Volunteer Work
There is a national honor society called Alpha Sigma Nu that allows students from Jesuit school (which Regis University is one) to join. You have to have a fairly high GPA (which I do), at least be in your junior year (which I am), and show service to the community (which I don’t have.) Only 4% of the applicants are allowed in every year. To improve my chances of getting into the ASN society, I’m thinking about doing some volunteer work.
Is this a bit self-centered? Yeah. Probably. I’ve always thought that volunteer work should be done without expecting to get anything back other than warm and fuzzy feelings. I’d like to say that my motivation to help other people is for self gratification, but I do have other motives. I’m not going to be secret about them.
Do I like helping people out? Sure. Do I expect something out of helping others? Sometimes, but not usually. Should I not do volunteer work because I expect something beneficial out of it? No. I think I can help other people, and if I get a side benefit, then good for me.
In the past, I was part of a drug rehab and drug prevention group. I was part of the prevention, not the rehab group. During the summer months, weekends, and on spring break, most of us would volunteer to help with an organization called “Christmas in April” that was similar to the Habitat for Humanity organization. We would swarm a run-down house, and remodel and revamp it over the course of a week. There were licensed contractors overseeing the whole operation, but a vast majority of the muscle, blood, and sweat was provided by the volunteers.
I remember working on an elderly woman’s house for almost an entire week. We started with her kitchen, and moved outwards from there. Because we did the kitchen first, it allowed her to make drinks (usually lemonade) and snacks (usually sandwiches) for the workers as we did our thing. After a hot day in the West Texas sun working our asses off, the lemonade was some of the best that we’d ever had. When we were finally finished with her house, she couldn’t even thank us because she was crying so much. Those tears of joy were all of the thanks that I needed.
Despite my current motivations being different from the “normal reasons”, I think that I can do some good. I’ve contacted Regis’ ministry services that coordinate these kinds of things, but my contact is out on vacation until next Monday. I’ve got a post-it on my calendar for next Monday to give him a call to see where I can get started.
I’m willing to roll up my sleeves to help build/remodel a house for Habitat for Humanity, or work in a soup kitchen for the homeless. I pretty much don’t have any limits on what I’m willing to do. I would prefer to put my professional and technical skills to use to create web sites for organizations, design software that allows them to track donations, requests for help, and things of that nature. I’ll probably end up doing a little bit of both if things work out well.
I’ll let you know how things turn out.
