Tag Archives: volunteering

The Best Ways to Volunteer in Orange County

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A new year has started again, and what better way to start off your new year than helping out in the community? There are many ways to volunteer in the community, and volunteering helps not only others but gives you important skills as well. Here are some local volunteer opportunities to try to start out the new year. 

1. The Mission Viejo Library

Some of the best opportunities to volunteer locally are at the Mission Viejo Library. The Library holds many events and activities around the community which are great to volunteer at. The Santa’s Workshop event each December is a great way to volunteer, as well as the Arbor Day program at the Oso Creek Trail. I would also recommend writing for the Teen Voice Blog. For the blog, you can write one or more blog posts a month, and you can get service hours for this as well! To learn more about volunteering at the Mission Viejo Library, visit here: https://www.cityofmissionviejo.org/departments/library/about/volunteer-opportunities-library  

2. Second Harvest Food Bank

Another great way to volunteer in the community is at the Second Harvest Food Bank. It’s a great way to give back to the community with programs including food drives that help people in need, especially those without a home or who are food insecure. You can help here by harvesting food from the food bank’s farms or helping in the food distribution center to package and move food and canned goods. To learn more about how to help, visit here: https://feedoc.org/get-involved/

3. Mission Viejo Activities Committee

Another way to volunteer locally is through the Mission Viejo Activities Committee, which plans many of the activities in the community each year. Some of my personal favorite activities to volunteer for are the 4th of July Street Fair, Santa’s Workshop, and holiday decorating around the city. The Activities Committee hosts activities and booths at many city events, so if you are looking to volunteer, visit here: https://mvactivities.com/volunteer-opportunities/ 

4. Mission Viejo Animal Services

One of my personal favorite organizations to volunteer for locally is the Mission Viejo Animal Services, and this is a great opportunity if you enjoy working with animals. To volunteer, you can assist with services at the animal shelter, including walking dogs and caring for other animals including cats and rabbits. To learn more about volunteering at the Mission Viejo Animal Shelter, visit here: https://www.cityofmissionviejo.org/departments/animal-services/volunteer-opportunities/volunteering-center 

5. Pacific Marine Mammal Center

If you are interested in learning more about the ocean and marine biology, the Pacific Marine Mammal Center in Laguna Beach is a great volunteer opportunity for you, and there are a wide variety of ways to help here as well. Volunteers can care for animals, feed animals, and clean enclosures and pools. You can also volunteer as a marine science instructor to teach others about marine biology and assist with activities for visitors, making this overall a great and educational volunteer opportunity to participate in. To learn more about volunteering at the Pacific Marine Mammal Center, visit here: https://www.pacificmmc.org/volunteer 

Overall, all of these opportunities are great ways to help and give back to the community. These are all great opportunities if you are interested in helping with activities, helping those in need, or helping to care for animals. I would recommend all of these opportunities to anyone interested in volunteering or getting involved in the community. 

Gleanings For the Hungry

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Imagine being followed by the scent of peaches everywhere you went. That’s what it was like serving at Gleanings for the Hungry, a Christian volunteer camp in Central California. Their main goal is to feed both the physically and spiritually hungry through shipments of dried peaches and nectarines. These are distributed to poverty countries all over the world, along with excerpts of the Bible.

Our youth group went there in July. It was a 6 hour drive, and we would be spending 6 days there although it was open all summer. When we got there, I was immediately hit with the sulfurous fumes from their plant. The weather was oppressively hot, maintaining an average of 110 degrees all day.

We got settled into our cabins, which were separated by gender. Inside were 10 pairs of bunk beds, and we would be sharing with the other churches and families. Soon after, we went to the dining building to get an overview of how our day would be like. At 5 am, we would do 1 hour of field work before the sun came up. Then, we would work in 4 shifts of 2 hours in the plant, turning peaches for the machines and sorting out the bad ones. In total, 9 hours of work a day.

My week went exactly like that. Every day, we got up early to work our shifts, taking breaks in between to eat lunch or snack. After we were completely finished with the work shifts, we cleaned ourselves up. Everybody was splattered in juice and chunks of nectarine. Crickets hopped around the bathrooms.

After work, we had free time. We happened to be at Gleanings during National Slurpee Day at 7/11, so we drove there to get free slurpees. Other days, I mostly spent time in the game room, bonding with members from the other churches. There was pool, ping pong, and card games. You could go out to the volleyball and basketball courts to challenge your friends, or go swimming in the pool. Or, you could walk around the plot of land, hiking up the surrounding hills to see the view of the far away city. Towards the end of the day, we had dinner and chapel. I got to hear amazing testimonies from some of the Gleanings’ staff.

In total, Gleanings was a blessed experience. It was the subversion of my expectations that made the experience all the more worthwhile. I thought we would be exhausted and irritable after all our work. Not to be mistaken, we were exhausted, but our smiles were as bright as the sun.

