Volunteer

Our volunteer programme supports cultural exchange, breaking down barriers and adding value to learning

Over the past 15 years, more than 100 volunteers from the UK have taken up placements with The Mango Tree in Kenya and Tanzania.

The programme supports our values around inclusion and diversity as well as supporting cultural exchange – helping to break down barriers between people from different cultures and environments, and enabling young people to learn from each other. Over the years many student volunteers have revisited TMT. Some return to take up internships or conduct research with our support and have gone on to pursue careers in international development.

We support volunteering schemes for students and internship opportunities for postgraduates and MA students. If you feel you have the right skills and would like to work with us, do contact us to discuss the available options.

Alison Wood

Alison has visited The Mango Tree Kenya several times, first as a volunteer and then to conduct research for her degree in International Development at Edinburgh University. Her work highlighted the issue of girls unable to afford sanitary protection who were then forced to drop out of education, leading to a new initiative supported by us to provide rural girls with the skills and materials needed to produce their own reusable sanitary pads.

“Having experienced the difficulties that school girls in Kenya face to access sanitary products, I set up the Lilypads project developing a reusable sanitary pad and menstrual health education model so that girls don’t have to risk sexual exploitation or being left behind in their education. Whilst doing research back in Edinburgh I realised that period poverty and stigma are prevalent here, too, and am now setting up a UK offshoot of the project.”