Mandatory Volunteerism

Mandatory volunteerism can benefit the community, however, requiring teens to do community service and forcing it upon them discourages them to do it voluntarily in the future. Knowing that they have already completed their way of giving back to their community during high school years, makes them not want to do more than they have to. In order to avoid "negative effects on student's intentions to volunteer freely in the future", the requirement for volunteering should either be removed or lowered according to Stukas, Synder, and Clary. After studying, researchers have found that in order to easily persuade people to volunteer is when they feel that "it is their free choice" or when they are "ready" to volunteer as adults instead of as teens (Stukas, Synder, and Clary). It is found that students would actually enjoy helping their community if the requirements for volunteering were not as harsh. A solution to this situation can be made if institutions designed programs that had "an element of choice" and were types of activities that would "allow students to combine personal interests and skills with the service requirements" according to the research published by Stukas, Synder, and Clary. If students were not forced to volunteer, they would want to do the job easily. If they were also interested in the activity they would freely want to join, work, and make a difference.