In today’s day and age, volunteerism is more prevalent than ever. Prior to engaging in community service, my thoughts on volunteering was that primarily middle-aged people served. Unlike high schools from Virginia, and other southern states, high schools in Michigan did not require any community service time to graduate. I definitely feel like this could be both beneficial, and detrimental for high school students. From my short time in Blacksburg, SERVE and students on campus have taught me that young adults are an enormous percentage of people who take part in volunteerism. As I mentioned previously, high schools in Michigan do not require and community service hours as a requirement for graduation. Many students would most likely brush community service off as something that people only do as a punishment. Also, many schools only require some sort of signature, which students can forge without actually volunteering. A majority of high schoolers do not see the personal value or development as a human being that can come out of community service. You can build connections with people you meet along the way, and create friendships that last a lifetime. Volunteerism is not just about helping others, but you learn more about yourself while doing so. You learn how to be hardworking, how to communicate with people you don’t know, and how to be humble. Requirements in high school for community service is a great idea, but however needs change. One way to revamp the requirement system is to set up certain mandatory events, where a specific person has to sign off- similar to the system that we have in SERVE. Another way to combat laziness in high schoolers is to reward them. A diploma is definitely the largest reward you can receive, but along the way, I believe that students may need a little incentive to get them to engage. Service should not always require incentive, but in the beginning stages in the active citizenship continuum, incentive may be necessary as a kick start for them. Similar to students and their engagement in volunteerism, required volunteer hours for prisoners is a hot topic. Just like for high schoolers, community service is a great idea for inmates because it has the potential to develop a side of them that they may never have had before. The downside to this is that most inmates see community service as somewhat of a “necessary evil” that they have to do to be released, just like high school students. Once they finish their hours, they turn their back on volunteering, and do not receive any benefit from it. The stereotypical community service project for prisoners is cleaning up trash on the side of the road. While this is necessary to help clean up the community, there is not a terribly large amount of reflection that you can get from this; it is a tedious task, that is looked down on by society. One change that can be implemented by the prison systems is to have the inmates take on tasks that allow self-reflection, such as reading to elementary kids, or serving in a nursing home. Anything where they can see how they help immediately would be substantially more beneficial than “busy work”. Of course, there is also the issue that inmates have a bad reputation and can potentially be a danger to society. As long as the prison sends groups of inmates who are not a hazard, and there is some type of law enforcement officer in the presence, there should be no issue. In addition to this, prisoners reputation as a menace could potentially become less threatening when society sees that they can also be productive members of society. In this generation, volunteerism is often twisted into voluntourism. Voluntourism is a great concept- people travel overseas to serve in third-world countries, for under-privileged people whom they most likely have never engaged with. Voluntourism is just what it sounds like, volunteering as a tourist. When performed correctly, voluntourism can be very beneficial. The group who is being helped receives the service that they need, and you come out feeling great about yourself all while visiting a new country and enjoying a few weeks there. While this is the image that you see when you think of voluntourism, it is so far from the truth. Many people who choose to take part in voluntourism go as an excuse to take a vacation. Of course, they volunteer, but all too often they neglect the service and focus on themselves. Even when people go for the right reasons, there can still be negative side effects that you don’t think about. Once you leave, the citizens of that country are left without no help until the next volunteers arrive. In order to have the greatest effect with voluntourism, an organization would need to set up a way for the citizens to start helping themselves. For example, if volunteers bring food and water to a village that is deprived of basic needs, they will be fed for two or three weeks, and will return to scavenging for food, and starving. As the saying goes, “Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day, but teach a man to fish and he will eat for a lifetime”. If this organization taught them how to grow their own crops, they would be much better off. Another common thing that happens in voluntourism is that we visit the local children and teach them the alphabet and play games. We have this idea that we are teaching them new information, but in reality, many groups have come before and taught them the same lessons. In order to move on, setting up a school, or providing books would allow the children to learn on their own. Voluntourism is a great concept when done correctly, but unfortunately, many people do not take it as serious as it needs to be taken. Volunteerism has its pros, and its cons, but ultimately, volunteering is a good thing in its most basic form. As much as we need to learn more about it, and become more engaged in our service, volunteering is better than not volunteering.