Support :: Expand Our Network

Spread the Word

Please help introduce us to your home, work, or campus community. By hanging posters, giving presentations, writing letters or blogs, or simply putting our link on your website, you can help more volunteers, classrooms, and donors learn from and support our international Partners. You can also help us expand our network of Partners by distributing invitations and offering references for outstanding organizations that you have encountered in your own travels.

A Basic Summary

If you want to put an Omprakash link on your blog or website, here is some descriptive text you can borrow:

Want to support grassroots social projects around the world? Omprakash is a free network that connects volunteers and donors with over 100 "Partner" projects in more than 30 countries. Omprakash Partners address issues in the sectors of health and education, and they generally seek support in the form of volunteers, material resources, and financial donations. There are no administrative fees associated with volunteering, and Omprakash offers competitive Volunteer Grants to defray travel costs for prospective volunteers. Check it out: www.omprakash.org

More Details

If you think your audience will want more details, here is a longer description:

Want to volunteer abroad...for free?

Omprakash (www.omprakash.org) is a web-based platform that connects grassroots health, education, and environmental projects around the world with volunteers, donors, and classrooms that can learn from and support their work. The network offers volunteer opportunities at over 150 grassroots social projects in more than 30 countries ranging from Ecuador to Kenya to India and beyond. Unlike most other databases of volunteer opportunities, Omprakash is completely free—no administrative fees whatsoever. Grants are available to help qualified volunteers defray travel expenses.

The organizations represented within the Omprakash network address issues as diverse as deforestation, women’s empowerment, energy shortages, food security, and access to clean drinking water. The core goal of Omprakash is not just to connect volunteers and fundraisers with its grassroots partners, but also to offer these connections as a resource for meaningful research and service-learning projects for middle and high-school students.

Omprakash has evolved in response to the popular model of “voluntourism” in which foreign volunteers visit underprivileged communities for short periods of time and sometimes inadvertently patronize the very people they are trying to serve. A central principle of the Omprakash ethos is that volunteers should humbly attempt to live and serve in the same community for at least a month, and should approach volunteering as an opportunity to learn from and with their host community. To learn more, visit www.omprakash.org today.

Success Story

After being awarded with an Omprakash Volunteer Grant in 2008, Sarah Zellweger left New York and headed to Kathmandu, Nepal, to volunteer with one of our Partners. While there, Sarah visited a number of different grassroots schools in and around the city, evaluating their quality and encouraging selected organizations to apply for to become Omprakash Partners. By the time Sarah returned to the United States, five new organizations had joined our network of Partners in Nepal.

Visit SARAH’S PROFILE