Volunteerism: A stop on the road to Civic Engagement

“If we continue to consider service as only those activities done through formal organizations or programs, we miss the opportunity to promote and support the many other powerful ways Americans get involved.  By challenging ourselves to think about service and engagement more broadly, we push ourselves and the service sector to innovative approaches to finding and using the most effective solutions and building enduring capacity of communities to solve problems.”

-Civic Life in America:  Key Findings on the Civic Health of the Nation*

The idea of civic engagement is an interesting one.  More often than not, people will think of the term and associate it with direct acts of volunteering—serving at a church soup kitchen, building a house for Habitat for Humanity, manning polls on Election Day.  Although volunteerism is a key aspect of civic engagement, the term actually encompasses so much more. Civic engagement includes social connectedness, political action, participating in a group or organization, and service, whether it is formal volunteering or informal service to others. 

Last week at the Marin Senior Information Fair I asked people passing by “Do you volunteer?”.  A good number of people said yes, that they volunteered for a local nonprofit, but many people responded that they did not; they were working and did not have the time.  The disproportionate number of “no” replies forced me to rethink not only about how I ask this question, but also  how we as a society respond to “Do you volunteer?”.  If we viewed volunteerism under the lens of civic engagement, the answer to this question would be a resounding yes.

This is a concept that is practiced here at the Center, which is one of the many reasons why I love working here.  Our Volunteer Services department recognizes that everyone volunteers in their own unique way, and they have worked to provide opportunities for each person.  Volunteerism can be helping out at 2 Flex projects a year, serving on a Marin nonprofit board for 2-3 hours a month, or working weekly with a nonprofit in your town.  Whatever way you decide to remain engaged is an act of volunteering.  So the next time someone asks you if you volunteer, I hope you will reply “Yes”.

To learn more about our programs and become involved, go to www.volunteermarin.org.

*To read the full report from the Corporation for National and Community Service and National Conference on Service, please go to http://civic.serve.gov/issuebrief.cfm.