Los Angeles is a city that has it all! There is a wide variety of shops, attractions, restaurants and interesting places. This southern city delights tourists and locals with fantastic weather all year round. Los Angeles offers a wide range of attractions that are visited by many tourists from all over the world every year. Disneyland, Hermosa Beach, Melrose Avenue, Dodger Stadium, Laguna Beach, Universal Studios Hollywood, Beverly Hills, Rodeo Drive, Santa Monica and Malibu - all this will make your trip unforgettable. There is no other city in the world where the likelihood of meeting your idol would be so high. The hustle and bustle of the city streets will make you feel as if you have lived in Los Angeles all your life in just a few days! This city is home to a large number of different nationalities and cultures.

A language course in Los Angeles is a valuable experience. You learn English under the strict guidance of highly qualified native-speaking teachers, and discover one of the most stunning cities in the world. Here you will find everything! The bustling city will charm everyone. English courses are an investment in the future, an unforgettable experience and new friends. Los Angeles will make a pleasant impression on you.

Advantages of a language school:

• The language school is located in the center of Los Angeles;
• Accepted from the age of 14 (not all US schools do this!);
• Just a few minutes walk from the beach;
• The perfect combination of study and relaxation;
• A mentor is provided;
• You can live either in a family or on a college campus;
• Full board.

Dates:

• June 23 - August 11, 2019

Cost (3 weeks):

= $3985 USD(summer period)

= $3675 USD(other times of the year)

The cost of the program includes:

• 20 English lessons per week;
• Single or Double accommodation in an American family;
• Three meals a day;
• Program of activities: sporting events, barbecues, shopping trips, a trip to the amusement park, bowling;
• 2 full-day excursions;
• Transfer from/to the airport;
• Certificate of completion of the program.

Additional charges:

• Registration fee of the Excellente company = 15,000 rubles;
• Consular fee = 160 USD;
• Additional excursion program = $85 USD per week ( if desired);
• Medical insurance;
• Air ticket.

Please note: Transfer is included in the price of the trip. If you arrive and/or leave on a date other than the day of arrival (Sunday) and departure (Saturday), the transfer will be paid separately! Transfer from Los Angeles International Airport: $80 USD; to the airport: $40 USD

The coordinators of our Company deal with visa processing, help to correctly formulate a package of documents, fill out consular forms, sign up for an interview at the consulate, and prepare for an interview with a visa officer.

We also help you obtain air tickets at reduced rates and obtain medical insurance.

Where to begin

Organizers of volunteer projects are annoyed by “voluntourism” - when people come to them to travel and not to work. So right away, honestly ask yourself what you really want, to look at the world or to help. There is someone to help: children in Nepal, old people in Norway, disabled people in Germany, farmers in New Zealand, crumbling castles in France, giraffes in Africa... Let's whisper a secret: no matter what you answer, you can still be a volunteer.

* There is a separate division for young people.

Personal experience

One of the most famous projects in the world is saving sea turtles in Costa Rica. Preserve the eggs and then show the young turtles the way to the sea. I decided to sign up there for a try.

Using the “Costa Rica” and “Envoiroment” filters, I found the desired program, selected August and sent an application in which I indicated all my data, profession, language skills and experience. Which, by the way, doesn't exist. I had to simply confess my love for animals.

A day later, I received a letter asking what exactly I would like to do on the beach. "Swim and have a sunbath!" - I wanted to exclaim, but we are serious volunteers, so I answered: anything, as long as it’s with the turtles themselves. A day later I received an invitation to the selected dates with a reminder that turtles are delicate creatures and it is forbidden to touch them with your hands. If you don’t want to take a selfie under the shell, welcome to Costa Rica. Easy and elegant.

Our job is to collect turtle eggs and bury them in the sand for preservation. In a few months, other volunteers will dig them up, help the babies hatch and make sure they successfully reach the sea. You catch either nesting or birth.

What and how is paid

There is an opinion that volunteers travel for nothing. This is not entirely and not always the case. There are three types of programs: completely free, partially free and paid.

The former are a minority. For example, the EVS program. It is only valid in Europe for those over 18 but under 30. The organizers cover 90% of expenses, including flights and pocket money, so getting there is not easy. The application may take several months to be considered, so choose more projects - at least a hundred. You have to be lucky with one.

