Crossroads International

What services does your organization provide?
Crossroads International brings together individuals, organizations and communities in Canada and the global South to eradicate poverty and assert human rights globally.

As our name suggests, Crossroads facilitates the coming together of people and organizations. Through international volunteering and partnership, Crossroads leverages expertise and resources necessary to address these global challenges.
Crossroads works with local organizations in West Africa, Southern Africa and South America that are combating extreme poverty and women's inequality. With Crossroad's support, partners in developing countries select Canadian partner organizations working on similar issues that can help them develop their programs and meet their development goals. The exchange of skilled volunteers and staff is central to the partnerships. Each year Crossroads brings partners from developing countries to work with partners in Canada, sends Canadians to work with partners in the South and facilitates staff and volunteer exchanges between Southern partner organizations. Crossroads volunteers live with host families and work with local organizations so they are immersed in the culture, the community, the people, and the issues they face. Placements vary in length from several weeks to a year depending on the needs of the project.

Do you have any age requirements?

Eligibility criteria:

• Canadian citizen or a permanent resident of Canada
• Must be 19 years and older
• Post-secondary graduate
• Legally entitled to work in Canada,
• Willing to conduct fundraising activities
• Willing to conduct public engagement activities before, during and after the placement
• In good physical and mental health (medical examination required)

What type of volunteer positions are typically available?
Volunteering abroad in Africa and Latin America.

Is there any training provided for volunteers?
Yes, pre-departure training.

How will a person benefit from volunteering with Crossroads International?
Volunteering overseas is a rich and rewarding experience. Many volunteers describe the experience as life changing.

People volunteer for many different reasons. Consider some of the benefits:
You have something to give. You have skills and expertise to offer. Crossroads International placements are carefully crafted with Southern partners to meet their organizational needs. Working alongside colleagues in the South, your skills will make a valuable contribution to an organization's development that will continue long after your placement is over.
You have something to learn. Volunteering overseas provides valuable international work experience. Your Southern colleagues will expose you to new perspectives and strategies that will be beneficial and useful to your career in Canada. Living and working in a new community will stretch you and your understanding of world in unimaginable ways.
You can make a difference. Your work will strengthen organizations tackling some of the most pressing global issues. In a small and meaningful way, your Crossroads volunteer placement will help eradicate poverty and improve human rights.
You are a global citizen. Your volunteer placement builds on work that has been done before you and creates a foundation for volunteer placements to follow. You are building bridges between people and organizations in Canada and the South. As a Crossroader you become part of a growing network of citizens working together for a more just and equitable world.

Why Volunteer with Crossroads?
Crossroads International volunteers make meaningful contributions to long-term partnership projects with community-based organizations in Africa, South America and Canada. Each Crossroads placement is an important part of a larger partnership effort to effect real and sustainable change in two key sectors: women's rights and poverty.

Every Crossroads placement has a specific job description that is tailored to provide a professional exchange of skills and information. Our overseas volunteers, known as Crossroaders, provide skills and experience that contribute to an organization's ability to deliver its programs and realize its development goals.

What do volunteers get out of it?
New friendships, new skills, international work experience but perhaps more importantly, a renewed sense of self. We often hear Crossroaders use words like transformative and life altering to describe their experience. A word of warning - Crossroaders tend to be Crossroaders for life - a committed community working for social change.

Do you accept high school students?
No.