Volunteering abroad for over 25 year olds

Are you ready for a career break and want to take action on the world’s most urgent problems? You’ve come to the right place – Change Starts Here.

Raleigh Expedition is a unique opportunity to work alongside and support young people as our leaders of tomorrow, whilst working in partnership with local communities to create lasting change.

Our sustainable development programmes equip volunteers worldwide with the skills, networks and confidence to ignite global change where it is needed most. To do this, we require the support of our Volunteer Managers – our teams of volunteers aged 25-75 who comprise a wide range of roles to ensure the safe and effective delivery of our programmes and projects.

We’ve been connecting communities and volunteers for over 35 years and would welcome you to join us on our Expeditions to:

• Take a career boost, not a break – build your skills and experience in a role on our project sites or from our international country offices.

• Be the driving force behind global change on our projects, from improving access to water, sanitation and hygiene, building more resilient communities to protecting natural resources and vulnerable environments.

• Develop your leadership skills and foster the development of young people aged 17-24 in a project site role, whilst directly working on our different projects.

• Ensure the delivery and impact of our programmes from the exciting location of our central Nepal or Costa Rica offices in field base roles, supporting our permanent staff teams to deliver safe and smooth Expeditions.

• Live and work in some of the world’s most biodiverse and incredible environments across Costa Rica or Nepal.

• Join our alumni network of over 55,000 volunteers and return with friendships made from all over the world.

Our roles

We welcome people from all over the world with a variety of experience onto our Expeditions as Volunteer Managers, which encompass three different types of positions.

We welcome people from a range of backgrounds from all over the world to our Expeditions as Volunteer Managers, which encompass three different types of roles:

Project Site – Foster the development of our young volunteers and inspire them to complete their programme as you join our community, environmental, or adventure leadership projects.

Field base – Ensure the effective running and reporting of our projects from our central office in Nepal or Costa Rica, in one of several different positions.

Medic – Use your experience as a doctor, nurse or paramedic to help us deliver safe and impactful programmes, either from the project sites or the country field base.

If you’re interested in finding out what happens day-to-day, take a look at a day in the life.

Where can I go?

Tanzania update: at this time, we are not planning to deliver international volunteering Expeditions in Tanzania, focusing on our national youth programmes.

All the countries we work in have large populations of young people, who we equip with the skills, networks and knowledge to lead action on the change that is needed. These countries are significantly impacted by climate change with those in rural areas often the most affected.

Let us know where you would like to volunteer, although we do ask you to keep an open mind as you will be placed where your skills and energy are most needed. Wherever you go, you can be certain your experience will be exciting, positive and impactful.

Attend an information event

Expedition dates

Secure your place on Expeditions from July 2021 onwards. Please click here for more information on our Covid-19 response and our future plans.

June – September 2021

August – December 2021

January – April 2022

June – September 2022

September – December 2022

Please note: these are the general timelines for our Volunteer Managers, divided by the Project and Field base roles. We also have some additional Project roles finishing four days after the given end date, if you are able to stay on longer. Please do get in touch if you would like to know more about the specific time frame for a role. For Medic timelines, please visit our main page for Medic roles here.

We advise Volunteer Managers to apply well in advance to give you the best chance of getting your first choice of role and country, although it is sometimes possible to join an Expedition leaving within three months. To do this please get in touch with us as soon as possible, to talk through what is involved and fast track your application.

How much does it cost?

As a charity we talk about fundraising rather than costs and set a minimum fundraising target. This covers all in-country expenses for you, contributes towards Raleigh International’s programmes and secures your place. We encourage everyone to do some fundraising activities for their Expedition.

Our Expeditions are about prioritising long term impact, not profit. By joining you will be contributing towards the long-term goals of Raleigh International.

We offer lots of ways to help with fundraising and we have supported thousands of young people to reach their target.

Fundraising targets

Ready to apply?

The process for applying for a role on Expedition is easy – just click our application stages button to learn about the steps to making an application so you know what to expect and apply!

Application stages