home > volunteer orphanage program > apply for this program
Volunteer Orphanage assistant Program (Africa - Ghana)
- The program
- The institutions
- The accommodations
- The feeding
- Entertainment and sight-seeing
- Minimum qualification required of volunteers for the program
- Rough estimate of total cost involved
- Apply for this program
- Next steps — after you have been accepted and given your placement information
- Other relevant facts on the program
- Sign up for our Newsletter
- Submit a question
The program
The volunteer orphanage assistant would be helping to:
- Maintain children in the orphanage by giving them the necessary care and attention as their mothers would have given them. This is achieved by feeding, bathing and ensuring general cleanliness of the children
- Supervise day to day activities of the children in the orphanage i.e. sweeping, bathing, fetching of water
- Keep the girl and boys dormitories clean, plan extra-curricular activities, physical education, music and culture, indoor and outdoor games, morning and evening studies, organize excursions and so on
- Organize children for extra-curricular activities such as sports and games etc.
- Organize children fro extra classes after school
- Organize them cultural activities such as singing, dancing, drumming etc
- Teach the children any subject that you will be interested in at the school
- Teach handicrafts, art, music, playing with the children
- Any other activities related to children
The orphanage home
The home is located in a lovely little town called Bawdwease; in the Central region of Ghana — within just 50 km of the capital city Accra
Back to top
Volunteers' accommodation
You will be staying at the orphanage's 'Volunteer House': All volunteers stay in a self contained house, which is about a 10 minute's walk from the orphanage. There are four rooms which can accommodate up to 12 volunteers. There is a kitchen where Nancy (the greatest cook in Ghana) prepares food, and the volunteers eat in a common area. There is electricity but no running water. The water is brought – by kids and volunteers – from a nearby well. The rooms are equipped with beds, fans and mosquito nets.
Back to top
The meals
8.00am - Breakfast; 12.00pm - Lunch; 6.30pm - Dinner.
Volunteers will be fed a variety of food including local dishes such as fufu, banku, kenkey and red-red, as well as ‘foreign’ meals such as rice and pasta. Volunteers with special dietary stipulations such as vegetarianism or lactose intolerance can easily be catered for. Volunteers have to budget for their own drinking water. Bottled (as well as filtered, bagged) water is available for purchase in many parts of the village. A 1.5 liter bottle costs about US$0.85 whilst a pack of bagged filtered water (popularly known as 'pure water') costs about US$0.90. One pack of bagged filtered water contains twenty-five 0.5 liter pieces of 'pure water' sachets or bags. An alternative to buying bottled or 'pure water' would be to treat the tap-water with water purification tablets. Water purification tablets are not readily available in Ghana so you would have to bring some along if you intend to treat your own drinking water.
Back to top
Entertainment and sight-seeing
Weekends (Friday afternoon till Sunday evening) are free days. Volunteers at the children's home usually would organize entertainment and sight-seeing trips as a group to interesting places far and near.
Back to top
Minimum qualification required of volunteers for the program
Applicants for this program must be able to communicate in simple English since English is the official language of communication in Ghana.
Back to top
Rough estimate of total cost involved
- Flight to and from Ghana: US$800-1250 (Round-trip)
- Ghana visa: US$50-150
- Vaccinations: US$100-250
- Miscellaneous personal items: US$300-900
- Personal Spending money whilst in Ghana: US$200 upwards
- VIGS-GHANA Program fee: starts from US$655
So, a rough estimate of the total cost for a three-week program duration (the minimum duration) would be about US$2,000 - 3,300. Check the equivalent in your currency.
Back to top
Next steps — after you have been accepted and given your Placement information
After you have been admitted to participate in the program, you would now have to execute the following:
- Book a flight. See our Ghana flight information page. The earlier you book and confirm your flight, the better.
- Go through the suggested checklist of items to do and bring and start getting (or packing) them
- Send us your flight itinerary
- 60-30 days before your departure date, you must start processing for your Ghanaian visa. VIGS-GHANA will provide you with the needed references in Ghana — which are needed to obtain a Ghanaian visa
Back to top
Other relevant facts on the program
- We will send you a document on how to fund-raise for your trip - after you confirm your intended participation.
- We will meet and greet you at the Airport in Accra (ACC) on your arrival day
- We can loan you a local mobile phone with IDD on your arrival into Ghana
- The average work day is 3-8 hours for this program
- Saturdays and Sundays are leisure days
- We will give you a Certificate of Participation on successful completion of your volunteer work
- You can contact VIGS-GHANA local staff on cell phones all the time — 24 hours a day — seven days a week
- You can pay the program fee through any one of the following means:
- By Wire Transfer through your bank.
- You can also pay it securely online through our highly-reputed payment processor using any of the following credit cards: Visa, MasterCard, American Express, Discover, JCB, PayPal.
- Through Western Union Money Transfer - using your debit or credit card securely online or by phone.
- Cash installments (or full payment) upon arrival into Ghana.