You will have an interview on Skype, coordination of details - in general, a lot of official routine, which does not even mean that you will definitely go.

Conditionally free programs will give you housing and food on site (grants are given for this), but for everything else you have to pay out of your own pocket. Plus, upon registration, they will charge a fixed participation fee. Each organization has its own, but on average it is about 5,000 rubles. The location is usually Europe.

Work - restoration of castles, renovation of museums, construction of a new conservatory, excavation of a primitive man's site, farming. An application for a specific project may be considered for about a month, but since by this time you will have already paid the fee, they will definitely find something for you.

Private organizations work according to the same scheme - children's camps, schools, monasteries. You can specifically search in your favorite place. For example, the famous “tiger monastery” Wat Pha Luang Ta Bua in Thailand is constantly recruiting volunteers. Food and accommodation included, work from 7 am to 5 pm, fluent English. Tickets at your own expense. A bonus is daily communication with tigers of all ages.

Finally, paid programs. You pay the fee, the visa with tickets and the program itself. This money will be used to house you and feed you. The question is, what the hell? I answer.

The homeland of such projects is Asia, Africa, South America. The receiving party simply does not have the money to serve you. Two weeks in Cambodia will cost $350, in an African reserve - $1,100, and turtles in Costa Rica will cost me $500. But, as practice has shown, getting into such a program is easy.

Katya, 19 years old, Novosibirsk. “I passed several tests and an interview on Skype to become a volunteer at the Olympics in Sochi. We went first to test competitions, then to the main ones. Both times it turned out that we had to pay for the air tickets ourselves. But 40 thousand isn’t a lot for a cool experience.”

experience

“They won’t hire me, I don’t know how to do anything.” In fact, there is only one requirement - English. It needs to be trained after submitting an application. Even a slightly below average level will do if you don’t plan to work as a guide or administrator. There are programs that require high qualifications, for example, medical practices in Africa. But usually the required qualities are sociability, openness, desire to work and unpretentiousness. About the latter - separately.

Kostya, 27 years old, Samara. “I worked with older people in Spain. It was not so much my good English that was useful, but my fluent Spanish: our charges spoke only their native language, and in some special dialect. Well, the previous experience in Russia and France was useful.”

Don't expect comfort

Whatever project you choose and no matter how much you pay, you will have to live very modestly. Tents, sleeping bags, school classrooms, hostels, sometimes rental housing for several volunteers or local families. Hot water and familiar European food are the exception, not the rule. All the money goes into the project, and not into your comfort, so get ready for camping conditions.

Ilya, 37 years old, Kolomna. “My wife and I worked at a school in Cuba. We lived in a dorm, washed ourselves with running water, slept on a bunk bed - no privacy. But it’s romance!”

Work is not a wolf

According to unspoken rules, a volunteer is forced to work 6 days a week, 6 hours a day, and may be forced to dig beds, carry stones or collect snails. If you buck and leave, you will end up on the “black list.”

Irina, 36 years old, Arkhangelsk, organizer. “Today, almost everywhere you can live for free through couchsurfing, and travel by hitchhiking. Volunteering is not a vacation where you sleep until noon. There are certain tasks that need to be completed. We’ve arrived and get to work.”

Get overwhelmed by the crowd

Most likely it won't work. Organizations try to recruit a diverse group. In paid programs they will accommodate you halfway, but others are not so loyal. SCI strictly selects participants by age, nationality, and gender. You can get into the same project with your great aunt from Norway, but with your significant other - if you're lucky. It doesn’t matter whether it’s a husband or a friend - you are from the same country and the “neighboring” age. There is little chance that they will take it.

Instagram is not only about beautiful photos, but it is also about interesting people. I would like to introduce you to my Instagram friend Anya, who, together with her husband, is headlong into traveling and talks about them on the RoadIsCalling blog (blog in English) and on Instagram @RoadIsCalling(posts in Russian and English). In the USA and Canada, they chose for themselves one of the most interesting ways to travel - volunteering. Therefore, today we will talk about moving to the USA, about work in exchange for accommodation and a lot of beautiful photos.

