Challenges and opportunities ahead for volunteers

Release Date: Oct 25, 2009

Carnegie Mellon Master of Public Policy and Management student Peter Heyworth is passionate about volunteering in Australia.

Peter Heyworth, the Executive Officer for Northern Volunteering SA and the August Convocation spokesperson, says volunteering is an important ingredient in building better communities.

“For me volunteering is all about human impact – of making a difference and creating change. The power of one highly motivated person working in a volunteer organisation cannot be measured,” Peter says.

Studies in the US and UK show the benefits of volunteering. Anecdotally, it is not unusual to hear statements from volunteers such as, “I was feeling depressed and didn’t believe in myself. I took up volunteer work in an area in which I was interested. Now I feel I am making a difference. I enjoy what I am doing and those around me appreciate me for what I do.”

Peter says the beneficial psychological effects of volunteering were demonstrated by an Indian lady who came to Northern Volunteering SA in the end of 2008. As a result of working on a particular volunteer project, she was invigorated and inspired by the project.

“Volunteering literally changed her life from one of being depressed to loving life. When you volunteer you are helping yourself boost your self esteem. You do this without even realizing it is happening. You just feel wonderful being able to be out and about and doing new things and meeting new people,” Peter says.

Australia has similar volunteering patterns to Canada, USA and UK. There is a high degree of professionalization and this affects how people perceive volunteering in the community.

Approximately 34 percent of Australians over 18 years of age (5.4 million people) volunteered 713 million hours in 2007.

In South Australia there are more than 600,000 volunteers and the median hours volunteered was 52 hours per year. The 35-44 year old age bracket is the largest volunteer age cohort.

“The challenge I have in my organisation is in the 65 plus age bracket. In community services the predominant age is in the mid 60s. In 10 years time these people will be older and stop volunteering. Younger cohorts aren’t really interested in community services as it operates on an old style of organisational architecture to which they don’t relate. So there are some major challenges emerging” Peter says.

“More people now are interested in short term volunteering. This is especially so amongst students. Unfortunately many volunteer organisations are not equipped to do this, especially community services which is focused more on building relationships,” Peter says.

The biggest area of volunteers is in sport and recreation sector. These are the mums and dads who are helping out at school sports on the weekends.

In order of largest volunteer groups of volunteering in Australia is Sports and recreation, Welfare and Community, Education and Training, Religion, Health and Emergency Services and to gain skills.

Peter says there were many reasons why people volunteer.

• Almost two thirds of those who became involved in volunteering in the last 10 years were asked if they would like to participate (35 percent) or did so because they knew someone involved (29 percent).
• They were rarely recruited by the media with only 5 percent doing so as a response to a media report of an advertisement.
• Over half of volunteers (52 percent) reported that at least one of their parents had done voluntary work compared to 23 percent for those whose parents had not volunteered.

Peter says volunteering is the ideal opportunity for students to put studies into practice. Depending on the organisation, students could be involved in a ‘consultancy’ role, program evaluation or developing funding submissions. Creative organisations can usually find a role to stimulate the intellect and ensure they do something suited to their interests.

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