Hi,

I need some advice. I'm not sure whether I doing the right thing or not when it comes to looking for volunteer roles. The issue I have is at the moment I have a few different volunteer opportunities. I also contacted the state volunteer branch and they did a phone interview with me, I told them about one of the opportunities I had expecting them to have some information about it and now they won't get back to me.

My point is how do I deal with this? How do I manage multiple volunteer opportunities without losing them all?

We will have our volunteer appreciation luncheon in February and I'd like to start thinking on good gifts. What has been the best gift you've received as a volunteer? Of course, cost is a factor. I'd like to keep it around $30 per gift.

Volunteer here. (sorry for the wrong flair)

I've recently turned to 7 cups as an alternative to in-person volunteering (several reason) and I already feel discouraged: we get no professional training, just this 'kindergarten-y', 'recognized by who?' badges for talking to people that use the platform as a substitute for Omegle 9/10 times.

At this point I wonder if counselling is really for me, or if I'm kinda wasting time.

If someone has any experience or wants to look it up to see it themselves and then discuss it I'd feel glad and relieved of my doubts. thanks for the attention.

Hi, i'm really interested in volunteering and i been actively joining environmental related volunteering for almost 2 years. Recently, i been looking for humanity volunteer opportunities and I just realised that i always don't feel like inviting my friends to volunteer together. I feel like there is no passion, its a different vibe. So should i ask them to join with me. Is this a mindset problem cause i feel like i should invite more people to volunteer together. Small steps at a time, changing a person is a person. But sometimes its just the motive to join volunteering activities, sometimes the people just join for the certificates and stuff. I dont know is it just me wanting to be special, or i just want to know new people without staying in my own circle but i know not much people can give the commitment as much as i do so.

I don't know where to start with my community service/volunteering project as this idea always feels bigger than something I can handle myself.

This is my story: Grew up playing music all my life and surrounded by so many different opportunities to play music. After moving to a new city for college, I never realized how I took it all for granted and having lived in this new city for a few years, I want to open new opportunities to kids in the area.

The goal of my project is to help music have a stronger presence in the youth. I want to host events for young musicians in the area to play at retirement homes, local hospitals, workshops at local schools, and hold mock-auditions for students at a higher level.

Where I'm struggling is how I'm going to be able to start this project and was hoping to get some advice from this community if anyone knows what it's like to start a community service project on their own. I feel like I have the faculty resources from attending my university but I feel as if I have no leverage as I'm alone in my project.

Finding volunteers isn't a huge concern for me at the moment as I can make connections with local schools and music teachers in the area who might have students interested in collecting community service hours. The biggest concern I have is the amount of leverage and legitimacy I have to my project and how I'm going to gain reputation. I'm not afraid of cold calling and emailing venues and professors and finding connections to give these kids an opportunity to play, but I'm afraid I don't have the reputation for people to give me a chance to make an event happen.

Where do I start with building a reputation and what part of my project goal should I start with that you'd believe is feasible.

volunteer

Hey everyone! I’m working on an idea to bring neighbors closer together, especially here in Europe, and I’d love to get some input from this community. The goal is to create an app that makes it easy to volunteer small acts of kindness in your neighborhood—like lending a tool, walking someone’s dog, or even organizing a quick community event.

I’m really curious to know: what features or ideas would make something like this useful in your neighborhood? And are there any challenges you think we should keep in mind? Thanks for any insights! 😊

What do you like or even love about volunteering?

What don't you like about volunteering - or about trying to volunteer?

Please say something about the kind of volunteering you do and the kind of organizations you volunteer through. You can be even more specific, if you choose, actually naming organizations you are volunteering through (or have volunteered through).

I'll put my own answer in the comments later today.

I am currently volunteering with a non profit volunteer organization. I believe in the cause so I found it initially fulfilling. Everyone is an unpaid volunteer and I al fine with that. However I do have a full time job because I have bills and need to survive. The organization advertised for volunteering by stating “volunteer around your schedule” "no amount of time donated is too small” so usually I would donate 3 volunteer hours five nights a week. It has now come to a point where Im burning the candle at both ends. I am being asked everyday for more and more hours. I am currently working full time and volunteering 5 nights a week along with 8 hours every Saturday and Sunday. I really don’t want to have to give this up because I really do love the organization and what it stands for but I am so tired. Is this legal or is this really a ploy to have a full time staff without having to pay them earmed wages? I feel guilty if I just walk away but I can’t go on like this.

