Halsbury’s ‘Helping Hands’ school expeditions offer your students the opportunity to experience some form of social responsibility activity.
Activities can include visiting a local school to interact with and help teach local children, visiting local charities and partaking in discussions or activities, or volunteer work with a local project or charity.
These activities not only help the locals in your destination but also give your students a focus for the tour that will inspire and motivate them to look at their own lives and actions in a positive and meaningful way.
Our ‘Helping Hands’ school expeditions are available in India, Thailand and Borneo in Malaysia. Each destination offers unique experiences and opportunities, but all will leave your students with a better understanding of the local culture and the issues facing the people there.
We take sustainability, social responsibility and ethical travel matters seriously. As a family company, we see everyone we work with as an extension of the Halsbury family.
And that means we want to see local communities benefit from our tours as much as the teachers and students that visit them.
By choosing a ‘Helping Hands’ tour for your school expedition experience, you can be sure that your tour will make a positive difference to the communities in the destination you’re visiting.
That’s because we make sure that we work with partners in each of these destinations that have the same ethical outlook as ourselves. In India, we work with partners who source all their literature from a small entrepreneurial business. And all their gifts are sourced from a rural women’s initiative.
And in Southeast Asia, we work with partners who provide educational scholarships for disadvantaged youths to become professional tour guides. They also work with a variety of other initiatives, including one that provides a sustainable future for elephants in tourism.
Perhaps the most exciting element of a school expedition is the opportunity for your students to make a real difference in the communities they visit.
On your school expedition, your students will be able to volunteer with local projects helping local communities or helping to conserve local wildlife. These are experiences that your students will never forget.
They will better understand the difference that they can make to the world and they will also better understand the issues that are being faced daily in many places around the world.
This may be their first experience of volunteer work but, once they see the difference they’ve made, it probably won’t be their last.
Whether you choose to visit Central or Northern India, Malaysia or Thailand, our ‘Helping Hands’ school expeditions will ensure your students enjoy more meaningful connections with local people and the opportunity to gain a greater understanding of local, cultural, social and environmental issues.
Whether it’s spending time with a local tribe in the Bornean jungle, finding out about their traditional way of life, helping to build a temple school for local children in India, or volunteering at a café run by survivors of acid attacks, your students will meet people with very different backgrounds, history and culture to them.
The connections they make with these people and the satisfaction they experience from helping them, will help them to become open-minded, empathetic adults, who will continue to want to make the world a better place.
Originally founded by former teachers, and with many former teachers still among us, we understand the value of school expeditions and how to make them successful.
Your trip will be completely tailor made, to ensure that it meets your specific requirements and learning objectives. And we’ll be on hand throughout the process to answer any questions you have.
In fact, we’ll be with you every step of the way, from now until you return home at the end of your trip. While abroad, you’ll be able to reach us with just one phone call, at any time of the day or night. And, with this comprehensive level of support while you’re away, you’ll be able to relax and enjoy experiencing your school expedition as much as your students.
Tell us your learning objectives, curriculum and budget and we’ll do the rest.
Contact usWe’re members of ABTA, ABTOT and the School Travel Forum. We also hold an ATOL and the LOtC Quality Badge.
Read moreMeet our education specialists and get to know more about the people committed to making your school trip the best it can be.