Category Archives: Community / Volunteer Engagement

5th year anniversary of my book on virtual volunteering

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It’s the FIVE-YEAR anniversary of the publication of my book with Susan Ellis, The Last Virtual Volunteering Guidebook! The book is the result of more than 20 years of research and experience regarding virtual volunteering, including online micro volunteering, crowd sourcing, digital volunteering, online mentoring and all the various manifestations of online service. It’s packed with examples from a variety of organizations – it’s not just our ideas about how virtual volunteering might work but how it does work, and how challenges are overcome, at many different nonprofits, NGOs and school-based programs.

Susan and I wrote The Last Virtual Volunteering Guidebook in such a way that it would be timeless – as timeless as a book about using computers, laptops, smart phones and other networked devices could be. That’s not easy when it comes to technology, but we gave it a try – and upon re-reading my own book, I was shocked at how successful we were!

The Last Virtual Volunteering Guidebook is for

  • both practitioners – people involving volunteers – and academics that do research regarding volunteering.
  • both people brand new to recruiting and supporting volunteers and those that are veteran managers of volunteers
  • both people brand new to virtual volunteering and experienced managers who are looking for confirmation they are on the right track or information to help them make the case to expand their programs.

It is USA-centric but it offers a lot of international perspectives as well.

The book includes:

  • Detailed advice on virtual volunteering assignment, including one-time “Byte-Sized” tasks (micro-volunteering / microtasks), longer-term, higher-responsibility roles and virtual team assignments.
  • A thorough look at various practices for screening and matching volunteers to assignments, with an eye to getting the most capable volunteers into your volunteering ranks and preventing incomplete assignments or burdensome management tasks
  • How to make online volunteer roles accessible and welcoming for a variety, diversity of people
  • More details about how to work successfully with online volunteers, so that they are successful, your organization benefits and volunteer managers aren’t overwhelmed
  • Ensuring safety – and balancing safety with program goals
  • Respecting privacy of both the organization and online volunteers themselves
  • Online mentoring, including adults mentoring children/students
  • Blogging by, for and about volunteers
  • Online activism
  • Spontaneous online volunteers
  • Live online events with volunteers
  • The future of virtual volunteering and how to start planning for oncoming trends

There’s also a chapter just for online volunteers themselves, which organizations can also use in creating their own materials for online volunteers.

In conjunction with the guidebook, I have maintained the Virtual Volunteering Wiki, a free online resource and collaborative space for sharing resources regarding virtual volunteering.

Here’s why we called it the LAST guidebook and reviews of The Last Virtual Volunteering Guidebook.

The Last Virtual Volunteering Guidebook is available for purchase in paperback or as an ebook (PDF) by Energize, Inc.

If you read the book, I would so appreciate it if you could write and post a review of it on the Amazon, Barnes and Noble and Good Reads web sites (you can write the same review on all three sites).

Here’s some of my free advice on volunteer engagement, not just virtual volunteering:

I also frequently blog about virtual volunteering. Examples:

review of latest data on volunteering in the USA

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The Corporation for National Service has released its annual report on volunteering in the USA. And, once again, the way they present the data, and the old-fashioned view of volunteering, has disappointed me greatly.

How was the data gathered? I can’t find anything on the web site to tell me. How many people were interviewed? Or how many organizations provided data regarding their volunteers? Where is a report I can read, to get more in-depth info, not just graphics and summary paragraphs? I spent a lot of time on the web site and searching on Google and cannot find this information anywhere.

Once again, the Corporation is focused on a dollar value for measuring the impact of volunteering: “Over the past 15 years, Americans volunteered 120 billion hours, estimated to be worth $2.8 trillion” and in the year for this report, volunteers gave $167 billion in economic value. That’s right – volunteers mean you can eliminate paid staff! And also contributes to the mistaken belief that volunteers are free (they aren’t).

The Corporation summary of the report breaks down volunteering activities in these categories:

  • Fundraise or sell items to raise money
  • Collect, prepare, distribute, or serve food
  • Collect, make or distribute clothing, crafts, or goods other than food.
  • Mentor youth
  • Tutor or teach
  • Engage in general labor; supply transportation for people
  • Provide professional or management assistance including serving on a board or committee
  • Usher, greeter, or minister
  • Engage in music, performance, or other artistic activities
  • Coach, referee, or supervise sports teams
  • Provide general office services
  • Provide counseling, medical care, fire/EMS, or protective services
  • Other types of volunteer activity

Sigh… so, where do these common volunteering activities go?

