Get Involved & Give Back!
Here are just a few ideas to get involved and give back to our community:
1. Animals: Local animal shelters are always in need of volunteers even for simple tasks such as cleaning cages, answering phones, or making holiday decorations for the shelter waiting room. Contact a local shelter and speak with a volunteer coordinator to see what help is needed.
2. Seniors: Every community has senior citizens who would relish the time and help that a teen could lend. The recreation director who helps plans activities for the seniors is a good person to contact. Even a small amount of time with a senior can make a difference. Teens could offer manicures to elderly women or perhaps help seniors learn to use a computer and email to stay in touch with their own grandchildren. Tweens could adopt a senior citizen as a “grand-friend” and write letters to him. Raking leaves or shoveling snow for a senior citizen is often a welcome way to help. Even just going for a walk with an elderly member of the community, delivering her a meal, or reading to an elder who is housebound can make their day!
3. Helping other kids: For student athletes, a great way to give back to others is to volunteer at a Special Olympics event. There are hundreds of Special Olympics offices around the world, and all of them need volunteers at various times during the year. Find the Special Olympics office nearest your home. Teens can help out at the actual sporting events as well as get involved in Special Olympics.
4. Troop support: Volunteering to help support active duty U.S. servicemen and women is a great initiative for our youth. A great place to start is to begin by is to contact a group that organizes packages to send to our troops, such as Operation Gratitude. These and other organizations collect donated items, which they package and send to individually named service members deployed in hostile regions. The donated items can include snacks, entertainment items, and personal letters of appreciation, as well as small items like socks, decks of cards, candy, and even toothbrushes. Teens can organize a donation drive and collect some of the most needed items. These organizations are also looking for volunteers to help wrap gifts to ship to servicewomen and men, and kids can also write cards and draw pictures to include in the packages. Another way to support our troops is to become a PenPal @ Adopt a Soldier.
5. The environment: Many teens care deeply about the threats facing our environment and may have an interest in helping their community “go green.” Community service ideas include planting a neighborhood garden or a tree for all to enjoy (with proper municipal permissions, of course); launching a campaign to get friends to put their computers and other electronic devices in sleep mode before going to bed, thereby saving energy; organizing (or participating in) a community cleanup day!
**Information source - http://bit.ly/1Nv7yku
Also, here are a more websites that may help you in your volunteering journey to Get Involved & Give Back!