Secondary school volunteers - I need advice on how to approach schools/teachers. (1 Viewer)

[ROVolunteers]

Hey there

I've started to post in these forums as I'm at a bit of loss as to what to do.

I'm with an Australian non for profit/charity volunteer programs for students to go to third world countries for a week or more and do community development and/or marine and wildlife conservation.

I'm super passionate about these projects because they are phenomenal. I was a volunteer five years ago and I have never felt anything as rewarding as that first volunteer trip, I am still running on a high from it. I've also seen how much of a difference it makes in the long term to these communities that we visit. So naturally I want to get as many people involved as I can.

We also offer duke of edinburgh awards, university credits (university and course dependent) and different courses for the students to really excel.

It could also be a viable alternative to schoolies.

There's incentives for teachers to come and get lots of students involved.

The problem I have is that I've spent close to 100 hours trying to get schools involved in some way shape or form. I've done lots of cold calling/follow ups, pamphlets, visiting the schools and dropping information booklets to maybe 50+ schools. Out of all of this I've gotten two volunteers. Most of the time I receive no replies from the teachers/principles.

I didn't expect to connect easily as I know this is not the sort of thing that is for everyone but I had hoped for more.

My question is if there is any tidbits of advice on how to connect with teachers/principles and students?

if you're interested to know more about the programs then feel free to send me a message or check out the website, google rovolunteers (I can't post links, too new of a member)

Any bits of advice would be amazing.

Sincerely
Stew Adams
Reach out volunteers.

Disclaimer - the programs do come with a decent sized fee but we spend time teaching all our volunteers to fund raise so it can be available to everyone. It pays for their transport, accommodation, food and building materials they use while at their projects.

Disclaimer #2 - I do receive a small strip end for my involvement to help cover the costs of fuel, printing and other expenses but it doesn't come anywhere near covering what I spend, let alone the hours I put in.

 

[ahri]

Most of the students who are interested in these things would most likely have LinkedIn. Offer programs or alternatives to different schools, not sure how that would work. Directly talk to not just the principal, but the careers advisor.

A good one would be to hold a workshop and invite students to come and learn some skills, which then you could interact and work with some students who may be interested. Spreading this by facebook events, hosting it at a reputable venue (USyd/ UNSW is a good option), for a low price (around 10-20 is still ok) and offer to allow them to network and gain new skills would be good. You could also have student abassadors who complete the program and can advertise it to their friends.

Edit: For the Duke of Ed, try to make that availible as volunteering. I know a lot of kids are looking for volunteering places for DoE but it's really hard to find it. Do you advertise yourself as a DoE assessor for volunteering as well? Maybe have that on your website as well.