Mission Trips in Bolivia

Volunteer Bolivia delve into a new language! Learn Spanish, brush up on your existing knowledge or enhance your skills while being immersed in a community project in Sucre. Live with a local host family, be part of of a community led service project all while learning Spanish.

Language immersion includes half day Spanish lessons (15 hours per week). Immersion program is available from one week to one month. Language Immersion program is combinable with any of our Sucre based volunteer projects. Language lessons are given by local tutors. Lessons focus on conversation practice, grammar, vocabulary and will be customized based on your Spanish levels.

If you want to work with babies and smaller children, this residential care center is home to children between the ages of 0-6 years. This is a well-maintained residential home in Sucre, for children who are waiting to be adopted. 

The professional staff provide guidance to our volunteers, who are very much in demand to help with the day to day activities. The center needs self-starters who are engaging with small children, and able to keep up the quick pace! 

The job of a volunteer usually requires listening to children, offering comfort when needed, and resolving minor spats and squabbles. Often, volunteers help with preparation, serving and cleanup of snacks or meals. Volunteers help in all aspects of daily life: helping with bathing, feeding the children, getting meals prepared, reading stories, playing games and basically providing one on one attention to these little children. The orphanage is located about 20 minutes from downtown Sucre. 

Most needed donations: baby diapers, powdered milk, children’s vitamins and cold medicine, educational toys, games, crayons, pencils, coloring books, children’s Spanish books and music.

Volunteer in a local kindergarten located in Sucre. The fundamental aim of the school is to educate the children in a safe and secure atmosphere and to prepare them for the future. The center encourages the cognitive development of the children, to prepare them for starting primary school. At the school the children are provided education and the staff help the children develop attitudes towards personal responsibility, autonomy, respect, and creativity. 

Most of the children attending this school come from low-income families. There are currently over 300 children between the ages of four and five years old. With over 40 children per room, volunteers help the qualified teachers with care of the children. You will assist teachers in their classes by helping the children to draw, cut with scissors, teach songs, letters, numbers, play with the children during recess, take them to the bathroom, wash their hands, etc. 

Most needed donations: pencils, story books in Spanish, colored pens/crayons, notebooks, educational games, maps, baby diapers, powdered milk, children’s vitamins and cold medicine, educational toys, games, crayons, pencils, coloring books, children’s Spanish books and music.

Child Support Center

Volunteer Bolivia Delve into a new language. This is a great opportunity to take Spanish lessons while being part of a community project in La Paz. Be fully immersed in Bolivian culture, learn Spanish, live with a local host family, all the while contributing to the volunteer project.

Spanish lessons are half day while you volunteer the other half day. Lessons from 1 to 4 weeks, 20 hours a week, if you need more lessons you can pay locally to our coordinator. Language Immersion classes can be combined with any of the La Paz based volunteer projects: teaching, physical therapy, childcare support, Sports and animal rescue. Language lessons are given by local tutors. Lessons focus on conversation practice, grammar, vocabulary and will be customized based on your Spanish levels.

This nursery is a happy community child care centre for 60-80 local indigenous children from poor backgrounds, aged six months to four years. It was set up by local women to provide high quality early education in a safe and nurturing environment that also respected their culture and to enabled women to take up jobs outside their homes to sustain their families.

The role of the volunteers is to give practical support to the local indigenous women who work in the nursery. Volunteers provide educational support with the Montessori based curriculum, preparing additional activities and lessons to reinforce certain aspects of language development, social skills etc.  Some volunteers also help in the busy kitchen, to prepare wholesome and nutritious meals and work in the Nursery Green House.  Our role is not to impose our outside skills and experiences on the local women educators, but rather to build relationships of trust and to work with them to empower them. 

• Program Open: from last week of January to last week of November
• Local transportation: 10 minutes by bus US$0.50 each way, by Cab US$1.50 each way
• Requirement: It is not necessary to have Spanish language skills, but of course basic Spanish always helps. This project is a great place to learn / improve your Spanish.

