“GLA was the catalyst for my transformation into the woman I am today and I will forever be grateful for that.”
Name: Fehintola Abioye
Life Changing Experience: Guatemala: Children of the Maya™ 2012
Where Is She Now: Program Coordinator at a community development non-profit
Passions: Game of Thrones, exploring cafés, international travel
Growing up in Boston, Fehintola Abioye always knew she wanted to do big things. What exactly, she wasn’t certain.
“I’d always tell people that wasn’t 100% sure of what I want to do in my life but that I want to make change,” she remembers. During her junior year in high school, Fehintola enrolled in Global Leadership Adventures’ Guatemala: Children of the Maya program, and her life was never the same.
“GLA was the catalyst for my transformation into the woman I am today and I will forever be grateful for that. The experienced helped me to frame the kind of work I could be doing in my community and abroad; the experience brought me together with like-minded people who I would never have interacted with otherwise, and a group of leaders who really were role models for women of color who were using their individual privilege and power to do something to help. I started to think outside of my box, which at that point consisted solely of my own community in Boston.”
After graduating cum laude from Tufts University with degrees in International Relations and Anthropology, Fehintola happened across a posting for EduTerra Global Internships (“EGI” for short). The eleven-month internship promised the opportunity to live and work abroad with a cohort of recent college grads, while learning a wide array of skills in the field of international education while working with families considering a Global Leadership Adventures experience of their own.
“I thought, why not take a job that allows me to continue my exploration of the world and helps me provide that same opportunity to other young people?” Six months later, she found herself living in San Jose, Costa Rica with a dozen other interns, some of whom also happened to be GLA alumni. Together, the group learned the ins and outs of setting up an international volunteer program, from helping families to find the best fit to visiting service sites to meeting with local partners throughout Costa Rica.
“We became our own version of a Tico {Costa Rican} family. Similarly to my program in Guatemala, my time in Costa Rica brought me together with people who I would have never befriended. I found love and similarities with people coming from completely different backgrounds and lifestyles. There were so many great things from the adventures, the experience with the Spanish language, but similar to many other experiences, the people involved are who made the internship amazing for me,” she says.
In the summer, Fehintola had the opportunity to serve as a staff member on a GLA program in Haiti, where her experience came full circle. Working alongside other staff members, she helped a new group of teens to navigate what it meant to be abroad in a service learning environment as they built a community center out of recycled materials, dove deep into issues of inequality and human security, and just let loose.
Sadly, all good things must come to an end; however, Fehintola was ready for the next chapter. Armed with her newfound skills and a renewed zest for bringing people together, she began her hunt for a new adventure. Soon, she landed a job as a Program Coordinator at the Mel King Institute, a training Institute through the Massachusetts Association of Community Development Corporations. This non-profit advocacy organization works with Community Development Corporations (CDCs) throughout her home state of Massachusetts, supporting a wide range of community-led initiatives.
She credits GLA and her internship with giving her the experience she needed to branch out. “Through those experiences I felt like I had a better sense of the world around me which I think is important for any career path, but especially one in which you are working with communities that are different from the one you’re from.”
What’s next for Fehintola? “I’ve loved learning about community development and how to be a catalyst for change at a local level,” she says. “I think one of my next steps is going back to school to learn more so I can do this type of work on a larger scale.”
For information on EduTerra Global Internships, check out our Employment Opportunities page!
