FloridaLisa Posted January 13, 2011 Share Posted January 13, 2011 My oldest went on a summer mission trip with Teen Missions. We were very, very happy with the safety, leadership, training, and mission wok itself. We can't do a TM trip this summer b/c of some date conflicts and two of my dc are looking at Global Expeditions. Can you share your experiences, good/bad/others? I'm particularly interested in learning whether you felt sufficient safety procedures were taken; about the leadership and training; about the overseas work; and whether you or your dc encountered any stray theology. THanks! Lisa Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sonshine Posted January 15, 2011 Share Posted January 15, 2011 My son and a friend's son both went on mission trips with them. They were generally very safe and very supervised. A student has to stay with their group of five and sometimes can't even go to the bathroom by themselves. It can be a good thing and a bad thing. I appreciated the supervision as my kid who went was a wanderer and it was good he had a short rein. He didn't appreciate the short rein, but oh well. The bad side of that was that a lot of people have power that are not old enough, mature enough, or sometimes qualified to handle it correctly. A friend of mine's daughter went to their honor academy and that was a negative to her - she rebelled against Christianity when she got out. I didn't know her well enough to have insight into whether she would have done that anyway. My friend's son went on a trip to Africa, and he did feel like the emphasis was a little off - they went hut to hut praying for sick people and he felt like they were acting like people were getting healed who weren't - I don't know the details though and this was from a young person's perspective. My son went on two different type trips and didn't have problems with the theology. We are from a Bible church background A lot depends on the leader. The leader of my son's one month overseas trip went without his wife and showed too much attention to girls - that really bothered my son. Probably nothing deeply immoral actually happened but it was not good - things like playfully kicking a girls' behind with his foot. A girl was really sick once and he didn't get her medical attention and forced her to keep working. She should have gone to the hospital. He was glad he went on another trip where he respected the trip leader. This was four - five years ago - maybe they have tightened up since then, and maybe my son's leader was the unfortunate exception. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FloridaLisa Posted January 15, 2011 Author Share Posted January 15, 2011 Thanks for your feedback. One big difference I noticed between Teen Missions and Global Expeditions was the amount of training that the students get before heading out on the missions trip. Teen Missions has several weeks of hard training (both physical and Biblical) to prepare the kids for their work, while GE looks like they have a day or two and then send the kids out. Not crazy about that. Thanks! Lisa Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sonshine Posted January 15, 2011 Share Posted January 15, 2011 It's not a mission trip experience but have you looked at Teenpact? My son has done this for three years now - as well as learning about government, they learn about leadership. He has progressed to being on staff. They have all kinds of camps they can go to once they have gone to their first state camp. I have been impressed with how the camps and experiences are run and the quality of the leadership. Let me know if you want more details. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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