About Us: Staff
Summer Jobs

The GLA experience is delivered by the expertise our staff who facilitate the program for our students.   The success of our programs can be directly attributed to the high quality and dedication of our amazing Directors and Mentors.   GLA leaders are safe, fun, energetic, knowledgeable, and creative!  They have experience and enjoy working with teenagers — and embody the GLA mission of transforming the next generation to realize their potential to transform the world and their role in it.

To join our team you must be able to to motivate and energize students in a variety of settings and situations in developing countries around the world and work cross-culturally with local staff in country.   We are generally looking for 7 – 8 weeks of availability from June – August. Leadership on all programs requires intensive interaction and mentoring of students.   The ideal candidates possess excellent personal leadership skills and the ability to handle varied tasks all happening at the same time.  It is necessary to be able to embrace the level of independence and responsibility that comes with this type of position.   Let us know if you can lead, inspire, mentor, counsel and set limits — while creating a transformative and safe experience abroad.

Program Director

The GLA Program Director is responsible for leading a group of 10 to 50 students through a life-changing service-learning journey.  Each program has 1 or 2 Directors.  Program Directors live alongside the students and have responsibility for the students 24 hours a day, 7 days a week while programs are in operation.

The Program Director is responsible for facilitating the students’ experience through:
1) Ensuring student safety,
2) facilitating discussion about social issues in the country,
3) guiding student self-reflection on their experience,
4) supporting students during the community service project,
5) delivering two sessions on personal leadership per week
6) helping students connect their personal experience with larger themes
7) handling student discipline issues, and
8 ) managing parent communications.

The Program Directors are NOT responsible for program planning or logistics.  All logistics and coordination is handled by our local Program Administrator.

Mentor
Mentors are teachers and other professionals who receive gratification by guiding students through a life-changing international experience, participating with them in community service and on excursions and, most importantly, facilitating discussion and reflection sessions to draw out knowledge and values from within the students. Their major goal is to extract lessons on leadership and values, based on the student’s experiences. Mentors will facilitate discussions directly with a small group of students and occasionally lead activities with the full group of students. Mentors should be in good physical health and able to actively participate in all elements of the experience. Mentors should have had experience with students at the secondary level and have some experience in youth leadership development.

Requirements
Programs run almost non-stop for six to eight weeks from late June until early August.  Candidates must be able to commit to the entire time period. Ideally candidates will have at least four years experience teaching high-school age students in either a classroom setting or in experiential education programs such as summer camps, or outdoor education programs.

Additionally, Director candidates should have extensive experience in the country or region where they are interested in working.  In countries where English is not widely spoken, intermediate competency in the local language is required.

Candidates who are not Red Cross certified in CPR and First Aid will be required to become certified at their own expense before commencement of the programs.

Compensation:varies based on role, experience and duration.  Includes international flight, food, lodging — all in country expenses.

Application Process

We begin interviewing program staff in January of each year.  The hiring process has multiple steps and usually takes two months to complete.
Step 1: Complete the online application. Applicants who do not complete the application will not be considered.

Step 2: Email a resume or CV and cover letter to
hr [at] experiencegla.com.

The cover letter should highlight your experience in facilitating experiential education programs and experience in the country or region where you are interested in working.

Step 3: Interviews.  We’ll do a brief introductory interview to get to know you.  If we think there’s a fit, there will be more interviews.

Step 4: Background check.  If you go through all the interviews, we’ll run a background check on you.  Assuming all goes well, you’ll be offered a position!