We all love visiting new cities, meeting new people, trying new cuisines and experiencing new customs. How cool it is to wander the streets of an old city in Europe today, and tomorrow to fly to meet the never-sleeping New York or to the azure shores of the Caribbean. Great, right? Probably for some - yes. For some it is a dream, for others a way of life, and for others, on the contrary, it is moral and physical exhaustion and a drain on money.

I always considered myself to be in the third group. I never understood and still don’t understand “traveling to the limit” or “galloping across Europe” - jumping from one place or country to another, trying to fit an insane amount of activity into one day. I also don’t understand the style of travel that involves running from one monument to another in order to take a photo and tell your friends via Facebook or Instagram “I was/was there.” My style is a slow travel which is characterized by a leisurely exploration of the city and its surroundings, deepening into the language, communicating with locals, tasting buns from numerous cafes and a simple moderate rhythm of life. I will always choose quality over quantity, life experience over excursions and hotels.

That is why, when I moved to America 8 years ago, I clearly knew that I wanted to live in several states and opposite parts of the country in order to experience traditions, culture and cuisine; learn the local accent and, of course, enjoy the local attractions at a leisurely pace. Yes, yes, all states are completely different and multifaceted. You cannot rush around America in a couple of weeks or even months and say that you have seen and experienced everything in it. America needs to be explored, namely through slow travel and the opportunity to live in this country. So I lived in 5 states and intensively studied 35. Absolutely the same scenario worked for every other trip I took: either across America or to other countries. For example, when I flew to the Bahamas for a month, I didn’t stay in a fancy hotel with beautiful roses, luxurious cuisine and colorful pools. No, I was eager to live with the locals and experience all the realities of life on the island. But life in the Bahamas is not as azure as the ocean washing its shores. Therefore, I found a family with whom I spent that hot summer month, working, relaxing, going to the market for groceries and talking with locals in the evenings. My once 2-month study trip to Poland took place with the same motive - it was slow, concentrated on one region and getting to know the country through study and communication with locals. I don’t like to rush into anything, and traveling is no exception.

Websites for finding volunteer projects

A lot of time has passed since my first trip “abroad” and my move to the States. A lot has changed in countries and what they offer, but my style has remained the same - the same slow approach and leisurely travel. Two months ago, my husband and I decided to leave America on a long trip to live in other countries and on other continents and look at life from a different perspective. Before we go to the opposite end of the world, we decided to travel around America and Canada and cover what we were not able to visit during the 8 years of living here. In order to fulfill our dream of slow tourism without emptying the piggy bank long before we left the country, we decided to volunteer and work 20-24 hours a week in exchange for free room and board. I had to look through dozens of different sites that offer similar services, but we focused our attention on only 4:

• Helpx.net
• Workaway.info
• Workingtraveller.com
• wwwofinternational.org

Each site offers registration for a small amount of money, but in return you get access to detailed information and contacts of the host party.

Helpx.net has become the most popular and favorite site for us personally. There are a lot of opportunities there, from gardening and farming to construction, childcare and help with cooking. Other sites focus more on farming and gardening only. It’s interesting to pick around the garden, but we were still looking for variety and some uniqueness. All of our volunteer projects were found through helpx, although we are also registered on other sites.

Volunteering in the USA: Utah

We started our big journey in April 2017 and the first project was an Indian temple in Utah, where we spent 2 weeks caring for animals, building a barn, helping prepare Indian vegetarian dishes and planting a vegetable garden.

One of the duties was to care for these cute creatures

This is the temple itself, where we ate delicious Indian vegetarian food, worked, shared fellowship and simply enjoyed spending time.

And these are the houses in which we actually lived, they are located right behind the temple and the entire area is surrounded by beautiful views of the mountains.

The minimum volunteering requirement at the church was 2 weeks (there was no maximum), we spent almost 3 weeks and really didn’t want to leave. I personally had love at first sight with Utah and I would like to hope that I can return to this beautiful state and to the lamas in the temple.

After Utah, we took a couple of weeks off, had to return to California to finish things up, and then waited for new volunteer opportunities.

