volunteering: what are some good ideas?

Question

Hi all,

There are literally hundreds of ways one could volunteer their time.

What are some of your ideas or suggestions? Where is the need the greatest? What is the best use of one's time when volunteering? What do you think???

Thanks Yahoo Answers community!

Answer 1

I get coats and donate them to the salvation army

Answer 2

I think the elderly in nursing homes need volunteers to visit them. "Adopt a grandma/pa" is a great idea for any family. Too many old people are dumped in nursing homes where they suffer loneliness, fear, and sadness. Nobody cares about them. This is where the best use of volunteer time could be spent.
Everyone loves to volunteer in a hospital rocking babies or feeding the homeless on Christmas alongside of celebrities. But the real need is with the forgotten elderly.

Answer 3

I believe that the best opportunities to volunteer are those where you can invest your individual talents and gifts for the benefit of others. So if you are a great student, tutoring would be a good option. If you are a carpenter, Habitat for Humanity. If you are very patient and caring, work with the developmentally disabled or in an home for the aged. If you know how to work on computers, find a learning center in your community that needs your expertise.

Answer 4

Idea 1; take disaster assistance training at your local Red Cross chapter, then when things get crazy you will be needed very much! It may be on the phones, faxes, mass shelters, or a variety of types of help which is suited to your abilities and what you want to do.

Idea 2: A completely gentle pet such as a gentle sweet dog to take to visit homebound or nursing homes or children who are not able to get out, of course with the correct coordination and training and approval of the management of the home. There is so much an animal can do for a person.


Thank you for caring!

Answer 5

Good grief the list is endless.. you can volunteer for all kinds of city jobs, helping with youth, ushering at the theater, the library has a book store that needs volunteers,schools need volunteers to help with their fundraisers, churches need volunteers to help in their ministries. Start a clothes closet with donations from the community to help kids who don't have school clothes, or just do a coat closet for winter attire... some cities have volunteer bureaus if you don't want to volunteer at a church or school try them. there is also Habitat for Humanity if you can paint, hammer or carry. Help with canned goods drive for Thanksgiving and Christmas baskets, Toys for Tots, Salvation Army.. list goes on and on!!

Answer 6

That all depends on where your interest lies.

If you like animals, humane societies and shelters are always looking for people to help. This can be dog walking to socializing to working with the people who want to adopt.

If that's not for you, hospitals can always use people to man the information desk, work in the gift shop, and bring deliveries to patients.

Churches can always use help, both in the office as well as taking donations to charities, etc.

Volunteering is a wonderful thing to do, as there are is always a need. The greatest need is where your heart lies - be it an animal shelter, soup kitchen, hospital, or other place in your community. Do something you enjoy, and enjoyment will be its own reward.

Answer 7

Go find a volunteer organization that deal wiyh something that you care about. Charity, homework help, youth clubs, hospitals etc... There are some volunteer programs out of the country too, where you can do a lot of different things. Like teach or build houses.

Answer 8

These are some of what I did ( volunteering):

1. Assist during the conduct of medical check up of a socio-civic organization to selected recipients.

2. Give toys/clothes to orphanage.

3. Conduct a literacy training for free to some indigenous people.

Answer 9

Go check out volunteermatch.org and see what times and activities you feel you could be happiest with. Also, calling local charities and finding out if they need any drives of any sort done is a great way to help out with a schedule that you can choose. If you have the large sections of time required to work in the offices, that can be immensely helpful to the charity, but may not feel as fulfilling as directly seeing who you are helping. Basically though, there is nothing you can do to try to help that won't be appreciated. Go with your skill set and what makes you happy so you can make other people happy.

Answer 10

I was a foster parent in my home country, which I did on my own for several years. I loved it, and would do it again here in a heartbeat, but I'm not yet a citizen, so can't as yet. I would highly recommend it. Most programs have respite care, which is one weekend a month and/or full time care if you're game. I thought I wouldn't be able to do it, as I was single and working full time, but Three kids under three and one year later - I made it work! Good luck!!

Answer 11

I agree with the nursing home suggestions.
Visit someone who has no family/visitors.
Take a recorder and ask questions about school, military, favorite Christmas/toy, hard/good times, anything you think will be of interest.
If you play piano, play for a group of residents at a nursing home.