This center is a unique and magical place that provides healing support and therapy to children with special needs using horses. This centre provides hope and opportunities for so many families who often face discrimination and poverty in a society that shuns disabilities.  This Centre has opened its doors to children with a wide spectrum of needs and capacities, such as children with cerebral palsy, downs syndrome, autism and those who have suffered emotional trauma.

This center is supported by a dedicated team, made up of horse trainers, physiotherapists, psychiatrists who provide physical and emotional therapy on site to the children and support and advice to their parents. There are also many Bolivian students who volunteer here as part of their university course and this means that this is a great place for international volunteers to meet students and other Bolivian professionals.

Description of volunteer activities:  There are many different areas where volunteers can help us. We welcome people with specialized skills such as horse riding instructors, physical therapists, occupational therapists, teachers, and physiologists and also people who simply love children and horses. Volunteers can participate in the therapy sessions and also in the care of the horses (grooming, exercising, mucking out etc) and general maintenance of the centre. We welcome everyone who shares our dream of a more inclusive society where each person can reach their potential and their rights are respected.

Project Notes:

• We accept volunteers from the 2nd week of January to the mid December.
• Transportation: by bus from volunteer accommodation is approx 40 minutes by local bus (approx.US$1 each way or by 14 minutes by cab (USD$5 each way)
• It is not necessary to have Spanish language skills, but of course basic Spanish always helps. This project is a great place to learn / improve your Spanish.

Our volunteers work alongside the animal care shelter team on a program which improves the quality of life for the animals and birds, many of which have survived trafficking or abuse and come to the center as a refuge.

The zoo is set in a beautiful valley and you will work alongside a multidisciplinary team that is enthusiastic and committed to promoting the welfare and the protection of animals in Bolivia through environmental education and also the animal enrichment program.

Description of volunteer and internship activities:

This volunteer placement provides a very unique opportunity to interact more closely with animals than you are normally able to have by just visiting the center, and to learn fascinating information about many unique species. For safety reasons volunteers are never expected to interact closely with any of the larger or more dangerous species.

• Volunteers create enrichment “toys” for the animals as stimulation and to increase their wellbeing.
• Volunteers participate in feeding activities.
• Volunteers work in the kitchen to prepare the nutritious food.
• Volunteers also contribute to environmental education programs supported by the zoo directed at school children and families.
• Volunteers help with the maintenance and landscaping of the zoo.

• Volunteers create enrichment “toys” for the animals as stimulation and to increase their wellbeing.
• Volunteers participate in feeding activities.
• Volunteers work in the kitchen to prepare the nutritious food.
• Volunteers also contribute to environmental education programs supported by the zoo directed at school children and families.
• Volunteers help with the maintenance and landscaping of the zoo.

Internships and Professional Volunteers with Expertise in Related Fields

The center can support internships and professional practice of students and research that furthers the objectives and enriches our work. These internships and professional placements may cover the following tasks:

• Support in the animal hospital
• Contributing to research programs, such as observing behavior of animals in certain settings or when the environment is changed.
• Giving talks and delivering information to multidisciplinary staff and professionals on issues related to zoology, animal medicine, conservation, and animal welfare, education for conservation.

Project Notes:

• We accept volunteers from the 2nd week of January to the mid December.
• Transportation: by bus from volunteer accommodation is 10 minutes by local bus (approx.US$0.50 each way or by 5 minutes by cab (USD$1.50 each way)
• It is not necessary to have Spanish language skills, but of course basic Spanish always helps. This project is a great place to learn / improve your Spanish.

Volunteers supports girls and boys (approximately 20 but this number may fluctuate) who are staying in a small residential home. Many of these children have suffered violence and abuse and are in a very fragile situation. They live with their mothers, who are undergoing the final stages of a year-long therapy program for drug and alcohol dependency. The refuge which is located in a pleasant residential friendly house that is managed by a small team of dedicated professional who will welcome you with open arms and you will soon feel very much at home here in this community.

