The Nevada Sagebrush

An international volunteering organization signed up a record number of students Sept. 16 to volunteer over the summer, according to Meetal Gandhi, a recruiter for the group.

International Student Volunteers sends college students from several countries abroad to both volunteer in conservation and community projects and have fun with activities such as kayaking, surfing and glacier climbing.

Gandhi and another recruiter visited the University of Nevada, Reno to talk to classes, hold information sessions and sign students up for trips. Gandhi said 147 students signed up, compared to a previous UNR-best of 105.

Students can also earn academic credit for volunteering in several majors by coordinating with their professors and colleges, he said. Volunteer projects in the past have included building a sidewalk on a dangerous street, working in a shelter for those victims of sex trafficking and research with turtle eggs, said Michelle Immel, Gandhi’s recruitment partner.

Students said they signed up because of the opportunity to travel and a personal desire to volunteer. Amrit Kaur, a 20-year-old speech pathology and audiology major, said she hopes to travel to the Dominican Republic.

“The biggest project there is the social project where you get to help kids learn English, and I really like to do that,” she said.

Kaur travels to India every other summer with her parents and taught English to children there last summer. Kaur has applied to travel with ISV twice before, but said that she didn’t have enough money to go. Four-week trips cost about $4,000 and two-week trips cost about $2,500, said Immel.

Ashley Slusher, a 21-year-old dual major in wildlife ecology and conservation and biology, said she would recommend ISV to other students.

“You usually get the tourist side of the country, and in ISV, you actually get to go into the villages and do things you normally wouldn’t get to do,” she said.

Slusher volunteered with the group in Thailand, New Zealand and Australia and said she hopes to volunteer in Africa with the group sometime in the future. She said she earned three independent study credits toward her biology major for her volunteer efforts in Thailand. She helped plant trees, kill invasive plants and took care of elephants on her trips, she said.

Students can apply to go on trips this summer online, but are less likely to be guaranteed a place than students who applied during the recruiters’ trip to campus, Gandhi said.

Ben Miller can be reached at bmiller@nevadasagebrush.com.

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