Helpful informations about volunteering in general

I was hoping we can put together a topic with general information’s about volunteering to help others with their research for the right company, project or program.
Also posts which are in general about volunteering, the market and challenges might be helpful.
Critical as well as positive feedback always helps others, here we fiend mainly positive feedback promoted by the companies and local partners which does not say a lot about the impact volunteering and the companies may have on the local communities but only the customer satisfaction rate.
The market is a mess with hundreds of companies involved sending out 10th of thousands of volunteers to undeveloped countries a year. They even fight over the placements within some countries, as there are often not enough good placements to satisfy the market. Many big companies advertise all around the web. With this topic, all of us can get deeper insights into the situation and the impact volunteering can have. We will update the link post every couple of weeks. Chose the company carefully and think twice (once for yourself and once for the locals you will work with) and you will fiend a good one for your volunteer experience!

Reviews can be influenced by the companies (You can fiend here many posts which are stated as fake reviews and post where the companies accuse each other of writing fake reviews):

http://blog.geovisions.org/geovisions-blog/bid/77129/Spotting-The-Fake-V...

1. Articles about orphanage volunteering:

http://orphanagetourismcambodia.wordpress.com/2012/07/16/so-how-do-you-m...

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/cambodias-orphanages-target...

http://www.aviewfromthecave.com/2012/05/al-jazeera-takes-on-voluntourism...

http://phuketwan.com/tourism/inside-cambodias-shocking-orphans-tourists-...

http://www.forbes.com/sites/morganhartley/2013/05/24/cambodias-booming-n...

http://tourism.wildasia.org/1978/child-safe-tourism/

2. Reports from well respected (real) Organizations:

http://www.unicef.org/cambodia/Study_Attitudes_towards_RC-English.pdf

http://www.childsafetourism.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/Child-Safe-To...

3. general articals about the impact of volunteering:

http://travel.cnn.com/bangkok/visit/price-volunteering-thailand-231682

http://www.digitaljournal.com/pr/1270035 (volunteering in an HIV placement, HIV sells)

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-22294205 (good and negative aspects of volunteering)

4. Advice how to volunteer:

http://www.volunteercard.com/2011/10/become-a-more-valuable-volunteer-5-...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/global-development-professionals-network/2013/...

5. How to check on your placement:

http://unitingforchildren.org/2013/05/checklist-for-evaluating-orphanages/

http://orphanagetourismcambodia.wordpress.com/2012/07/16/so-how-do-you-m...

6. How to choose the sending company/organization:

http://travel.cnn.com/bangkok/visit/price-volunteering-thailand-231682

http://www.openthemagazine.com/article/nation/the-volunteer-trap

http://unitingforchildren.org/2013/05/checklist-for-evaluating-orphanages

http://orphanagetourismcambodia.wordpress.com/2012/07/16/so-how-do-you-m...

http://www.vergemagazine.com/articles/volunteer-abroad/volunteer-abroad-...

7. Career and volunteering:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/02/giving/volunteer-work-gains-stature-on... (volunteering on the CV and in the job interview)

You can fiend a lot of more helpful informations here: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Responsible-Volunteering/270333629677425?...