Volunteering in the USA: Oregon

Our next opportunity was in Oregon. I've always wanted to spend some time in Oregon, living in the city and traveling around. How happy we were when we received an invitation from a family who needed help restoring their Victorian home! No skills were required, the owner promised that he would teach us everything. And he taught. We worked 3-4 hours a day, 5 days a week, and the work was a complete pleasure.

For the first time in my life I am working with wood. I learned how to make wall cabinets for the kitchen. June 2017, Portland, Oregon.

And my husband is in the process of preparing the bathroom for laying tiles. We worked on one Victorian house and lived in another:

This is what our dining room and kitchen looked like. The feeling is phenomenal, as if we were able to travel back to the 19th century. The owners are wonderful and generous people who gave us a lot of free time and bought us a lot of goodies.

We spent a little over 2 weeks in Oregon, and for a few hours of work per week we received comfortable and unique accommodation and food. Since we had plenty of free time, we managed to drive around neighboring towns, visit national reserves, go to the ocean, explore everything in the area and at the same time complete our personal affairs.

Volunteering in the USA: Washington State

Oregon, you were awesome! But the time has come to drive our car further. And then we wanted to see Vancouver and the province of British Columbia in Canada. Unfortunately (or fortunately, as we later realized), there were no opportunities in Vancouver. More precisely, they were, but they were all dismantled by other travelers a long time ago. Therefore, without hesitation for a long time, we decided to volunteer in the northern part of Washington state, the one that is right on the border with Canada. Again, through the website Helpx.net, we were lucky enough to find a project in the small town of Bellingham, surrounded by greenery and surrounded by lakes:

The house in which we lived was on the shore of this lake.

We lived in the house of an elderly couple who needed help with housework. One day to cook food, another to pull up weeds in the garden, the third to put screens on the windows, and on the fourth just to keep them company and play games with them. We “worked” 3 hours a day and somehow I can’t even call our help work. It was an absolute pleasure to spend 2 weeks with wonderful people, in a beautiful cozy town, helping them with household chores, socializing and driving around Washington State.

The backyard of the house in Bellingham, where we sometimes worked, relaxed and sometimes had tea.

All the possibilities were so different, but so rich and exciting. All of them gave us an unforgettable experience, great contacts and a lot of emotions. We had agreed on 2 more volunteer projects in Canada, but we decided to refuse and travel around the country through couchsurfing.

Thanks to a friend who once recommended this opportunity, now I myself recommend it to others.

There will be new items very soon.

The ZagraNitsa portal knows how to spend a vacation in the USA with benefit not only for yourself, but also for others. We have selected 7 of the most interesting and useful volunteer programs for you. So if you want to take care of wild animals, promote nature conservation, help the homeless or develop the fashion industry, fill out the forms and go save the world!

Caring for Turtles in Florida

Submission deadline: all year round

What they offer: take care of the safety of movement of sea turtles

To whom: to everyone who cares about the state of wild nature

Participation in the program is free, but it is possible to make donations starting from $5. The duration of your trip depends on you

Appalachian Helpers

Submission deadline: all year round

What they offer: lodging, food, hiking in the Appalachian mountain ranges

To whom: sociable people with higher education and knowledge of English

Cost and duration: Participation is free, the average shift lasts 12 weeks

Florida Wild Horse Rescue

Submission deadline: all year round

What they offer: accommodation at the ranch, three meals a day and horseback riding

To whom: for non-smoking wildlife lovers over 18 years old and without animal allergies

Cost and duration: from 2 ($1495) to 8 weeks ($4195)

Spring Program for Students in Los Angeles

What they offer: accommodation, career development workshops, lectures, city tours and even surfing lessons

To whom: students

Cost and duration:$8499 for 8 weeks

A whole block of programs, from seminars and lectures to walks on the beach and excursions around Hollywood. Here you will learn valuable practical skills, ranging from proper resume writing to surfing.

For the most gifted, there is the opportunity to get a loan to study at a local college, and there are also options for employment. Directions to choose from: advertising, event planning, tourism, fashion, finance, graphic design.

