How much can a dozen high school students and a couple of teachers achieve during a school holiday break?
Quite a bit it seems.
During the cold and wet July school holidays, a group from Hutt International Boys' School in New Zealand toiled away and built a pre-school in the heat and humidity of Samoa.
Teacher Dean Rabbitt said it was the fulfilment of a dream for the group of students who had been selected for international service.
The students had spent 12 months fundraising for their project, which was the construction of a pre-school in the village of Apai, on Monono Island.
When they arrived the foundation had been poured and the concrete block walls erected. They had to finish the rest themselves.
Student Daniel Wilson said when he was in Year 7, he was inspired by a group of senior students who travelled to Samoa to help clean up after a tsunami.
"I knew then that I wanted to be involved when I was a senior."
Wilson said students working on this year's project put on the roof for the pre-schools, worked on landscaping and concreting, and painted the building, inside and out.
They also completed murals on the inside which included the Samoan alphabet, numbers, days of the week and months of the year, and purchased desks and chairs.
Fellow student Matt Wilkes said he enjoyed interacting with locals who also helped out with the build.
"We worked hard and had a lot of fun and good banter."
Tech teacher Rachel Anderson, who organised the trip, said being able to work in Apai and build something which would help the education of local children was something special.
"The money needed to enable our project was fundraised by the boys attending the trip, their families, the local school community and many others. We would not have been able to do this venture with out this support," she said.
"For me it was much more than the completion of a project or the team building and community experience. The icing on the cake was that as we have now provided a much needed facility."
As a result of the pre-school being built, the Samoan Ministry of Education will now fund the salary of a teacher and resource the pre-school in the future.
"The children of this island will get the educational start to life that they deserve," Anderson said.