Protocol for Types of Activities Which Qualify as Service Hours

 

In general, community service focuses on the larger community and it addresses a significant community need rather than the gain associated with the service. Community service is done without monetary compensation and is done most often for non-profit agencies rather than for-profit businesses.

Typically, community service would not include volunteering with a for-profit business except in cases such as: 1) if the focus is micro-enterprises/economic development in very depressed communities; 2) if the for-profit business has as its primary purpose providing a significant public service (hospitals and nursing homes for example); 3) when working with the company's corporate community service program.

 

University service/campus involvement is great for the campus and it is well-documented that student success and retention is positively impacted by being active in the campus and local community. One of the goals of student community service is to broaden exposure to the larger world and their role in that world. This is directly related to the Missouri State University mission to "develop educated persons."

 

What is volunteering?

Asking, "What is volunteering?" is like asking, "What's a sport?" There are some basic similarities between all sports (they all have some rules, they all involve physical activity), but most sports are very different from each other. Just think about the differences between soccer and ice hockey. Volunteering is similar—there are thousands of examples of volunteer opportunities. The one basic similarity among all volunteer opportunities is this: volunteering involves you offering to give, or volunteer, some of your free time and skills to serve your community. You can define community any way you like- school, neighborhood, town, country, or even the global community.

-Taken from Idealist.com at: http://www.idealist.org/kt/voloverview.html.

 

 

Volunteering is an opportunity to engage as a community member and citizen with and in service to other members of a given community in an effort to make the world a better place.

 

Hours should be categorized as either direct service or indirect service. The following explains what activities fall into each of these two categories.

 

Direct Service

• Time physically spent serving and addressing community needs (i.e. building a house, raking leaves)
• Time spent helping with ongoing and existing service projects in the community (i.e.  tutoring children)
• Time spent assisting the community in accomplishing necessary tasks (i.e. serving food at the Market Street Festival)

 

Indirect Service

• Time spent planning and preparing for a service event, program, or activity
• Time spent on creating PR materials or posting PR materials for the organization's service activity
• Time spent on set up or tear down for a service activity
• Time spent recruiting members for the organization or "building capacity"
• Time spent on fundraising for an outside agency or your club/organization's needs in assisting the community (i.e. supplies to make cards for soldiers)
• Time spent on service-learning initiatives
  • Time spent educating others about a community, environmental, and/or social need or problem to be addressed
  • Time spent in formalized group reflection, as recognized by the University, upon service and/or focusing on an environmental or social problem associated with the service

 

Not all time spent related to a service organization can be categorized as direct service or indirect service. The following activities are neither.

 

Not Considered Service

• Time spent at an organization's meeting socializing, having a pizza party, etc.
• Travel time to/from a service activity
• Time spent on fundraising for your campus club/organization's own benefit (i.e. social events, transportation costs)

 

"Everybody can be great, because anybody can serve. You don't have to have a college degree to serve. You don't have to make your subject and verb agree to serve. You only need a heart full of grace, a soul generated by love." ~ Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

 

In the Service of Life by Rachel Naomi Remen

Available at: http://www.theinterpretersfriend.com/Terpsnet/11.html

This is a beautiful essay written describing the difference between helping and serving. Helping implies some sort of inequality, serving is based on equality.