Emily there are lots of South American trips on globeaware.org that are really great programs like Jamaica for $1180, cost that include stuff like meals, accommodation, on-site travel, bi-lingual coordinators (who are with you the whole time), medical insurance...etc. Everything they provide is really worth it.

GlobeAware.org is a really good website for affordable volunteer vacations, their trips are 50% service and 50% cultural experience so you actually do stuff like cook traditional food with a family and go to traditional rituals and stuff like that as well as helping.

Emily there are lots of South American trips on globeaware.org that are really great programs like Jamaica for $1180, cost that include stuff like meals, accommodation, on-site travel, bi-lingual coordinators (who are with you the whole time), medical insurance...etc. Everything they provide is really worth it.

But just FYI if you are thinking of taking a volunteer vacation the best thing to do to make sure you are not getting swindled is to go onto guidestar.org (you have to registrar) but then you can access the financial information for all non-profits and see exactly how much of your donation goes towards greedy executives and how much of it is actually sent towards helping developing communities.