DofE volunteering

[Grandprixmad]

My DD is 13 & just starting her Bronze DofE (she's 14 in April). She's looking for volunteering opportunities, she's interested in art & animals & not very sporty. A local charity shop was advertising for DofE volunteers, so we enquired, but they said she's too young. She could volunteer at our local park run but I'm just wondering what other options there might be.
What sort of thing did your DD/DS volunteer to do?

Mine helped at a kids club at church

There is a list of possibilities on the DofE website
dofe.org/thelatest/volunteering-ideas/

Have you asked at an animal shelter?

DS volunteered at a club for adults with disabilities. He helped run the snack bar. He really enjoyed it too, and they were lovely to him

Our local animal shelter has loads of d of e volunteers.

Helped at scouts, walked neighbour's dog.

Brownies!

We're a bit stuck for this section. Doesn't want to commit a whole evening to helping at brownies/scouts and has a number of extra curricular herself.

She's said she's interested in medicine but I don't think you can volunteer at a doctors/hospital as an under 16?

I think we will endup with an online counting animals/conversations project but that may get quite boring.

Some people locally do litter picking with an organisation so you can record hours etc.

It's really quite difficult. Quite a lot of places won't allow volunteers under sixteen for insurance reasons.

Finding an opportunity where there are already children gets round this. Like Brownies or helping at a sport they already participate in.

DD started volunteering at the Beavers at the Scout group she is an Explorer, it also counts for the Chief Scout award, she actually never did DoE in the end.

A friend volunteers at a riding stable who caters for disabled riders, again, started 2 years ago and still continues.

We have an animal sanctuary who takes DoE volunteers.

If she does any sport, are there any other classes she could help out? Another of DD's friends helped with the baby ballet class where she did modern dance.

Library? Although I think ours takes from 15.

My dd volunteered at rainbows. It was a local group for an hour a week.

My daughter was a social media volunteer for St John ambulance. This suited her as she could do it in her own time and she had been having difficulty finding something that fitted in with everything else she was doing!
https://stjohnambulancejersey.com/build/img/headers/social_media_volunteering_aap.pdf
For her silver she helped to coach an u12 football team.

My ds is a volunteer young leader at Beavers.

After school club at a local primary school

Barnardo's takes them from 14.

As she is interested in medicine, perhaps ask your local hospice if they have any tasks she could do for them. (It wouldn't actually be dealing with the patients), She could for example use her art skills to do paintings for them to display/sell to raise funds, or help with weeding the gardens, or make crafty things for them to use in a tombola/raffle prize.

St John ambulance cadets is good for anyone interested in medicine/first aid.

They can go on duties with adults (volunteering) and also help out with the younger groups.

Local library

Community/school farm if you have one near you.