Role of Volunteers

Volunteers run recreational and therapeutic sessions which draw on their own skills and experiences –  for example through art, music, dancing, sports activities. Although there are reasonable restrictions regarding the appropriateness of activities for these vulnerable children, this project provides volunteers with the most creative freedom and opportunity to use their personal skills. Volunteers are in charge of designing and planning one to two hour activity sessions and the children hugely enjoy the variety of activities they receive from different volunteers.

Project Notes:

• Transportation: by bus from volunteer accommodation is 10 minutes by local bus (approx.US$0.50 each way or by 5 minutes by cab (USD$1.50 each way)
• It is not necessary to have Spanish language skills, but of course basic Spanish always helps. This project is a great place to learn / improve your Spanish.

We need volunteers to teach English in our village schools. The students are very enthusiastic and the classes serve as a cultural exchange between the students and volunteers, where the students present and share their culture and identity, as well as having the opportunity to learn about similarities and differences with foreign cultural practices.

The objectives of these classes are: to increase their vocabulary, to promote their interest and appreciation about cultural practices and customs in Bolivia and across the world, and finally to promote self-esteem of students to express themselves in front of a group. Girls, especially benefit from these workshops. They are often shy and do not speak up in class in formal classes, but with our focus on gender equality and inclusive participation, our volunteers encourage them to speak up and speak out. We have seen over the years how students that have participated in our courses have gained employment or become entrepreneurs in the flourishing tourism sector in the village.  During the year, in response to expressed requests from community groups we may also set up courses for adult learners. 

Role of Volunteers:

To prepare and implement English classes for groups of 15 to 30 children (including preschool, primary and high school levels) and occasionally adults living in the community. This requires great organizational skills and we will ensure you have enough time to prepare well-structured classes. You will need to be innovative as materials may be limited. Volunteers usually work in pairs or buddy up with Bolivian volunteers.

Project Notes

• We accept volunteers from the 2nd week of January to the mid December.
• The schools are located in different areas – most are very close by (even walking distance) but sometimes we respond to expressed needs in more rural areas. Transportation: by bus from volunteer accommodation is between 10-30 minutes by local bus (approx.US$0.50 each way or by 5-15 minutes by cab (USD$1.50 – USD$5 each way)

Football is the national sport in Bolivia but until recently it was exclusively for boys. Up Close Bolivia supports footballs school in La Paz that aim to integrate boys and girls, fostering not only technical expertise but also key values around team work, gender equity and communication.  Each school works with approximately 30 to 50 children aged 5-15 years of age.

The football schools are situated in nearby neighbourhoods about 30 minutes from the volunteer houses and cater for children, many from low income families, from across the city.

Role of the Volunteers

• You will work alongside local coaches in leading and supporting training sessions with boys and girls.
• You can introduce new drills and games and tie these into education around team work, gender equity and good communication.

Project Notes

• We accept volunteers from the 2nd week of January to the mid December.
• The schools are located in different areas. Transportation: by bus from volunteer accommodation is 30-45 minutes by local bus (approx.US$1 each way or by 15-20 minutes by cab (USD$5 each way)

We work with community organizations using art and particularly community murals and occasionally theatre and workshops etc. – to raise awareness about local sustainable and ecological development, and on specific issues such as recycling, human rights, animal welfare and gender equity etc, responding to the interest of the local community groups or schools we are working with.

On a regular basis, we also offer our services to local organizations and schools to improve and clean up the environment, this may involve tree planting, rehabilitating classrooms or community centers, clearing rubble, rehabilitating playgrounds and schools, amongst other activities.

These projects are a great way to see a concrete action during a limited period of time and to leave a visible legacy in our community. When the project is completed we organize a celebration and thanksgiving ceremony with the volunteers, members of the community and local leaders.

Project Notes for Groups

• We accept volunteers from the 2nd week of January to the mid December.
• The projects we support are located in different areas, usually within walking distance from the volunteer accommodation. Transportation: by bus from volunteer accommodation is 30-45 minutes by local bus (approx.US$1 each way or by 15-20 minutes by cab (USD$5 each way)
• No Spanish required.