The Importance of Your 40 Community Service Hours

In order to graduate high school, you need a specific amount of earned credits and a completion of 40 community service hours.  Without either of these requirements, one may find it very hard to convince any teacher or principle to allow you to graduate with the rest of your classmates.

The first thing that may come  to mind when the words “community service” are uttered include cleaning up litter from parks. Although these two tasks are good ways to complete your 40 hours, it doesn’t always have to be so plain and boring.

Explore Your Interests

You do not need to complete your 40 community service hours within the same place with the same people. It also does not have to be completed within a strict short amount of time. You can make a schedule as to when and where you are available. .

Completing your 40 hours seems like a lot to do, but it is not. Don’t over think! The best reason behind all this extra work is to find out who you are as a person and expand your mind to what the world has to offer. This task is made for students to explore their interests, along with helping others, or a specific cause that means something to you. For example, you can receive your first ten hours by volunteering at an elementary school, another ten at your own school, another ten by offering to wash a family member’s car a few times and the final ten by babysitting. Not necessarily in that order, but the idea is to get into the habit of doing a variety of things. Keep in mind, the more things you do to complete your 40 hours, the more different experiences you have for your job resumés.

Think About Your Future

How you choose to complete the 40 community service hours is solely up to you as an individual. It is always good to do something not only you find amusing, but something that will benefit you in your future.

To get a specific career, you need specific skills. For example, if you are applying to work at a restaurant one day, the first thing you need is to fill out a resumé. In order to do that, you need some experience with a variety of things such as collaboration. Volunteering at a restaurant first is a good way to get your hours and it gives you work experience. Another good way to show good collaboration skills on your resumé is by stating that you have volunteered at a school, a library or a camp to show that you are good with other people in terms of assistance and patience.

Do What You Love

Personally, I love working with children. Every week I visit my elementary school to help the primary teachers mark spelling tests, clean classrooms and teachi the kids simple math, reading and arts and crafts. Doing these  things does  not make me worry about how many hours I have left or how much longer I have to spend with the children. Since it is something I love to do, the number of hours I spend doing it is the last thing on my mind while the kids are my first priority.

If you do something you love whether it be working with children, filing papers in an office, or taking dogs out for a walk,  it can distract you from the reason why you are doing it in the first place. Instead, it allows you to focus on the task at hand.

Making a Difference

Volunteering can allow you to have new perspectives on people and things that go on around the world. If you are passionate about preventing poverty or trying to find a cure for cancer, then volunteering at a hospital or the Stop Poverty Foundation is a good place to start. This way it shows that you want to do more and help more while in the process of gaining 40 hours which is great.

Sources:

Sarikas, Christine. “SAT / ACT Prep Online Guides and Tips.” How to Improve Reading Comprehension: 8 Expert Tips, blog.prepscholar.com/the-best-places-to-do-community-service

Stop Poverty Foundation. “Welcome to Stop Poverty Foundation, 501 (C) (3) Non-Profit Organization.” Stop Poverty Foundation, stoppovertyfoundation.org/