Is it my imagination or are volunteers less forthcoming these days?

[Limesaregreen]

Have name changed. My youngest has left school now but I still get the odd call to 'help out'. Now when they were at school I was more than happy to help out, sat on the PTA at both primary and secondary, extra pair of hands on school trips, sports trips, school concerts, cycle proficiency etc. etc. as did loads of the other Mums and Dads whether they worked or not.
After my youngest left nursery, I heard that certain things that used to happen, no longer did in the same way (nursery eventually closed as no-one volunteered to be on the committee to run it). Cycling proficiency no longer happened after youngest left school as no-one wanted to get involved. Very few school trips seem to happen now and high school is struggling to get people to help for prom night and end of year show (hence the call).
I've said I'm not available. I've done my time and moved on and feel no guilt about that, it's for current parents to step up to the mark. But is this the new norm now??? What's it like for those still with kids at various ages in school??

@Kite22 It was me who posted that. I think I’m maybe especially sensitive to it because both DP and I have small families (no animosity, just tiny) and DD is an only with no cousins. We know she’ll rely on friends and community networks as she grows up, and are working extremely hard to build these - volunteering, getting to know neighbours, attending church, signing her up for Rainbows etc, offering open house for play dates, happy to take friends on holiday with us in future etc - but we’ve noticed that many people have turned inwards since the pandemic, and are content spending time with just immediate family.

We’ve deliberately chosen a school for DD that is extremely active and engaged with the local community, has lots of events, has a Brownies/Cubs unit attached (church school) etc, and I’ve already offered my services volunteering in the classroom (trained teacher). But there’s another recently opened free school up the road that markets itself as somewhere you can literally drop your child off at 8am and pick them up at 6pm, with virtually zero engagement beyond that - no PTA (big legacy fund so not needed); no whole school events; volunteers; drop off at the gate and so on. Their entire ethos is based around optimising results for the individual pupils, rather than embedding those pupils within a wider community. I’m so glad DD isn’t going there.

Does nobody actually enjoy any voluntary stuff they do...?

Ive loathed some aspects of some roles ( everything about every committee, ever, and pta shite). But other voluntary things have been great(toddler groups, community garden, wierd circus group, craft circle). I work FT and have primary-aged DC and parent in a care home, so generally drop the stuff I hate.

Does nobody actually enjoy any voluntary stuff they do...?

I do.
I guess most of us do, or we wouldn't continue doing it.

I love my volunteering! I do think the right training, support and flexibility matters. Volunteering for a national museum means I can sign up for shifts well in advance, and a variety of roles means some are weekdays, some evenings, some weekends, some short, some long. I really admire people who take on the sort of volunteering commitments that require much more, running PTAs or Guides or whatever - but there are other, more boundaried ways to donate a few hours a month at a time that suits you, for those who cannot.

I'm a Brownie Leader. I've been in Guiding pretty much since I was 10 and am in my late 30s now. I love the meetings with the girls, and the trips away. I do not love the ever-increasing amounts of paperwork, especially for anything remotely exciting outside the unit meeting place. But I think my perspective is very different because I've been involved such a long time - I know the ropes, I know how the programme works, and I've seen hundreds of girls benefiting over the years. I think the barriers to getting started for someone "fresh" to the organisation at my age, would seem very complex.

And yes, I work (not FT but ~30hrs/week) and have two young DSs (5 & 3). I try not to bring them to meetings with me as they mess around and distract me and the Brownies.

We are pretty lucky with our parents in terms of having enough of them who will volunteer for an occasional evening or event. But we have already lost one adult leader, and will lose another in September, and finding someone able/willing to make the regular commitment is much harder.

My DSs have been on the waiting list for Beavers since they were babies, so I very much hope they'll get a place one day. I've already had e-mails from the waiting list manager asking if I can volunteer - I've said I am happy to help out occasionally or for events/trips, but can't do another weekly commitment. This is the one downside for me of having boys - if they were girls we'd be sorted for Brownies etc!

That's interesting about scouting. All of my kids are scouts in Italy and they don't want any parent volunteers!

This. It's a shame.

I think one issue with volunteering is that you are almost thought worse of if you volunteer for a while and then stop, than if you never volunteer. So people do the latter.

Or they may be volunteering for other things. I was a school governor but didn't help at PTA events. And now I volunteer for parkrun and England Athletics so wouldn't volunteer for other things.

I've also noticed that my work has a lot more "non core" activities that I'm involved in like our Womens group and Mental Health work. Once I'm finished I don't have the band width to do anything else.

Less time available especially midweek as both parents work.

Less inclination to help out (there's definitely a matching vibe to parents of the "snowflake generation" DCs - who don't see that they should have to wash up even their OWN dirty dishes when away on Cub camp...and those same parents will never do their once a year turn for 2 hours standing on shore while Cubs do boating so all leaders can be on the water with them).

Much more bureaucracy - garda vetting (which needs to be done individually for each separate organisation, it can't be transferred across to others), safeguarding training, first aid training, .....and general paperwork to fill in for each activity and in the background too.....