  • Participating in hackathons and wikipedia edit-a-thons? What if I’m not doing anything at the computer – I’m walking around serving drinks?
  • Supporting artistic activities but not actually supplying them? Would a theater usher be under the “usher” category or hear?
  • Volunteering to register voters go?

And what about this range of typical virtual volunteering activities go?

  • Managing an online discussion group
  • Facilitating an online video chat/event
  • creating web pages (designing the pages or writing the content)
  • editing or writing proposals, press releases, newsletter articles, video scripts, etc.
  • transcribing scanned documents
  • monitoring the news to look for specific subjects
  • managing social media activities
  • tagging photos and files

And, as always: where is the information about the resources it takes to engage volunteers? It takes money and time – yet the report never says a word about this. Volunteers do not magically happen.

I have all the same complaints about CNCS and its report on volunteerism that I had in 2014, so I won’t repeat myself here. But please, CNCS, read it. Drag yourself into the 21st Century and let’s get the data we truly need to help politicans and the general public understand and value volunteerism.

#GoVolunteer

Also see:

Volunteering to help national public lands cleanup after shutdown

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Updated February 1, 2019, at the bottom of the blog entry:

The House and Senate have passed a bill to reopen the government until February 15, and the President is expected to sign it – it may be signed by the time this blog is published.

The impact of the shut down on US public lands – national parks, national forests, national monuments and Bureau of Land Management (BLM) land – is still being assessed, but we already know, per numerous press reports and social media reports by visitors, that it’s been bad: trash, graffiti, plant destruction, trail destruction and more.

Official groups that volunteer on US public lands have all been somewhat or entirely inactive as well during the shutdown because they are under the auspices of official partnerships with federal offices, and their liaisons have all been out during the shutdown. Many have been making plans during the shutdown on what to do immediately when the shutdown ends, and many will be starting activities ASAP to address the damage that’s been done to national public lands.

If you want to help volunteer in the next two weeks in particular to address the damage on US public lands during the shutdown, look for “Friends of…” groups that support specific national parks, national forests, etc. You can find these using Google, Bing and Facebook. Check their social media accounts for updates on what their immediate volunteering activities will be and apply to volunteer via their web sites. If they don’t have a way to fill out an application on their web site, email them and ask how you can become a part of their efforts.

These groups do not provide transportation to the public lands they support, nor do they provide accommodations – that means if, say, you want to help at the Grand Canyon, you have to get yourself to the Grand Canyon, find and pay for a hotel or motel room somewhere, etc., all paid for by you. If you decide you want to join in on these volunteering efforts, you need to be prepared to be self-funded and get to wherever the group wants you to be on your own.

You also need to apply to become an official volunteer with any volunteering group you want to help – don’t just show up at the gates of a national park, national forest, etc., and say, “Here I am!” These groups have information on their web sites on how they do this. You may want to apply to volunteer with more than one group – I have no idea if they are getting lots of applications or very few, nor any idea if you will get a quick response, or any response at all.

These groups could all be shut down again on Feb. 15, if no more permanent legislation is passed.

Also, remember that these groups need help year-round – when there’s not a shutdown happening. Many would welcome your support running their gift shops (which raise money for their efforts), building and restoring trails, leading groups and more.

Update: I curated tweets sent by various people and organizations about #volunteers helping on public lands – national parks, forests, monuments, BLM land, etc. – during the 2018-2019 US Federal government #shutdown. The tweets have a lot of links to news articles. I’ve posted this list of curated tweets to Wakelet.

One of the social messages that went viral during this shutdown was a video of a group of spontaneous, unaffiliated community volunteers being told they had to stop cleaning up in the Shiloh National Military Park in Tennessee. Again: official groups that volunteer on US public lands had to be inactive during the shutdown because they are under the auspices of official partnerships with federal offices, and their liaisons were all out during the shutdown. The park worker or law enforcement person or whoever it is in the video did a very poor job of trying to say this in explaining why the people had to stop trying to clean up the park, and his explanation left these community members confused and angry. What he should have said was this:

Thank you. I know you all really care about this park and it’s bothering you to see trash and other debris laying around. These are public lands, your lands, and of course, you feel like you want to clean them up. However, even when the government isn’t shut down, even when there is staff in the parks, people cannot just show up at the park and “volunteer” here. We don’t allow people to spontaneously volunteer, without any formal affiliation with our park, because of liability risks and because of the risk, however small, that unsupervised volunteers will do damage. I so appreciate what you are doing, but park policy says you need to stop. Here is the name of the person you can call the day after the shutdown stops so that your group can volunteer.

