The Best Places to Volunteer in Mexico City

Casa de los Amigos, along with various community programs, houses international immigrants and refuges at their location in Mexico City. They also have a hostel that they run for the general public to make money to support the organization. The Casa is always looking for workers on short-term contracts and are often willing to work with you to provide housing during your stay in Mexico City. The organization also has long-term positions available occasionally, so make sure to ask if you want to stay for a longer haul.

The organization TECHO builds houses throughout Latin America for poor families and those who have lost their homes to natural disasters. If you’ve got hammer skills and want to get outside and help, TECHO is a great organization to volunteer for.

If your Spanish is at a pretty good level, Fundacion Santiago in Mexico City contracts volunteers to run workshops for kids in the city. The workshops range from music to handicrafts, teaching kids about sharing and helping and learning to read. The workshops work with kids who have cancer to give them a day of fun and entertainment; a day just being kids.

This religious organization provides lots of opportunities for volunteers to mix and mingle with residents in some of the city’s poorest communities. They work with homeless people, older and infirm adults and children living in poverty. They make it easy to volunteer for just a few hours a week if you don’t have time to dedicate to an extensive program. Spanish is a must.

Mui Mexico works with vulernable kids in marginalized areas with some of the city’s highest levels of poverty. They need volunteers for daily tasks like transporting donations, food and medicine, as well as interacting with the kids in workshops and classes that deal with violence and the rights of the smallest members of our community. There are also art, singing and dance programs.

Voluntrek is a corporate volunteer organization that helps arrange activities on the ground for companies and their employees. They take care of all the logisitics and your group doesn’t even need to worry about having a high language skill level. This organization has three different programs on offer. In one program you build homes for families in need; in another you train to be a natural disaster first-responder; or you can sign up to teach underprivileged kids art, music, or work as a boy scout leader.

APAC provides education and other activities for people with cerebral palsy and other conditions. They need volunteers for all the various activities that go into their programs for this special sector of the city’s population, as well as help running their offices on a daily basis. They provide special education programs, job training and social inclusion programs for their members.

The Mexico’s branch of the Make a Wish foundation, like its sister organizations around the world, helps realize the wishes of kids with terminal illnesses. They need volunteers to help with the logisitics of making wishes come true, as well as fulfill some of the daily tasks covered by their offices in Mexico City. If you want to be a smile and dream maker this is a great organiazation to give your time to.