Fashion Internships in New York

Submission deadline: all year round

What they offer: cooperation with the world's leading brands, participation in organizing fashion shows and photo shoots

To whom: for those who are crazy about the fashion industry, over 18 years old

Cost and duration: depends on the duration of the internship - from 4 weeks ($950) to six months ($1830)

Depending on which event from the given schedule you want to attend, calculate the deadline for submitting the application form. The hottest dates are seasonal fashion weeks. You will be offered a loyal price, depending on which apartments you prefer to live in and what transport you use. Here you will see how famous fashion designers and photographers work, learn time management and organizing shows. And the experience gained will help in developing your career in the fashion industry.

You can register and get more information.

"Volunteers for Peace" - any part-time job throughout America

Submission deadline: all year round

What they offer: work in various fields - from house construction to social support. The lists are constantly updated.

To whom: active people over 18 years old.

Cost and duration: approximately $500 for 2–3 weeks

United Planet - helping those in need in Boston

Submission deadline: all year round

What they offer: homestay accommodation, breakfasts and dinners, excursions, transport costs and logo T-shirt

To whom: over 18 years old, experience in the social sector will be a plus

Cost and duration: from a week ($1865) to a month ($3195)

Work in the US social sector, aimed at helping poor families, troubled teenagers and the homeless. If you want to study English more intensively, you can take lessons for an additional fee. Since this program is designed for cultural exchange, only participants from other countries are accepted.

Flight to the USA and home is at your expense.

You can fill out the form and get more information.

Work without money for thanks. Many in the United States do this out of a desire to help or gain the necessary experience. Volunteering for newcomers to America is a good opportunity to adapt to a new environment, brush up on the language, practice in an area of ​​interest, or simply get busy if you don’t have a work permit in the States. For those who are ready to work for free, the Forum tells you what benefits volunteering can bring.

Two sides of the coin

In America, being a volunteer is useful, and in some cases necessary. In particular, during college, students often need to complete a professional internship, during which they work as volunteers, for free, in their specialty. Volunteering can also be the first career step for a young professional with no work experience who wants to join his dream company, or for a newly arrived migrant who wants to join a professional environment. Having volunteer experience behind you makes it easier to find a job or go to college.

Over more than a century and a half of the existence of the volunteer movement in the United States, free labor has been used in almost all areas - from working with children or the elderly to the film sets of multimillion-dollar Hollywood films. However, sometimes companies openly abuse the altruism of volunteers. Thus, in 2013, interns who worked for free for more than six months for the film company Fox Searchlight Pictures on the set of the film “Black Swan”, which earned more than $300 million, won the trial and sued for their wages.

IMPORTANT: The US Department of Labor clearly defines six criteria when internships in commercial companies may not be paid:

1. internship is essentially vocational training;
2. the experience gained is useful for the intern;
3. the intern does not replace the employee, but works under his leadership;
4. the employer does not receive direct benefits from the intern's activities;
5. the intern does not necessarily receive a job after completing the internship;
6. the employer and the intern understand that the intern is not entitled to payment for time spent in the internship.

However, in general, the US population volunteers a lot and with pleasure.According to the latest data , in 2014, every fourth resident of the country was involved in volunteer activities in one form or another. And even US President Barack Obama regularly volunteers at the Martha’s Table charity organization on the eve of Thanksgiving and distributes food to those in need. At the same time, his entire family volunteers with him - his wife, children and even his mother-in-law.

How to help yourself by helping others

Newly arrived immigrants can find many advantages in volunteering if, of course, they are mentally prepared to work for free.

1. Volunteering will help you learn English and integrate into society

The best way to learn a language is to immerse yourself in the language environment and communicate more. You will be accepted to volunteer at any level of language proficiency.

There are many volunteer positions where you don’t even have to talk, but you can listen and delve as much as you like. This could be working in a library, museum, or souvenir shops at museums or amusement parks. Volunteering in the classroom is a good idea for mothers of schoolchildren - you can help the teacher, cut and paste educational materials. Nature lovers can help at farms, parks, animal shelters and zoos.

Such volunteer work will also help newcomers to the United States understand the peculiarities of the American mentality and the details of everyday life.

Where to look for positions:

If there are no suitable positions on general sites, then you can try a specialized search. Just enter “volunteering” and your area of ​​interest into the search bar. For example, physics, biology, medicine and so on. You can also enter your location or even view a position at a specific institution.