Of course, if you’ve watched the video, based on the logic used by the worker, all those unaffiliated volunteers had to do was say, “Oh, we’re not volunteers. I’m an individual citizen enjoying the park and this is how I choose to enjoy it.”  They might have gotten away with it.

Sadly, there have been cases where even “official” volunteers on public lands have caused damage. For instance, 30 miles of dirt trails and primitive roads in Deschutes National Forest in Oregon were deliberately wrecked in 2014 by unsupervised volunteers who were supposed to be doing necessary, environmentally-appropriate trail maintenance. They caused more than $200,000 in damage.

Also see:

Honoring volunteers engaged in economic & social development

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graphic by Jayne Cravens representing volunteersThere are volunteers all over the world, right now, who are working to help impoverished people start small businesses and generate the income they desperately need to care for themselves and their families. They are training people in sustainable farming methods and ecological land management. They are helping build the computer literacy of a variety of people. They are training women in public speaking and in how to lead. They are training rural people in how to set up and operate groups that will identify their own most pressing community needs and communicate those needs to government and potential donors. They are helping refugees and immigrants learn local languages and participate in local civic life. They are helping to educate communities about HIV/AIDS and to not be afraid of those among them who are HIV positive. They are working to stop female genital mutilation. They are using theater as a tool to educate about something, to build awareness, even to change behavior.

Some of these volunteers live in their own homes and engage in these activities in the same communities they are from, or in nearby communities. Some travel thousands of miles away and live in a compound or a guest house or with a local family. Some face hostilities, dangerous situations, even violence, as they try to this service. Some are killed in the line of duty. Many endure sexual harassment and assault. Many suffer from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), but will not seek help because they know that, if they do, they could be jeopardizing their chances of continuing volunteer service, or they do not have access to PTSD treatment.

These volunteers don’t get statues or parades or school assemblies that honor their service. Songs aren’t written and sung in their honor. People don’t post to social media to thank them for their service. And I don’t know of any such volunteers asking for such, though they would most certainly like local and national press to pay more attention to the communities they are trying to help and causes they are trying to address.

These are volunteers who are engaged in economic and social development, and December 5th is the day to honor them: International Volunteer Day for Economic and Social Development, as declared by the United Nations General Assembly per its resolution 40/212 in 1985.

This is not a day to honor only international volunteers; the international in the title describes the day, not the volunteer. It’s a day to honor, specifically, those volunteers who contribute to economic and social development. Such volunteers deserve their own day. This includes local volunteers, not just international volunteers.

I say this every year in conversations and on social media and repeatedly on my blog: I think it’s a shame to try to turn December 5 into just another day to celebrate any volunteer, another day to give volunteers a meme with a happy kitten that says “thanks!” There are PLENTY of days and weeks to honor all volunteers and encourage more volunteering and to hug a volunteer.

Let’s keep December 5 specifically for volunteers who contribute to economic and social development, per its original intention; let’s give these unique volunteers their due, as per the original purpose of this day’s designation. Let’s honor their sacrifices, the stress they deal with, the service they give and the work they are trying to do.

Thank you to the many volunteers who help with the range of economic and social development needs in the world! Today is all about YOU and the incredible service you undertake.

Here are all the times I’ve tried to remind people of what IVD used to be about and should be again:

Also see:

Holiday gift idea for anyone that works to make a difference

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Looking for a gift for someone in your life that works with volunteers, either as a volunteer themselves or as an official manager of such? Or a gift idea for someone studying for a degree in nonprofit management? Or anyone working at a nonprofit, a non-government organization (NGO), or a government program that engages volunteers?

May I not-so-humbly suggest The Last Virtual Volunteering Guidebook?

The book is available for purchase in paperback or as an ebook (PDF) from Energize, Inc., the world’s largest publisher of books regarding volunteer engagement. The book is written by me and Susan Ellis, and is the result of more than 20 years of research and experience regarding virtual volunteering – also known as online micro volunteering, crowd sourcing, digital volunteering, online mentoring and on and on – yes, there are a lot of different names for the various manifestations of online service.

Did you know that virtual volunteering was a practice that was more than 20 years old? You would if you read the guidebook!

This book is for

  • both for practitioners and for academics that do research regarding volunteering.
  • both for people brand new to recruiting and supporting volunteers and for those that are veteran managers of volunteers
  • both for people brand new to virtual volunteering and for experienced managers who are looking for confirmation they are on the right track or information to help them make the case to expand their programs.