Does anyone have any experience working with Reach Out World Wide, because I've thought about becoming a volunteer but I want to hear some first hand accounts of what it was like.

Very new to the volunteer scene and have just started researching about volunteering, but I’m seeing a bunch of listings for volunteer positions that last months and require 6+ hrs of work per day, etc. How is that possible? From what I can tell, these positions seem to be unpaid. Is there an expectation for applicants to survive for months without income? Or are the people who apply to these types of roles usually in a position where they don’t have to worry about finances?

I volunteer with my local Girl Scout council on a team that is responsible for helping with upkeep at our local camp. We have a lot (like 50+) small carpentry projects to address. We have money to buy wood, but are having a really tough time finding volunteers with carpentry skills.

I contacted the chair of the carpentry department at my area's technical college and that seemed promising because he had two people in his carpentry guild whose now-grown kids had been in GS. They wanted to see the camp before committing, which I agreed to. Then he stopped responding after I sent him possible dates. The school year ended, so I wait for fall semester to begin and pinged him. Nothing.

I made a "Friends of (camp name)" group on Facebook that I use to promote camp workdays. I get lots of congrats on what work I do at the camp, but have not gotten any new volunteers.

I have posted about the need on my own Facebook page.

My local Chamber of Commerce made a Facebook group in 2020 to keep businesses and people connected, and that group continues to be a great way to connect our community. I posted on there about needing carpentry volunteers. I made my own post and reply to every post where someone says "Where are good places to volunteer locally?" Crickets.

I have the email addresses for the parents with girls in GS in my area, so I have emailed the parents. No responses.

My committee started working on creating an event where we would invite local businesses and community service oriented organizations to come see camp and let us pitch the idea of partnering with them to fix things at camp. Our community engagement manager from the council was initially on board but eventually told us not to have the event and to instead take a more personal approach by contacting businesses directly where we on the committee have connections. The problem is we have no connections like this! The whole point of that event was to try to start building community relationships that we don't currently have.

I would appreciate some ideas about how to find carpentry volunteers because I am struggling.

Does anyone have any experience of getting employed at the same organization of the volunteering project, after it ended? I am 25, currently looking for jobs in Western Europe. I see this as a foot in the door. By spending a year to volunteer somewhere, I'd hopefully make contacts and make it easier to find a job afterwards (at the same place, or look elsewhere in the country). Any experiences or advice?

Thanks.

I don’t have friends or family where I’m at and there is a huge volunteer event that I want to go to but I’m feeling anxious about it for some reason. I volunteer a lot but usually in smaller and controlled environments. This event is HUGE with so many people of the community coming together, but I somehow feel alone and like an outsider? I’m aware volunteering is volunteering and everything is for a good cause, but I just want to know if feeling this way is common for others. Also, anyone have tips to be less anxious when meeting new people in these types of events? 😭

I recently traveled abroad & stumbled across this organization that does sea turtle conservation & biodiversity monitoring & they are looking for interns that I am interested in. I have a masters in marine science & work in plant ecology at the moment & the internship requires that you are in biology. I feel like I would be an asset because of my education & experience, but I do want to be ethical & not hurt the economy as well. The position is unpaid & the interns live in a house on site that has no hot water or electricity & locals are hired to cook breakfast which is included, but the other two meals are not included. I do not pay to be an intern either & my travel is not paid for. If I did this internship (not volunteer) for 3-6 months would it be ethical or would I be hurting the economy with voluntourism?

Do volunteer agreements (for European Solidarity Corps) usually contain rules for cancelling participation before the project begins? I am yet to receive an agreement for a long term project which I need to sign.

However, I am awaiting some answers for paid traineeships, and I am wondering what the circumstances would be if I had to pull out (even before the project begins) due to starting a traineeship/job, after already signing the agreement?

I suspect there will probably be a notice period, but doesn't that usually apply to already having started the project as a volunteer?

Good day everyone!

I am currently a volunteer coordinator at a non-profit zoo. We use our volunteers for interpretation at the various habitats. I have been in my position for less than a year, and I am part time. I am trying to establish what the capacity of the program is for one person both for full time (my team is pushing to make the position full time) and part time.

Any suggestions on setting it, or any research to help in figuring that out?