Between school, an external committee attached to school, Cubs, another sporting activity as a major organiser, being a person who regularly pitched in on a few others and more generally, I have done a lot of volunteering and continue to do so. But I notice there is definitely a reduction in the numbers of people willing to take on voluntary roles whether as a once off event or ongoing involvement in something. Even something as simple as putting out and taking back to the shed the goals, equipment and balls for training and matches. And it's not always the same people, but there is definitely also an increase in the expectation of some parents that things will happen - and why are the activities not of a sufficient standard or happen often enough for their darlings. (Funnily enough, a lot of parents and DCs seem to think that all activities involve paid coaches/leaders - and they are very surprised to know that I don't get paid for any of the things I do - some of which involve significant responsibility and additional training!).

Yes I agree with your first point.

I volunteer with a national helpline and during the pandemic lots of older volunteers had to step away for health protection. No problem, lots of us stepped up and did extra, alongside working from home and homeschooling.

The result was that lots of us got completely burnt out after a year and needed to step back a bit. Then we had to listen to retirees on comfortable pensions with no childcare issues berating us for our lack of service. I made some very direct points at that AGM!

And I'll add - the pandemic changed the types of callers we were getting. Not in the middle of it but at the tail end when people seemed to have lost their bearings on how to live in the world. More hoax callers, more sex callers, more drunk callers, more very, very mentally ill people who are being spectacularly failed by the NHS and call to scream abuse at us because they can't see a GP or Psychiatrist. The role itself became less enjoyable. I've had more shifts where I've resented being away from family and hobbies. If it doesn't improve I'll be stepping away and giving my time to local organisation. No organisation is owed my time unpaid. But tbh I feel like the pandemic has accelerated a social decline that was already happening.

Except all the volunteers are also DBS checked and have been for years...
The Scout association pay for them to be done
ANYONE that has a clean dbs may just never have been caught.
Lazy stereotypes help no one.
Please stop it.

@Overthebow almost every volunteer I work with holds down a job too 🙄. Most of them full time.

I hope that all of these busy people with no time to volunteer 🙄 never send their kids to activities that require volunteers. That would be gross hypocrisy.

(And yes I do mean all those parents who drop off at rugby/football/scouts/guides and can’t wait to get away claiming they have “no time” when they just can’t be arsed. And the laziest ones are usually the whingiest too 🤬).

well good for them that they have time to volunteer. I don’t. They don’t have the same job or lives as me.

I hope that all of these busy people with no time to volunteer 🙄 never send their kids to activities that require volunteers. That would be gross hypocrisy.

I don’t, no. I’m happy to pay for the time of the staff for my DCs activities, I wouldn’t expect them to do it for free.

Then they can’t go to cubs/brownies as the leaders are always unpaid.

And no school discos, fairs, trips either

I co-chair my ds10 school PSA. I also work full time, am not in the best health myself and have a toddler.

However, I feel I am contributing something important and can see the difference we are making for our children. It is so hard to get volunteers though - we've cancelled a major event due to lack of volunteers recently. It's really sad and we do say there's no commitment, just help us for 1 hour on 1 single event as it all makes a difference, but still we get very little support. I've actually now run out of ideas for getting any volunteers!

Also the critics on the events we do run... who invariably won't step up to help!

@Overthebow of course not, you’re obviously the busiest person ever.

The idea that only SAHPs can volunteer is such nonsense. And all those activities I listed don’t pay their leaders. I hope you check these things before expecting other volunteers to provide you with free childcare.

Honestly, I miss volunteering.
The big grin on a shy, quiet cub's face when they have finally reached the top of the climbing wall, how proud they look when they get their silver award, trying to get them all out of bed after a night hike for the next fun activity, the sense of humour, the endless fart jokes...

I just can't imagine giving up that sort of time again though.

Maybe when I retire, if Scouts hasn't been totally ballsed up by bullshit policy.

@pudseypie the most successful way we found to get volunteers for school events was to allocate bits of the events to individual classes. The parents were more likely to know each other so clubbed together to provide a rota for their “section”. It’s immensely frustrating though. I had parents proudly boast to me that they’d never volunteer for anything and didn’t know why I did it 🙄. Arsholes. If everyone did a little bit then those of us who do help wouldn’t be so exhausted and run ragged. So many selfish people in the world 🤷‍♀️.

I'm really lucky that I work part-time and my youngest is now 8, so I can do stuff for the PTA. Our current chair and her DH both work ft in demanding jobs and is currently picking up supplies for our summer fair.

My DH is a coach for a sport (volunteer) and this takes at least 9 hours a week. He couldn't do it last week and asked any available parents to hang about to help the other coach to set up. He had lots of offers, but on the day, no one turned up. It's shite.

A lot of the problem with volunteering is that you say you will help for a set amount of time and then you are asked to do more and more.

I have quite an important volunteer role at my local Parish Church as no one wanted to do it, I didn't realise quite how much time and how much responsibility it required, but have carried on doing it, as well as being on other committees within the Church. However I was quite annoyed last week when I heard someone complaining that I don't often attend Church Services - well if I didn't spend so much time 'working for free' then I might have more time to attend! (Plus I wasn't a regular attendee before I took on the role so they knew what they were getting).

they won’t go to cubs/brownies as I don’t like the organisation.

I would actually volunteer at things like school discos when they’re in school, but they’re not yet.