Susan and I wrote The Last Virtual Volunteering Guidebook in such a way that it would be timeless – as timeless as a book about using computers, laptops, smart phones and other networked devices could be. We didn’t want it to be out-of-date in just a few months. That’s not easy when it comes to technology, but we gave it a try – and four years later, it still reflects what works, and what doesn’t, in working with volunteers online. In fact, as I’ve said before, I use it as a reference myself – there are times I’m asked a question about working with volunteers online, or facing a dilemma regarding working with volunteers myself, and I go back to the book to see what we said – and, tada, there’s the answer!

The Last Virtual Volunteering Guidebook details the basics for getting started with involving and supporting volunteers online, but it goes much farther, offering detailed information to help organizations that are already engaged in virtual volunteering with improving and expanding their programs. It offers a lot of international perspectives as well.

The book includes:

  • Detailed advice on virtual volunteering assignment, including one-time “Byte-Sized” tasks (micro-volunteering), longer-term, higher-responsibility roles and virtual team assignments.
  • A thorough look at various practices for screening and matching volunteers to assignments, with an eye to getting the most capable volunteers into your volunteering ranks and preventing incomplete assignments or burdensome management tasks
  • How to make online volunteer roles accessible and diverse
  • More details about how to work successfully with online volunteers, so that they are successful, your organization benefits and volunteer managers aren’t overwhelmed
  • Ensuring safety – and balancing safety with program goals
  • Respecting privacy of both the organization and online volunteers themselves
  • Online mentoring
  • Blogging by, for and about volunteers
  • Online activism
  • Spontaneous online volunteers
  • Live online events with volunteers
  • The future of virtual volunteering and how to start planning for oncoming trends

There’s also a chapter just for online volunteers themselves, which organizations can also use in creating their own materials for online volunteers.

In conjunction with the guidebook, we’ve maintained the Virtual Volunteering Wiki, a free online resource and collaborative space for sharing resources regarding virtual volunteering.

Here’s why we called it the LAST guidebook and reviews of The Last Virtual Volunteering Guidebook.

The Last Virtual Volunteering Guidebook is available for purchase in paperback or as an ebook (PDF) by Energize, Inc.

If you read the book, I would so appreciate it if you could write and post a review of it on the Amazon and Barnes and Noble web sites (you can write the same review on both sites).

Kenya’s own in-country volunteering program for young people

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Kenya has a national volunteer program for its own citizens to help in-country. It’s called G-United. Its aims: strengthen education outcomes, promote national cohesion & provide development opportunities for youth.

This is a program for Kenya’s own citizens – young people – to be able to take several months devoting themselves full-time to a cause in their own country. It’s similar to the national service programs – AmeriCorps NCCC, AmeriCorps State and National, and AmeriCorps VISTA – in the USA.

Do you have a University degree? Are you Kenyan, aged 21-30? Are you passionate about social change? Join the Kenya Ministry of Education in helping to develop the #literacy skills of the next generation of Kenyans. Apply to volunteer with 1,600 other champions of progress, as part of the G-United 2019 cohort.

On Twitter: @G_UnitedKE.

Crowdsourcing / Hive Mind – it’s been happening since at least 1849!

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Crowdsourcing is an open, public call for contributions from anyone to talk about a pressing issue, offer advice or data or to help solve a problem or challenge. It’s an open-call brainstorming session. While the term crowdsourcing was popularized online to describe Internet-based activities, there are examples of projects that, in retrospect, can also be described as crowdsourcing, without the Internet.

For instance, in, 1848 Matthew Fontaine Maury, an American astronomer, United States Navy officer, historian, oceanographer, meteorologist, cartographer and more, distributed 5000 copies of his Wind and Current Charts free of charge on the condition that sailors returned a standardized log of their voyage to the U.S. Naval Observatory. By 1861, he had distributed 200,000 copies free of charge, on the same conditions. The data the sailors provided was used to develop charts for all the major trade routes.

The Smithsonian Meteorological Project was started by the Smithsonian’s first Secretary, Joseph Henry, and in 1849 he set up a network of some 150 volunteer weather observers all over the USA. Henry used the telegraph to gather volunteers’ data and create a large weather map, making new information available to the public daily. For instance, volunteers tracked a tornado passing through Wisconsin and sent the findings via telegraph to the Smithsonian. Henry’s project is considered the origin of what later became the National Weather Service. Within a decade, the project had more than 600 volunteer observers and had spread to Canada, Mexico, Latin America, and the Caribbean. These remote volunteers submitted monthly reports that were then analyzed by a professor at Lafayette College in Easton, Pennsylvania, and published in 1861 in the first of a two- volume compilation of climatic data and storm observations based on the volunteers’ reports.