Elena Kostrygina came to the United States from Donetsk 15 years ago and immediately took a volunteer position as a web administrator: she created survey forms on the site, learned to communicate correctly by e-mail and phone, and updated the site. In total, the work took about ten hours a week.

Elena Kostrygina worked as a volunteer in her profession. Photo from personal archive.

Elena did the same thing in her homeland, so a year and a half of volunteering became an excellent work experience for her, an opportunity to improve her professional and spoken language and a worthy line on her resume. “For those who want to continue to pursue their professional interests upon arrival in the United States, I would advise them to find volunteering in their field and work in this field for some time,” she says.

1. Volunteering will help you enroll and graduate from college.

In both schools and colleges, any volunteer activity is encouraged - it helps teenagers develop leadership skills, shows their activity and initiative, and later becomes a good start for building a resume. In addition, volunteering helps teenagers decide what areas they are interested in, what they are strong in, and what makes sense to work on.

Volunteering during your high school years is a big plus when applying to college. Volunteering, or the so-called internship (internship), is a prerequisite for graduating from college. For the interns themselves, this is an opportunity to gain practical experience, which can be safely included in their resume. However, as a study by the National Association of Colleges and Employers, cited by the American Forbes , interns who completed an unpaid internship get jobs with lower salaries than those who did not undergo an internship at all. But after a paid internship, graduates find higher-paying positions.

Where to look for positions:

For interns:

Natalia Volkodav came to the United States from Zaporozhye in 2009 with her husband and child. I wanted to improve my English and not sit at home all the time, so I almost immediately got a job as a decorator in a bakery. After six months of work, volunteers were promised a decorator certificate and the opportunity to get a paid job. But within a few months Natalya found a job in a restaurant at the San Jose airport, and the line about volunteering in her resume helped her significantly.

Volunteering helped Natalya Volkodav improve her English and fill out the necessary line on her resume. Photo from personal archive.

And in 2014, Natalya entered a California college for a two-year nursing course. Volunteering as a nurse is a mandatory requirement during training. Natalia has already volunteered at the Kaizer Medical Center, as well as at individual events and examinations. This gave her not just a line on her resume, but also irreplaceable experience, with which she has a much greater chance of being in demand in her profession.

“Volunteering is a very important component of education and profession. After all, for an employer, this is like a sign: if a person agrees to do something for free, it means that he is really interested in it,” she believes.

1. Volunteering allows you to do interesting things and help others

If you do not have and do not yet have the opportunity to work, but you are full of energy and want to develop, be useful and needed, then volunteering becomes an ideal opportunity to realize yourself. You can choose to work in the field of your professional activity or find one-time events if you don’t have time for full-time volunteering. And for those who cannot sit still and are attracted by the wind of distant travels, volunteer positions abroad are perfect. Volunteers are always needed for schools and training centers around the world. The only “but” is that you will have to pay for flights, insurance and, possibly, housing. - working with children, volunteering at a surfer's beach

http://www.wwoof.net/ — volunteering on organic farms

https://movingworlds.org/ — dozens of different positions around the world

http://www.freevolunteering.net/ - diverse positions

http://www.camphill.org/ — work with children and people with special needs

Elena Aravina has been in California for 2.5 years. Almost immediately after arriving from Saratov, she found a volunteer position at the Fort Ross Russian Historical Heritage Festival, which takes place annually near San Francisco. According to Elena, she was driven primarily by curiosity and the desire to find herself, but this first experience gave her a lot: communication, language practice, socialization. And after that, volunteering itself became a conscious choice - to give part of my free time to a socially useful cause.

Elena Aravina volunteers at the Fort Ross festival. Photo from personal archive.

Elena is currently studying in college, so she cannot volunteer on a regular basis due to her school schedule. However, she is often found in the Silicon Valley Volunteers group on Meetup.com interesting one-time volunteer projects. In particular, Elena has already joined the tree planting campaign.

“Volunteering for me, an introvert, is first and foremost a challenge to myself. After all, you almost always have to communicate with strangers. In addition, it turned out to be very nice to do something for free. The main thing is to choose something you like, so that it does not greatly interfere with personal plans, then work will invariably be a pleasure!” - Elena thinks.

Now she is finishing her studies at college and preparing to go to work, but she does not plan to give up her volunteer work even in the future.