Learn
To care for marginalised and vulnerable members of society and seek justice in everyday life
Celebrate
New cultures and how local people are transforming their communities
Advocate
Using your learning and skills within your communities to empower local people to serve their communities
Begin a Journey of life-long learning
Rok Kern is an invitation to do volunteering and short-term missions in new ways – exploring what it means to love and serve others while entering new cultures and communities with humility and respect.
Learn how our past efforts have unintentionally harmed vulnerable children and communities and how Cambodian practitioners are changing that.
Be inspired to love and serve others in your daily life.
Ethical
Rok Kern has been created using best practice standards from the aid, development and mission sectors. Through our partnerships with organisations in these sectors, we continue to reflect and learn from current research into ethical approaches.
Responsible
Recognizing the impact that many short term teams have on the communities they are visiting, Rok Kern is committed to using do-no-harm approaches in every aspect of the program.
Child-safe
Rok Kern is committed to safe-guarding children and their communities so that everyone has the opportunity to grow up with a healthy childhood. Visitors do not interact with any local children or vulnerable people groups on a Rok Kern trip.
2000
Australian Modern Slavery Act of 2018 recognises orphanage tourism as contributing to orphanage recruitment – a form of human trafficking.
1.5m
travel each year on short-term trips or to volunteer in orphanages, creating a 2.6 billion dollar voluntourism industry.
1
%
church goers in Australia and up to 15% of Australian schools financially support orphanages.
Our Guiding Values
Rok Kern recognizes that people who volunteer abroad (whether that is in orphanages, or in other forms of short-term mission trips) do so with the best of intentions and a desire to care for others. Rok Kern realizes that reflecting on past experiences, learning new approaches, and changing attitudes takes time and emotional investment. Consequently, we ask all our staff and program participants to uphold the following values:
Humility
We are open to learn as guests in new cultures.
Partnership
We celebrate and work with local organizations to help them achieve their goals.
Respect
We respect the culture, privacy and lived experiences of those we meet.
Dignity
We recognize each person’s dignity and consider the way we communicate about others.
Amplify
We use our lived experiences to amplify the voices calling for change in their communities.
What People Say
Rok Kern is addressing critical issues that schools and churches facilitating mission and service trips need to consider. Team visits to poor communities overseas, conducted well, can present an invaluable opportunity to learn about the richness of other cultures, the nature and impact of systemic injustice, local resilience and resourcefulness, and opportunities for positive partnerships between Australians and international communities. Conducted badly, team visits can reinforce an unhelpful myth of western superiority and promote damaging paternalistic interventions into the lives of the poor. Rok Kern does a great job of helping people to understand the difference between these two approaches.
Mike Penberthy
South East Asia and Pacific Regional Coordinator, TEAR Australia
Our Resources
Find out more about our approach, the latest research and reflections from participants on our blog.
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Rok Kern review: “These experiences allowed me to become the person I am today”
How has working with CIF impacted you personally, professionally (if your career path might have been impacted) in your schooling (i.e done projects on Cambodia) …
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Guest post: The Faces We’re Coming To Know – GOEL COMMUNITY
We, at Rok Kern, wanted to share this blog post because this is the sort of advocacy that we like to see from people who …
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Testimonial: Acknowledging that just because we feel like we are making a difference doesn’t mean we are.
The Rok Kern team has been hosting a number of training and development workshops for Tatachilla Lutheran College over the last 3 years. Their year 11 team spent an afternoon with us as part of their wider school Service Learning experience in-country and the school has also participated in our one-day “How do I respond to poverty?” workshops and leadership forums in Australia. In this short testimonial, Chris, one of their staff members, reflects on what attending those workshops has meant for their school.