A Renaissance College student at University of New Brunswick has recently turned his internship experience into something more.
Renaissance College allows students to get their degree in three years with a ten-week internship in another country. Andrew Walshe chose to go to Bhutan.
The Kingdom of Bhutan, bordered by India and China, is home to just under 700,000 people. It used to be one of the most isolated countries in the world.
“I was there from May 4 until July 12 (2009). A majority of this time was spent at my internship site, Sherubtse College in Kanglung, Bhutan.”
It was there when Walshe came up with an idea.
At the residence where Walshe was staying, a friend was collecting money for a local leprosy hospital near Wamrong, a small village in Bhutan. Walshe gave $20.
“This student group, the Social Service Unit (SSU), has an annual trip where they take a bus to the hospital and bring donations of food, clothing, and money to the six patients who live there,” Walshe said.
” (I) saw just how much this meant to him and his group. This led him to invite me to join then the next day on their trip.”
“I decided that if $20 could go a long way towards helping both the SSU and the leprosy patients respectively, I could find a way to raise a couple hundred and really help out during my time there.”
Walshe planned a walk from Kanglung to Trashigang, the nearby town.
He would do the 22-kilometre walk while being sponsored by friends and family back in Canada.
After explaining to the Sherubtse students what he wanted to do, they jumped at the chance to join him.
“I then began messaging people back in Canada, mostly through Facebook, telling them what I was doing and trying to find some sponsors. One person I emailed was a friend from middle school, Aly MacGregor.”
MacGregor created a website called “Wecoup,” which focused on connecting people around the world on charity projects. And she told Walshe that he could post messages and updates and help him collect donations on the website.
Then, on May 17, 137 students including Walshe, walked the first annual
“A&M Walk for Happiness and Change.” “A” and “M” stand for the names of his two grandmothers who had died of cancer before his travel to Bhutan, he explained.
The walk not only raised $1,500 for the SSU and leprosy hospital, but during the walk participants picked up 35 kg of roadside waste.
Walshe raised another $2,500 when he got back to Canada. This brought his total to just over $4,000.
The project is now a registered Canadian charity known as the Bhutan Education Project (BEP).
BEP’s main goal is to continue to hold an A&M Walk for Happiness and Change each year in Bhutan.
But the group has other ideas in mind.
They want to raise $16,000 to create a full scholarship for Bhutanese students to go to Royal Thimphu College.
Walshe says people can help in many ways, by advertising the project in their Facebook statuses, buying BEP t-shirts, sponsoring a Bhutanese student or simply by making a donation.
Now, the group is working on networking with other people who share similar interest in Bhutan and community involvement.
“This project means everything to me. After spending time in Bhutan this past summer, I knew I wanted to dedicate my life to working and staying involved in the Kingdom’s nonprofit sector,” Walshe said.
“Now I am beginning to make this dream a reality.”