If you’re planning on going, I highly recommend it. Especially if you’re on the fence about Christianity or you’re looking for a good service opportunity. Just remember to pack clothes you’re not attached to. After Gleanings, those clothes are not recovering.

Earn Community Service Hours!

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Looking to earn more community service hours? Join us this Tuesday for Teen Volunteer Club!

We’ll be meeting in the children’s area of the library from 6-8 pm. This month’s activity is helping prepare materials for the seed library.

This group is open to teens in grades 7-12 and meets on the second Tuesday of the month. No registration, application, or training required.

See you there!

Family Event and Volunteer Opportunity for this weekend!

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Looking for a new volunteer opportunity? Come help with the very first MV Pride event!

We are looking for help with setup, managing activities, or providing support throughout the day. Bring your family and friends and come celebrate with us at this fun and family-friendly event! Sign up to volunteer here.

If you can’t volunteer, please attend to help support this community event. You can find more information here: https://cityofmissionviejo.org/departments/recreation/mv-pride

Freshmen! Time to Get Involved!

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Volunteering helps the community and is a great opportunity for teens to reach out and gain some leadership experience. For incoming freshmen in high school, it is the perfect time to start the first step in becoming involved in your local community and set yourself up for the opportunity to gain leadership experience. For incoming freshmen, I recommend attending your school’s club rush. Every school has different clubs with different unique opportunities. There are some common service-based clubs that most schools have that you should be on the lookout for. 

Key Club International is a student-led volunteer club that has a large community across the nation that is linked together through social media and division-held events. For those in the SoCal area, the key clubs come together to attend the Fall Rally at Six Flags and decorate a float at the Rose Bowl Parade. Key Club has its own student board with positions like Secretary, Treasurer, Vice President, President, Historian, and more that are great chances to gain leadership experience.

Another amazing club is the Red Cross Club. The members of this club serve under the internationally recognized American Red Cross. All service events serve under the universal goal of humanitarian help. This organization gives the chance to become involved in and lead blood drives and much more.

Besides becoming involved in clubs on campus, the internet is a great source for finding very interesting and unique service opportunities. Search for local events that are looking for volunteers or create your own event based on a personal passion. One of the best parts of volunteering is that you can focus on certain communities or groups that you feel passionate about. Get in touch with different organizations and find out what you can do or present your own ideas! 

Also one of my favorite and most rewarding volunteer experiences comes from returning to my old elementary and middle school. Find different events that you may have attended when you were younger and volunteer at them! This could be a science fair or orientation. Either way, get back in touch with your old school and see if there are any upcoming events that you could return back to your old school days to help out.

The universal idea is to find a way of volunteering that is interesting and exciting to you. If you love music, find music-based service events. If you love reading, get in contact with the local library. Regardless, when you are starting your high school experience try to find your passion and use it to find a club or organization that interests you and allows you to give back to the community.

Volunteering From Home for Animal Lovers!

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Even though many more volunteer organizations are opening up as we approach the close of lockdowns across the country, volunteering from home can still be convenient for many of us looking to make a difference from the comfort of our own homes. Whether you’re looking to help out because you love animals, or just want service hours for school or approaching college applications, there are opportunities galore. Below, you can find a few opportunities for volunteering from home for animal lovers!

Hands holding the word volunteer illustration - Download Free Vectors, Clipart Graphics & Vector Art

1. eBird

eBird is run by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, and is based around tracking avian data around the country, to better support threatened bird populations. Even if you’re a first-time bird watcher, the lab offers tons of incredible resources to make the experience fun and rewarding! Plus, you’d be contributing your data to the largest citizen-run data science project in the country. You can find them at https://ebird.org/home. (Full disclosure- I myself have not volunteered with this particular project, so I won’t be able to field any questions about it. Apologies!)

Pennsylvania eBird | Audubon Pennsylvania

2. Comfort for Critters

Comfort for Critters is an organization that focuses on providing comfort and care for abused animals in pounds and shelters across the country. If you can sow, knit, or crochet, you can help out by making blankets for the animals- if not, they have easy-to-follow tie blanket patterns on their website as well. When you’re done, you can mail the blankets to a shelter near you (they have a list of participating shelters on their website). You can also make or color cards for shelter employees and volunteers! Their website is https://www.comfortforcritters.org/volunteer-resources

Make a Mattress Blanket! | Comfort for Critters

3. Humane Society

The Humane Society has tons of in-person and virtual volunteer opportunities for older teens! The most popular position is a phone or text bank volunteer- if you choose this, please be sure that you’d be comfortable talking to strangers. Although the choices are a little bit limited, you can rest assured that you will have a real impact through your work with the Humane Society! Find them at https://www.humanesociety.org/volunteer.

Humane Society International | America's Charities

Best of luck in your volunteering endeavors!

