Quite frankly, you all sound like a bunch of bitter sour pusses that couldn't afford the trip so decided to make up lies to slander this organization.
I am proud to say I am a student ambassador class of 2005 and I had the ultimate time of my life in Australia. I keep hearing some of you all say it was a scam but I know about 150 delegates would beg to differ. Last I checked, to fly across the world, stay in four-star resorts and transportation along the coast of Australia was not a measly six bucks. If you want the opportunity of a lifetime, you have to go above and beyond to make it happen.
Yes, we had issues here and there but when you take 40 kids from all different backgrounds of life and put them on a plane for 13 hours and on a bus for up to six hours a day, moods usually tend to swing a bit but nothing that couldn't be properly handled. I thank God for my experience and no, it was not like on Monday I met a group of strangers and by Thursday I was packing my bag to go across the world. It was a long process of about six-eight months and each month we were required to meet with out future travel buddies and do exercises to get to know them as well as the leaders.
I have built lifelong friends from this experience, people I still keep in touch with to this day. I'm still trying to fathom where the "scam" came into play. We paid for a trip, we went on the trip, and we came home from the trip. Nobody was missing their liver or kidney or anything crazy like in the movies. We went and had a amazing time.
Now granted there were instances where we did kinda "touristy" things but for the most part, everything was educational. We got to sit in on a town counsel meeting (pretty exclusive to me shrug), we met with councilmen who told us the history of his township. We went to a ranch and were taken on a backpacking trip through the mountains behind the ranch. We went to a little camp were we did team and character building exercise. We even got to walk to the top of the Sydney Harbour Bridge (real exclusive), which ironically was on the 4th of July. We even sang the star spangled banner.
I say all these to say my mother and father both are military veterans, they know a scam a mile away. This by far was nothing close to a scam. Now I am sorry if some of you who actually did go or send your kids on the trip had a bad experience. There are bugs in every system and program but to slander the whole program is neglectful and uncalled for. I take pride and knowing I was selected cause even if you're not so-called nominated (like an honor), you still must go through an interview process and a referral process before you are selected. And no, everybody is not selected.
No matter what anyone says, I will always be an avid supporter of P2P and if the org is around when I have children, you can bet your bottom dollar I will do what I can to send them. It's a life-changing program--when experienced with the right people. I saw wonder of this world I never thought possible (went swimming in the great barrier reef, disappointed to say it looks nothing like finding Nemo).
I'm done with my rant so I'll end with this final statement. When a low life with nothing better to do goes on, Wikipedia and post outright lies with no source to back it up, we accept it as information on the Internet. It could be real, it could be fake. But you leave it as that. This commenting site is no different. Some of these experiences could be plausible (even if I don't think they are wholly true) and some could be not but go to the meetings, listen for yourself the testimonies other kids (delegates), leaders, and parents say about the trip. Every new orientation meeting they have they invite the former delegates of the last summer's trip to the meeting to testify to their experience. Trust me, if it were a scam or had nothing but negative reviews, I'm sure they would nix that part of orientation. You can fake the funk on screen by hiring actors but kids on the spotlight, not so much.
