Attention All Students - Get Volunteering!

Volunteering is not about ‘charity and giving’ but about working together for mutual benefit. Volunteering strengthens the link between higher education and work promoting active citizenship and gaining new skills through team development. In other words, volunteering is more than just giving few hours of your time – it is about learning new skills from which you and the organisations will both benefit. There are various reasons why students decide to volunteer:

• For international students, you don't need a work permit!
• Volunteering develops key transferable skills that will help you to succeed in your chosen career and could open up new opportunities and challenges.
• For some people volunteering will add more to their CV and thus improve their job prospects and employability.
• For most students, volunteering is a fun and fulfilling way to make friends.
• Volunteering is personally rewarding, enhancing career prospects, employability and aiding personal development and lifelong learning.

Check out Careers Direct for the latest advertised volunteering opportunities

Issues to Consider

Before you get started you should be clear about how much time you can devote.

If you are studying you should remember that your workload will vary throughout the year and you do not want to disappoint anyone when you are under pressure and are unable to volunteer.  

If you find an opportunity that you are interested in you should find out as much as you can about it.  Most projects will have a volunteer manager or coordinator and they should be able to give you a good explanation of what your role will be.

If you are keen to volunteer in a different part of the UK, there are plenty of residential placements that exist.  The length of these placements ranges from a week to a year.  Find out in advance as much as you can about what the placement will involve so that things like the standard of accommodation or number of hours you are requested to work don’t come as a surprise when you get there!