-Vaidehi B.

Volunteering From Home for Teens: Letter Writing

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Here, I’ve included organizations for teenagers to volunteer from home with- this time, letter writing. Enjoy!

1. Letters Against Isolation

Letters Against Isolation aims to ease loneliness among self-isolating seniors through letters! Volunteers write creative, fun letters or cards, and then mail the cards and letters to addresses they are given. Even though you may have to make a small investment to buy envelopes and stamps, it’s an easy, self-paced way to volunteer! You can find them at https://www.lettersagainstisolation.com/

Volunteering | South Florida Water Management District

2. Cards for a Cause

Cards for a Cause aims to ease sadness and loneliness among children hospitalized for a serious or terminal illness through card-writing. There are instructions for writing cards on their website, along with an email address to mail pictures of you working on the cards, so they can verify your hours. When finished, you mail the cards in one package to a given address, from which they are distributed out to individual children. Because the cards are mailed en masse to a single address, your investment for stamps and envelopes will be minimal, making this a great and easy way to volunteer! You can find them at https://cardsforacause.org/make-cards/

3. Soldiers’ Angels

Soldiers’ Angels is a massive volunteer organization, with many different virtual and in-person opportunities, so take a look at their other campaigns! They currently have two letter and card writing campaigns. However, to participate in their variety of opportunities, they do require a $1 per month donation. You can find them at https://soldiersangels.org/

-Vaidehi B.

Online Volunteering For Teens Part 2

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Below, I’ve included three more organizations with which teens can volunteer online! Good luck!

Volunteer Opportunities | Cardinal at Work

1. DoSomething.org

DoSomething.org is another great virtual volunteering platform. The idea here is that you can volunteer from home, on your own schedule, and participate in mini ‘projects’- for example, one project could be collecting a number of nonperishable items for your local food pantry. You must track the hours you spent on the project, and upload pictures of your results- and DoSomething.org will send you a signed certificate confirming your hours! You can find them at https://www.dosomething.org/us

2. Points of Light

Another great platform to check out is Points of Light. Points of Light serves as a database, like VolunteerMatch, for volunteering opportunities in your area, and can also direct you to online opportunities- just toggle the Presence setting to “Remote.” You can find them at https://engage.pointsoflight.org/

3. TED Talk Translator

Do you know a language other than English? Then translating TED Talks might be the perfect volunteer task for you! You are assigned TED Talks in a secondary language, and then write subtitles for them in English, or vice versa- for example, you may have to write English translation captions for a Portuguese TED Talk, or write Portuguese captions for an English one. Even if you only know English, you can transcript subtitles for English TED Talks and review others’ work. The application process to become a translator is a bit tedious, but the work is rewarding! You can find them at https://www.ted.com/participate/translate/transcribe

-Vaidehi B.

Online Volunteering Opportunities for Teens

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Whether you need to complete a school requirement or are just looking to spice up your college applications and resumes, volunteering is a huge part of the middle and high school experience. However, in COVID-19 times, finding in-person volunteering opportunities has become very difficult. A reasonable alternative? Virtual volunteering! You can complete your hours anytime, anywhere, according to your own schedule. Below are three great virtual volunteering opportunities for teenagers!

New Jersey Department of State - Volunteer and National Service - Volunteering in NJ

1. Zooniverse

Zooniverse is an online platform, specializing in science-based volunteering through transcription and editing. For example, you could be assigned to a project digitizing marine organism classification cards, or transcripting research vessel records from the 19th century. There’s no shortage of projects available! You can find them at https://www.zooniverse.org/

2. Amnesty Decoders

Amnesty Decoders is an offshoot branch of Amnesty International. The platform utilizes citizen volunteers (like you!) to analyze images, scan text blocks, or sift through documents to find, track, and report occurrences, like harassment, that impinge on people’s human rights. You may also be assigned a research or categorizing role. For example, you could examine pictures of New York City intersections and flag all the cameras you see, so Amnesty can better understand how new facial recognition and camera technology impacts marginalized communities. Amnesty Decoders does not currently have any projects open to volunteers, but you can subscribe to their mailing list to be notified of upcoming projects. You can find them at https://decoders.amnesty.org/

3. Smithsonian Transcription Center

The Smithsonian Transcription Center is another great volunteer option. It also utilizes citizen volunteers to make transcriptions of otherwise illegible documents and recordings in the Smithsonian Archive, in order to make them easier for people with disabilities and impairments to access. For example, you could be in charge of transcripting letters from Charles Perrault to Anne Tapissier, discussing an upcoming art exhibition at the Château de Nemours. To ensure all transcriptions are as accurate as possible, multiple volunteers can work at once on the same page or item, and all transcriptions must be reviewed by a peer. The documents are very interesting to read through! You can find the center at https://transcription.si.edu/

-Vaidehi B.