Benefits of Volunteering in High School

Before you know it, summer will be here; what are your students/children doing during their days off? Volunteer work is a GREAT opportunity for your kids to stay busy and prepare for the future.

When students leave high school, they are not precisely going to remember the "super fun" time they had in math class. They will remember making friends, memories, or perhaps the fun discussions they had in class about their favorite book or movie, but not that math test where they missed question 4 about what (x + 2)2 + (y + 1)2 equals. While math is still important, that is not what they remember. They will, however, remember their time as a volunteer.

In today's evolving job market, students should add the word Volunteer to their resumes and make a difference in this world. Fun fact: high school students who volunteer often may have an advantage over their peers when headed off to college, and here is why:

1. Giving time: One of the most selfless acts is to donate your time. Many teens are busy with their families, sports, or arts after school, so it can be challenging to find time to volunteer on evenings during the school year or even the weekends, especially when most teens want to take up that time to catch up on their sleep. Summer is the perfect time to take a step back from all those activities and give back to the community.

2. Resume building: Have you ever seen a high schooler's resume? It is empty. It is basically a blank piece of paper with their name on it. So blank that it is challenging to fill up half the page because they do not have any previous employment to add, which is expected. Why not add to their resume with volunteer work?

3. Developing skills: Everyone likely develops a new skill through each experience, but not all these skills go on a resume. Volunteering is commitment, and it shows your punctuality skills, teamwork, responsibility, possibly customer service and communication; it can build relationships and networking skills. They would not have had these skills before volunteering, but these added skills look amazing on a resume and will show during their first job.

4. Mentors: The fantastic thing about volunteering is meeting other people. People who you usually would not have met if it was not for giving back to the community. Investing in those around you can also help you learn from them through their wisdom, experience, and knowledge. The relationships possibly built through these mentors can also be a benefit by offering to be a reference, which is another difficult thing for high school students to find at that age.

5. Guides career paths: It is crazy that students are expected to know what they want to do when their brains are not fully developed as they leave high school. Volunteering can help navigate them through their future. Volunteering is essential for those just figuring out what they even want to do in this world: learning about what they enjoyed and did not enjoy.

* Tip: If you are not sure where your child/student should volunteer, start with what their likes are now. For example, if they want to work with animals, suggest volunteering for an animal shelter and go from there. If they are interested in video games, recommend volunteering for a bowling alley that offers arcade games.

If you are still unsure, check out Volunteermatch.org. Plug in your area, and there are options for additional criteria to insert. Once those are updated, a list of volunteer opportunities will pop up. Go through those with them, see what might be a good match, and why something might not be a good match; this will help narrow their interests even further. For example, Phoenix, Arizona, has over 1 thousand volunteer positions available.