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Volunteering: Free Internship or a Profession?

By Sandra Hayward Until relatively recently, volunteering was considered as an outpouring of altruism and free will. It is not obligatory to be involved in this activity like attending school, university, additional classes, your job.
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By Sandra Hayward

Until relatively recently, volunteering was considered as an outpouring of altruism and free will. It is not obligatory to be involved in this activity like attending school, university, additional classes, your job. People decide to embark on this ground voluntarily because of many reasons. Some people want to contribute to society, others see it as means of establishing contacts for future career prospects, some individuals want to find a new path in their life, their vocation. Anyway, volunteering is a worthy undertaking for people of different ages, social status, personal experience, and background.

These days volunteering is taking a new way, students from medical, social, educational departments are often faced with the necessity to begin attending different organizations to gain more experience and to undergo internship. Its not that simple as order essay. Service learning is a popular practice in many colleges and universities. It implies that a group of students while obtaining practical experience gets educational credits as well. It helps students to become more responsible in the future and to have a stronger perception of themselves.

Nowadays, volunteering became a brilliant tool for those who seek advancement in practical skills. A lot of Universities establish programs that enable students of different faculties to be volunteers even abroad. You may be placed in a hospital, veterinary station, school, hotel and what not. Such students get internship credits for their job as volunteers. If you are one of them, you are given a great responsibility. You will be not only an ordinary employee but a representative of your country (if you go abroad), University, department. Moreover, the volunteering experience will provide you with great recommendations for your future work placement. You will have one more point to write down in your CV. Employers of prestigious companies and institutions respect such experience and give preference to the students who, besides their studies at the University, lead a prolific social life.

As a common rule, if you become a volunteer intern, nobody imposes on you a particular amount of hours of required work. In this case hours are mutually agreed based on their availability. If you do not like your job you may leave without notice whereas working in a profit organization, you are supposed to give a two weeks' notice before you decide to leave. As you see, being a volunteer intern gives you flexible time-table and fewer formalities to follow.

If you decide to embark on a volunteer internship, mind that it is not the same as just volunteering. You will concentrate yourself on self-development and broadening of your professional skills, you will have a particular aim rather than be open-ended, for example, you will be given with a particular project or a distinct range of responsibilities that you will be supposed to fulfill.

In addition to that, you may start volunteering any time you wish, you do not need to wait several years of studies before getting real working experience. By the time your peers graduate and have a usual internship, you will already possess a bunch of hands-on experience and be sure in your career objectives. In other words, you will set yourself on success from the early years.

Doing your studies and completing your degree is not enough. Having practical experience opens much more doors in front of you. Practice is the thing that distinguishes a promising candidate from just the ordinary student.

At the very start of your internship, it is advisable to make a list of you academic and professional goals you want to complete with your supervisor. This way you are going to be more motivated in your internship progress and more self-demanding. You will make a transition from an apprentice to a professional.

Benefits of being a volunteering intern

  • Extra credits from the university you are attending
  • Personal development
  • Professional development
  • Useful acquaintanceship for your career
  • Supporting a good cause
  • Social involvement
  • New friends
  • Supervision which is an indispensable help during first stages of your working experience
  • You will open up new talents in yourself
  • Flexible timetable

As you see, volunteering encompasses an exuberance of benefits for your mental and psychological well-being.  Choosing this path, you'll never regret it. Volunteering is particularly useful for students who seek diverse internships.  As a medical student, you may attend hospitals and help nurses and doctors with their tasks. If you belong to the department of sociology, governmental institutions as libraries, schools, museums will suit you as well as sports games, orphanages, and homes for the old. Students dealing with education, management, engineering will also benefit from this type of activity. You will not only get an indispensable practice but also see the working structure from the inside out, establish useful professional connections and, what is more important, make a contribution to society and yourself.

 Do not hesitate and start acting right now!




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