteer’s personal development, including learning new languages and cross-cultural learning, such as community traditions and norms. The same applies vice versa; host families also learn a lot from volunteers, such as new perspectives on different ways of living. These valuable insights can be discovered simply from everyday life, cooking, fetching water, and cleaning. The shared learning during these daily tasks can be remarkable.

How Host Families Help the Local Community

Host families are also vital in mobilizing community participation in the projects, which is critical to ensuring community ownership and sustainability. We work to ensure that all our projects are inclusive, and by integrating into the community fully, the projects are owned by the community. Volunteers start by encouraging the family they live with to take part, and then, with the help of the family, they encourage their fellow family members, friends, neighbors, and eventually the whole community to participate in the respective project.

local families enjoying and dancing together

The Lasting Impact of Homestay Experiences

Leaving the incredible host families and the community at the end of the project is usually a sad and tearful moment for both volunteers and community members. When these two initially separate parts think of being separated from all the love and shared ways of life they have become used to as a family, it is always sad. The bond continues long after the young volunteers have traveled back to their home communities or countries. Volunteers kept in contact with the host families they lived with and shared the good memories they had together, tackling our shared global challenges. We will never forget and appreciate the contribution of our host families in every community where we have worked, and today, we are proud to recognize it. Happy International Day of Families!

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