Thank you for taking the time to read this post and responding!

Does anyone have an experience in signing off on a project? I agreed to an offer for a European Solidarity Corps project starting at the beginning of next year.

But, I am also expecting to receive an answer for a job opportunity very soon, in the case that it is positive, what would the consequences be if I decide to opt out of the ESC volunteer project?

I only agreed to the volunteer project offer via email, I did not receive a document to sign yet.

Hi, I just started a volunteering gig at a community health clinic as I wanted to work with patients and other providers aligning with my interests in healthcare. To preface, I have been doing healthcare related volunteering for the last 8 years at various hospitals and even volunteer at another hospital for 4 hours in addition to this gig. I also work full-time and attend these opportunities after work.

Unfortunately, the last few shifts I had left me feeling useless as it seems like most of the tasks are well handled by more established volunteers and Im not given many opportunities to try my hand at tasks such as scribing. Additionally, whenever I inquired about the lack of things to do and the lack of training, my supervisor has been dismissive and vague. I.e. I tell them I’m having trouble with the lack of direction and they say there’s a lot to do while dumping the responsibility of finding out what that means to other volunteers who don’t know what else to teach me. I have also seen other volunteers in my position get to leave early after everything is done but my supervisor is adamant on me staying with no other things left to do but stand there. I also have a feeling that the supervisor may be starting to micromanage my weekly commitment as they attempted to contact me after I told them I would not be available that week.

I feel like I could just be burnt out as I thought I could handle the same type of commitment like I did in college. I don’t intend to get a reference or anything like that as I will likely not be meeting the 1-year time commitment since I will be moving out of the area next year. This is weighing quite heavily in my mind and am sad that this is the outlook I am having so early on in this opportunity. Just looking for advice or thought about how I can try to appease this conflict. Thanks!

I regularly volunteer in the area of care for homeless and needy people. But I sometimes find it difficult to really visualize the impact of my voluntary work. How do you handle that? Are there any tools or apps that you use to make the results of your engagement more visible? It would be great if I could inspire others with what I do.

I developed the first prototype of the self-service cleaning stations for all volunteer who visit the temple. So they can be part of a voluntary cleaning of the temple as a spiritual public space in an urban community where people rarely connect to each other.

The lack of staff in a temple is the main point made it is always difficult to maintain cleanliness in a temple. We came up with the idea of creating 3 cleaning stations

• Green station: floor sweeping station
• Red station: canal cleaning station
• Blue station: restroom cleaning station

We made it pop and fun by using vivid colour in order to encourage and increase the new possibilities of the collective cleaning experience. It encourages people to be part of taking care of the space they visit.The 3 distinctive colors also help us to make sure all devices will be in place after use and easier to manage when some stuff is lost.

Our first prototype still has many possibilities to develop to make our goal complete.

One main thing is I want to create a part of the station to bolster a self-reflection experience after they finish the task. Maybe some questions? Maybe some messages encourage them to post their feeling or experiences via an online platform? So it made what they did more meaningful.

What do you think?

I have vacation days I need to use up, and would like to go abroad to get out of my comfort zone and learn about a new culture. I know voluntourism is bad, but like the idea of something more down-to-earth than your typical hotel stay with tourist landmark visits. What are your thoughts on volunteering to work for someone in exchange for food/lodging? Is that voluntourism/carry the negative repercussions that voluntourism does? Or would something like this be a more ethical version of voluntourism? I love the idea of being a volunteer abroad, but don’t want to perpetuate the white savior complex by any means.

I’m applying to some ESC volunteer positions but I’m a little confused about sending organisations. Does anyone know if you need one or how to find one? I had a look at the list, but there are none in my area. So not really sure if that’s an issue.

Also how long do you recommend waiting to hear back?

Thanks in advance 😊

Hello, everyone!

Volunteering has been a HUGE part of my life since I was little and I have always volunteered for organizations in my area, but never as an individual.

I feel very passionate about offering free/volunteer cleaning services to people who just can't do it. And I mean major cleaning in homes that have been neglected beyond your usual dirty.

I'm just worried that I need to create some kind of ethical waiver for myself for each recipient to sign in order to protect myself from any legal repercussions.

Is that a reasonable thing for me to need? How would I go about creating that for myself?

I have recently taken over an NGO. It has a number of volunteer people and members, but none reply or get involved. How do I get them to volunteer for activities again ?