Volunteering Scholarships

In previous posts, we’ve talked about why you might want to start volunteering in your college years, but today, I wanted to talk a little bit about volunteering a little earlier. There are actually financial rewards to volunteering while you’re still in high school. Actually, one of my friends is a perfect example; she volunteered for Meals on Wheels throughout high school (yep, all four years) and she ended up getting two different merit scholarships for college. She went on to work in various charities after school and now she’s on the board for a major non-profit organization.

Now, I’m not saying that a scholarship should be your only inspiration for volunteering, but even if it is, it’s better than not volunteering at all. If you’re thinking about volunteering for the potential scholarship perk, check out DoSomething.org. This is a website that organizes information from various sources to deliver a list of available college scholarships for high school students. Here you might find a scholarship from a realtor or an organization, like Tackle Hunger, that is really interested in helping budding philanthropists get the education they deserve.

In order to be awarded a scholarship, you can’t expect to give a half-hearted effort. You have to imagine that you’re competing against every young philanthropist in the country for the same role. So, keep that in mind when you decide how much time to spend at your charity of choice. Also, it would be risky to think that you could volunteer only in your senior year and be awarded money for college. For one, that’s very last minute; but secondly, it doesn’t show the long-term commitment that these organizations are looking for in their awardees. In order to be competitive, you should start volunteering in your freshman year and continue throughout your time in high school.

There are many scholarships available, so your chances are good – but there’s still a chance you won’t get a scholarship out of your efforts. Just make sure you enjoy the volunteer work enough to feel personally fulfilled before you commit to doing it.