Quick Community Service?

Question

okay just wondering, but how long does it take to get into community service?

Like I know that hospitals have paperwork and such and the ones near me take a month or two until you actually start volunteering.

But what about the other options?

Like animal shelters and places like that?

I've waited too long, and now I have a month to get a "steady supply" of community service (not that I don't want to serve the community..)

Answer 1

Different programs have different requirements. Animal shelters, for instance, DO have paperwork and an orientation you must go through -- they must ensure the safety of their animals.

Resign yourself to the fact that paperwork must be filled out and an orientation, if not a training, must be attended for most volunteering opportunities -- and keep track of your hours engaged in such, as it counts toward your overall service hours.

VolunteerMatch (http://www.volunteermatch.org), Idealist (http://www.idealist.org), Change.org (http://www.change.org) and CraigsList (http://www.craigslist.com) all list volunteering opportunities with thousands of organizations. There's also this government sponsored site (http://volunteer.gov/gov/) which provides volunteer positions through USA federal land agencies like Fish & Wildlife, Forest Service, National Parks, etc. Also, contact your local volunteer center; you can find this via the Points of Light Foundation web site (http://www.pointsoflight.org/centers/).

Answer 2

I was going to give you volunteermatch and idealist.org's sites, but the person already gave you a good list of places to start.  Just take out the parenthesis when clicking on the links given.  At first I thought they were broken. :)