Visions Service Adventures
Since 1989 VISIONS has set the standard for international community service programs.
VISIONS summer programs for teenagers, and middle school students, blend ambitious service, cultural immersion, and adventure.
Days of close camaraderie within another culture have a rhythm and substance that push you to tap into your potential as you and your peers work toward common goals.
You will know the people whose lives you have impacted, and will return home a more confident global citizen with genuine appreciation for our multi-cultural world.
Service Work
VISIONS projects are ambitious. We work hard to meet service commitments that we plan with host communities in response to needs that they identify. The service encompasses both construction and non-construction.
We spend at least 55% of the program engaging in service. We partner with local governments, NGO's, civic sectors, and community-minded individuals. In some locations, our partners plan projects in stages, several progressive seasons ahead, confident in VISIONS high standards and our participants' proven capabilities.
Culture & Language Immersion
Cultural understanding and friendship is a core focus. Working with and for our hosts is a doorway into their lives. You will learn about the place you go in many ways. Spanish- and French-speaking programs, with fluent staff leaders, offer constant language immersion that increases foreign language speaking skills.
We share work sites, meals and down time with folks who have become close friends over the course of many summers. Always there are opportunities to meet and mingle with local people. Our programs have the means, methods and opportunities for a variety of dialogues with native speakers.
Adventure & Exploration
Our goal is to provide a balanced experience overall. There is time to play and wind down throughout the program. VISIONS program sites offer a splendid variety of scenery, geography, wildlife and history. We explore the places we go in ways that are challenging, engaging and purely fun.
Depending on the location, recreation activities include rock or ice climbing, wilderness backpacking and hiking, snorkeling, scuba diving, sea kayaking, rainforest zip-lining, rafting, horseback riding, whale watching, underground cave exploration and more.
I have never had so much fun with such amazing individuals completing projects that would and will benefit so many people in my entire life.
Patrick Fleming
Watertown, CT
I still call on my experience with VISIONS and am gratified to have that knowledge informing my work. This is no luxury tour - just luxurious learning and growth. VISIONS has its head and heart in the right place and really is different, in all the right ways, from many organizations that offer summer service programs for teenagers.
Max Savishinsky, Program Director for Latin America and Caribbean
Council on International Experiental Exchange (CIEE)
Since 1989 VISIONS has set the standard for international summer community service, culture and language learning programs for high school students who want to volunteer in the U.S. or abroad. Among teen summer camps, teen travel and international adventures, community service and other summer programs for high school students, VISIONS has enjoyed the highest reputation for quality and integrity for 22 years.
You live in the heart of a host community, rooted to a very new, very different place in ways that are exceptional and that surpass the superficial. Local people welcome you, sharing their lives and views of life. You learn about, do and see things you never imagined. Lasting friendships form spontaneously with your peers, hosts and leaders. Days of service and close camaraderie in another culture have a rhythm and substance that push our participants to tap into their potential as the group works together toward common goals. VISIONS participants return home with genuine appreciation for our multi-cultural world and confidence as global citizens.
Everything in VISIONS, the degree of our success, depends on teamwork. We are interdependent, alternately supporting and leaning on each other. We live together simply, work together, explore and play together, and enjoy our shared experience.
VISIONS was established in 1988 as a kind of Peace Corps for teens. Our mission has not changed but has grown and flourished through decades of experience, earning VISIONS a reputation for quality and as a leader in the field. VISIONS summer programs for teenagers blend ambitious service projects, cultural and language immersion, adventure and exploration. We work hard to meet service goals planned with host communities in response to needs that they identify. While construction service projects are keystones of each program, every location incorporates non-construction service, too. Adventure and exploration travel are woven into the experience as the days progress.
We spend at least 55% of the program engaging in community service. Our partners are local and national governments, NGO's, civic sectors, community outreach and charitable organizations, schools, and community-minded individuals. In some locations, our partners plan projects in stages, several progressive seasons ahead, confident in VISIONS high standards and our participants' proven capabilities. Of equal if not greater value are the close relationships with individuals in the communities in which we live and work.
Program planning occurs during the off-season. Often we know the next season’s projects before the current summer season ends. Most projects are developed during winter months through regular communication with our partners in the field and personal visits to the sites before the summer.
Every VISIONS program undertakes a ground-up building project. You learn technical skills from staff carpenters, local masons and adobe maestros. We break into small teams so that you can choose daily where you go and what you do. VISIONS incorporates sustainable development by building green houses, irrigation canals, cisterns, potable water systems and compost latrines, low-impact environmental walkways through protected lands, and fish and endangered species hatcheries.
Every VISIONS program includes non-construction service, too, such as internships with micro-businesses, farmers, artisans, health workers, and others. We create and paint murals for community buildings. We volunteer with children in day camps and tutoring activities, and volunteer with the elderly, orphaned or disabled.
Cross-cultural learning is a core focus. We share work sites, meals, recreation and down time with folks who have become close friends over the course of many summers. Our programs have the means, methods and opportunities for a variety of dialogues with native speakers. Spanish and French language programs, with fluent staff leaders, offer constant language immersion that increases foreign language speaking skills.
Your leaders in foreign language locations are fluent speakers of the language. They help build language bridges by interpreting, clarifying, practicing and playing language games with you, and nudging you to try your skills.
In VISIONS there is always time to play and wind down and plenty of adventure camp like activities. VISIONS program sites offer a splendid variety of scenery, geography, wildlife and history. Depending on the location, recreation activities include rock or ice climbing, wilderness backpacking and hiking, snorkeling, scuba diving, sea kayaking, rainforest zip-lining, rafting, horseback riding, whale watching, underground cave exploration and always sightseeing.
VISIONS is not a typical teen adventure travel camp, teen adventure tour, summer travel program, teen summer camp or teen adventure tour. It is a wholly experiential learning experience with a purpose in a real life setting of continuous discovery and constant rewards.
VISIONS Service Adventures offers summer programs for high school students 14 to 18, and Passage summer programs for middle school students 11 to 13. VISIONS blends ambitious community service, culture and language immersion, exploration and adventure in:
- Alaska
- Montana
- Mississippi Gulf Coast
- Dominican Republic
- British Virgin Islands
- Dominica
- Guadeloupe
- Nicaragua
- Ecuador & Galapagos
- Peru
Indeed, today's IT demands require that many a summer camp program, teen camp, teen travel program, international teen adventure camp, high school summer program, adventure camp, language camp, international camp, international experiential education summer program, community service camp, or other summer program for teens lay claim to the highest level of quality. If you are a teenager seeking a rewarding, life changing summer of community service, culture immersion, and adventurous exploration, consider VISIONS. Speak to our references. They will confirm that VISIONS offers the best community service, cross-cultural summer program for teens.