The Smithsonian information in this blog is from a 2011 article “Smithsonian Crowdsourcing Since 1849!” by Elena Bruno, a Smithsonian intern who conducted research into how crowdsourcing could be integrated into mobile applications and making the Smithsonian experience, for those inside our Institution and beyond, more valuable and engaging.

I miss the crowdsourcing feel of the 1990s Internet, particularly via USENET newsgroups. My favorite was soc.org.nonprofit, for the discussion of nonprofit organization management issues. It was amazing to see someone post a question about how to reach a particular audience or databases or whatever and see knowledgeable people offer helpful advice on the subject within days, sometimes hours. There was lots of help and very little posturing – or trolls. Good times. Read more about the Early History of Nonprofits and the Internet (before 1996).

 

vvbooklittleOnline crowdsourcing is one example of virtual volunteering. Wikipedia is probably the most well-known example of online crowdsourcing, but there are many more. For advice on working with remote volunteers, or using the Internet to support and involve volunteers, whether in crowdsourcing initiatives or in more formal, higher-responsibility volunteering, check out The Last Virtual Volunteering Guidebook. It’s written by myself and Susan J. Ellis, and is the result of many, many years of research and experience.

Brilliant volunteer firefighter recruitment video from Germany

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A brilliant volunteer firefighter recruitment video from the station in Meldorf, Germany (Freiwillige Feuerwehr Stadt Meldorf): a man drives by a training exercise by volunteer firefighters in his village. The popups in the video show what professions the volunteers come from: IT professional, farmer, chimney sweep, lawyer, clerk, caregiver, student, etc. It’s meant to say that a variety of people can be volunteer emergency responders (and are needed as such).

A big difference between Germany and the USA re: firefighting is that firefighters aren’t EMTs. Instead, for emergency medical calls, there are ambulance corps throughout the country. That definitely makes it much easier to recruit volunteer firefighters in Germany than in the USA, and as a result of the model used in the country, Germany has the highest number of volunteer firefighters per capita in the world.

Still, this is a terrific recruitment video, one that firehouses in the USA that involve volunteers should consider re-creating for their own communities. Don’t have the video shooting and editing skills to make it happen? Consider recruiting volunteers with such skills from nearby universities and colleges – even high schools.

Also see:

Some people think they aren’t perfect enough to volunteer with you

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Meridian Swift has a terrific blog about the impression our volunteers-in-action photos might give, unintentionally. She imagines this scenario:

Yvonne took in the photos of volunteers working together, triumphant smiles on their busy faces. She imagined how dynamic these volunteers must be, and here she was, shy, insecure, and full of doubts. She wasn’t like them. They were so…amazing and who was she kidding, she was just stumbling through life. With a wistful sigh, Yvonne closed the tab and moved on.

She’s right, and not just about photos: when we celebrate volunteers on the organization web site or in a press release or at a ceremony, we celebrate things most people cannot do: volunteer for more than a decade at the same organization, in the same role, or volunteer 100 hours or more in a year. That isn’t to say that those volunteers shouldn’t be honored, but what about honors for the most tenacious volunteer, or the volunteer who made a big impact with a small project?

As Meridian says in her response to volunteers who may be thinking they aren’t perfect enough to volunteer, per the perfect-volunteers imagery:

You may think we want you to be perfect. What do we want? We want to do some good in this crazy world and we don’t have all the answers. We’re not looking for perfection. We’re looking for you.  

It’s something to keep in mind as you recruit and welcome new volunteers at your organization.

Also see:

research on why NGOs recruit international volunteers

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I am a frequent blogger about voluntourism – mostly to say, “Don’t do it – don’t pay to volunteer for two-weeks abroad. It’s not only ineffective, it’s potentially, sometimes actually, harmful.” Most recently, earlier this year, I blogged about volunteers themselves speaking out about voluntourism. I so appreciate these honest accounts of people who have paid to volunteer abroad and found the experience lacking in terms of actually helping local people or the environment – and even found it to be harmful.

