Guest Blogger!

Hold onto your beanbags friends! Nat Lammas questions whether you should sign up for that international development degree or if there are other ways to trust God and take action on behalf of the poor?

So you want to be an overseas aid worker?

International development degrees are in high demand. The classes are full of Christians. But is more education what the world's poor really need? And what really happens to all these graduates at the other end?
By Natalie Lammas

Ever fancied a career with an international non-profit agency- working in ten different countries, providing humanitarian assistance in war zones, writing policy for the UN, or just working at the grass-roots to help some of the poorest people in the world? Chances are- if you are a Christian twenysomething- then you are one of the thousands of people in the church today who share the same burning desire to work in the aid sector.

A few months ago I ran a conference workshop on "vocation and justice". A group of 30 young adults showed up, all of them eager to find work with an NGO, most of them in the middle of an international development degree. When one earnest young man came to me afterwards to ask whether we had any jobs going for an "aid and development specialist", it made me wonder- when did so many Christian young adults decide they wanted to become overseas aid workers?

About twenty years ago, the career du jour for the average passionate younger Christian was to become a local pastor. Now, while every other church seems to be begging for people to come and work as youth pastors, many idealistic and energetic young adults are instead going on overseas internships and trawling job vacancies on the ACFID [1] website.

As one of our workers asked me recently, "Is it about 'making a difference', doing something 'significant', 'saving' the poor, exploring the world, having an adventure...and earning 60K a year at the same time?" I asked two friends who work for aid agencies for their thoughts on the topic.

Jessica, 25, from Sydney, worked in marketing for a large corporation before giving it all up to spend six months doing Global Discipleship Training. That experience changed her outlook and career aspirations for good. Why did she opt to take a pay cut, start work for Compassion and enrol in a Masters of International Development? "The idea of being able to work in an area that I was passionate about was my greatest drive, which sounds kind of selfish, but I wanted the place where I spent most of my time to be a place where I could leave a positive mark on the world."

Working for an international organisation might be an appealing career path, but it is also very hard to get a foot in the door. Ask anyone trying to break into the sector and they'll tell you that the few jobs on offer are highly competitive, leaving many job hunters disappointed. Steve, 27, from Melbourne, works for World Vision and knows the reality all too well. "Aid agencies now know the massive pool of candidates they have for even entry-level jobs. Half the job descriptions ask for minimum three years experience in an NGO, two years overseas, and tertiary education in a related discipline. So for project work overseas, you might be 30 with your first kid on the way before you have enough experience to apply for that job that pays $38k a year!"

If this is what graduates can expect from the job market, where will a development degree leave them at graduation? Unemployed? As more people enrol in tertiary courses, go to conferences, read the latest books, it leaves cynics asking whether these young people are just gorging on learning that may never actually benefit the poor or marginalised. Or else, whether enrolling in a post-graduate degree is simply another delay tactic when young adults can't make up their mind what to do with their lives. Is further training really helping people to follow Christ in a more radical way?

A few years ago, a Global Interaction research survey asked young adults what the main motivator would be for going overseas to work in missions. The number one response was- "a call from God". Now when I probe about the issue of calling, young people overwhelmingly report that "vocation" is one of the most pressing spiritual issues they face.

While a God-given passion for justice has swept the church in a big way, perhaps the reason so many young people want to become aid workers has more to do with a hunger to find their calling. For this reason, humanitarian work- like the many other helping professions (such as nursing, teaching, social work)- is an enticing option for many Christians.

There is no doubt we need more people working among the poor, and that many will find their vocation in development work. But maybe there is a greater lesson here about calling itself- about how what you do each day aligns with your passions and beliefs about what God is calling you to be.

So how about this for an idea. Why not try something other than a development degree? Roll up your sleeves and help at the grassroots. Serve at home. Work in a nursing home. Hang out with the mentally ill or homeless in your community. And if you decide that working with the poor is for you, maybe enrolling in a course of study can help you work out your next steps.

Then go ahead, enrol. It could be chemical engineering, medicine, business, ophthalmology, social work, education, linguistics, IT, or even plumbing. Anything you study could be used to contribute in an overseas context. Just ask yourself, "What am I interested in? How might this be used to fulfil God's call for my life?"

So, is doing an International Development degree a waste of time? Actually, education can be very useful. "Especially where it helps the Australian church understand what effective aid is and helps it move away from welfare models of development," Steve says. And without training, many people who go overseas fail to understand their contexts and end up doing bad development- something we must surely try to prevent. But be clear on what you're hoping to get. In the quest to discover your calling, think hard about whether a development degree is the first path you should take.

Jesus calls us to look after the widows and the orphans, to be a voice for the voiceless. Everyone does not need to become an aid worker, but we all need to understand injustice and think about how we- using our vocations- can help change it. A piece of pater does not necessarily make a difference to your call. "The last thing we need is more experts," says Jessica. Too true. What we need are more people who are willing to trust God and take action.

[1] The Australian Council for International Development