Yesterday, Travelocity announced the four grand prize winners for their recent Travel for Good® program. Over the last six months Travelocity has been looking for stories of inspiration from volunteers around the world. The four winners will each receive a $5,000 grant for a so called “volunteer vacation” – where they can offer their services in some corner of the world.
The winners of these competitions were picked from video submissions. Their volunteer vacations will take them to Ghana and Tanzania in an effort to help create lasting change there. The current grant winners are:
- Tiffany Schivley – Kailua-Kona, Hawaii (video) – Schivley has been working in Hawaii with Teach for America, and will be headed to Ho, Ghana with GlobeAware to volunteer in the local community and at the area orphanage.
- Jessica Garlock – Honolulu, Hawaii (video) –
Garlock will be traveling to Tanzania with Cross-Cultural Solutions to volunteer on education, health, and social services initiatives in the community. She is currently pursuing a PhD in Social Welfare at the University of Hawaii. - Georges Le Chevallier – Garner, North Carolina (video) – Le Chevallier is the co-founder of Artists Unite for Haiti. With a passion for giving back, he too will be traveling to Tanzania with Cross-Cultural Solutions.
- Jeff Garkow – Littleton, Colorado (video) – Garkow, a teacher from Colorado, spent last winter volunteering in Kenya. This year he will be volunteering in Tanzania with Cross-Cultural Solutions.
For those interested in volunteering themselves to help abroad, Travelocity also announced they will begin a new round of applications beginning July 1 through September 30. Four new winners will be selected for volunteerism grants when the contest officially closes on December 31st. If you would like to enter, you should visit VolunteerJournals.com to upload your video submission.
In the video, you should explain why your application deserves to be selected. Furthermore, entrants can also promote their own videos via social media and social networking. Make them good quality though, as half the judging is based on video quality. The final four winners will be picked from among the 25 best submissions overall. Finally, Alison Presley, manager of Travelocity’s Travel for Good, had this to add:
“We encourage anyone with a passion for travel and volunteering to enter. Don’t let the video entries intimidate you – the submission process is easy. Most of today’s smart phones can take a quick video and what we’re really looking for is a passion for volunteering.”
We leave you with a video from the Travelocity YouTube Channel and Travel for Good. Find out how you can travel not only for fun, but good too.