My consulting colleague, sometimes presentation partner and all-around amazing human Dr. Erin Barnhardt wrote about her own experience as a pay-to-volunteer-abroad experience in her 2012 PhD thesis, Engaging Global Service: Organizational Motivations for and Perceived Benefits of Hosting International Volunteers. She notes in the introduction to her research:

While my experience in Jordan was on the whole overwhelmingly positive, I was surprised and somewhat disappointed to discover that I was in fact a largely ineffective volunteer. I knew that staying for only two weeks meant that my contributions would be severely limited and that my lack of Arabic language skills would further hamper my impact, but I’d assumed that coming in with a professional expertise meant that I could make some kind of lasting contribution during my very short tenure. What I discovered though was, despite having gone through a reputable volunteer-sending organization to an organization that regularly hosted international volunteers, the infrastructure to put me to work was minimal and somewhat ad hoc. I came to the Jordanian NGO with a genuine interest in helping out, only to discover that there was in fact little for me to do.

I so appreciate Erin’s honesty – and the honesty of all those who have paid-to-volunteer abroad and are now speaking out about their negative experiences.

Erin’s academic research after her Jordan experience came from her desire to know why some NGOs recruit volunteers from other countries. Erin’s research started with an initial survey of 248 NGOs that are not based in the USA and host international volunteers – people from outside of country of the location of the host NGO. Then she conducted a more in-depth survey of 31 NGOs from that group or 18.8% of the original 248. I wish she had limited her research to what I’m most interested in: those programs where volunteers are required to pay a fee to a volunteer-sending organization or to the host NGO – perhaps someone else will do that. Erin’s research was much broader: she looked at a range of NGOs, including those that do NOT charge any fees from volunteers. In fact, a majority of NGOs that responded to Erin’s surveys do not charge fees from volunteers, only 13.3% partnered with a volunteer-sending organization and just 8.5% had international volunteers placed with them by other kinds of partner organizations such as universities and faith groups. In addition, just 37.1% of responding organizations said international volunteers pay them a fee to volunteer with their organization. In addition, the survey was limited to NGOs who had registered on the Idealist.org web site, which means these NGOs are quite tech-savvy and independent – two qualities I don’t think are had by most local NGOs that host international volunteers in pay-to-volunteer-abroad schemes.

With all that said, the research is worth reading, to see how Internet-savvy, independent NGOs view international volunteers and the services they provide. I see these NGOs in Erin’s research as the kind of organizations that I recommend DIY volunteers abroad try to partner with when they want to travel and do good.

Here are some items from her research that are especially interesting – at least to me, because I think that these three findings would very likely be true of research that was limited to programs where international volunteers are charged a fee for their service:

  • Just over half of respondents – 50.4% – reported that they began hosting international volunteers only within the past five years, while 78.3% of respondents began hosting international volunteers within the past decade.
  • Overall, respondents reported that shorter terms of service were more common for their international volunteers than longer terms. For example, while 69.2% of respondents reported that international volunteers almost always or occasionally served for between 67 two weeks and one month, just over half as many reported having international volunteers almost always or occasionally stay for over one year.
  • Types of volunteer projects and roles varied widely with, by far, the most common type being teaching, classroom assistance, tutoring, and/or community education (61.3%). The next most common types of volunteer projects were construction and/or infrastructure development or improvements like painting, installations, etc. (17.8%), technology tasks like building websites (15.6%), and research, data collection, and reporting (12.4%).

I so hope someone out there will do similar research specifically on programs where volunteers are required to pay a fee to a volunteer-sending organization or to the host NGO. I hope they will take the research even farther and find out:

  • who identifies assignments for international volunteers (does the NGO define the assignment, do potential volunteers say “Here is how I would like to help and what I can do,” or does the volunteer sending agency say, “Here are volunteers and how you will use them”?)
  • not only if applicants need to meet minimal skills requirements, but how those requirements are verified
  • if the programs have written policies and procedures regarding sexual harassment and safety
  • what percentage of overall applicants that have the ability to pay are rejected from service by the agency, and what the reasons for those rejections are
  • how many of these agencies have conducted formal evaluations with resulting documentation regarding the impact these volunteers have on the agency or those that the agency services – not just satisfaction surveys among volunteers.

I would also love to know more about the process local NGOs must go through to request long-term international volunteers from

There is such a thing as effective short-term international volunteering. There is such a thing as quality program where volunteers need to pay a fee to the host organization. In fact, there are volunteering abroad programs where volunteers pay nothing, such as UN Volunteers, VSO and PeaceCorps – but such programs require a much, much longer commitment of volunteers than a few weeks.

My other blogs related to voluntourism: