Do your DC do volunteering work?

[PooshTun]

At the breakfast table this morning I was reading my local paper and I came across an ad for the volunteering services centre. On the xth a number of local charity groups will be at y to sign on teenage volunteers for the summer. Volunteering, goes the ad, can 'help your child boost their cv and personal statement'.

I accept that many people volunteer because they are genuine. However, I am cynical enough to believe that some parents include volunteering as part of a strategy to build an impressive cv for their DCs.

Is anyone brave enough to own up to the latter?

And do Uni admission panels really attach any weight to this?

I mean, we use to laugh at Miss World contestants who go on about their charity work with Third World children while dressed in a £1,000+ gown.

My year 6 dd volunteers to help out with the baby class at her ballet. She does it entirely because she loves dealing with that age, and they love her too. I doubt she's ever had a thought of a CV, and she was the one who asked if she could do it.

Don't know much about the value of volunteering to high-end DCs aimi9ng at top unis, but I work with SEN / behaviour kids and it is very useful to them.

We try to find them volunteer roles through which they can demonstrate relaibility, self-discipline & committment. Its not easy for them, they often need a lot of support & quite a lot of them fail. But most of them adapt to a world of work, turn up regularly & on time, don't hit other people or steal things and eventually achieve enough esteem in their own eyes and other peoples to get offered proper paid work.

To be honest, successfully completing a year of one day a week volunteering or unpaid work experience (and the companies who provide this do a hell of a lot for these kids) is much more useful than a handful of low grade GCSEs.

I agree with DeWe that a lot of it is because people want to as well. We used to help out with younger classes at school and my children have duties at school with younger ones. It's very good for them as they get older to have that sense of responsibility. Employers will also always want the child who was head boy or a prefect etc. as schools tend to choose those very well.

poosh - i'm sure this 'thread' or whatever they call it is dead - and i don't even know/remember how i found this (bored again!) but that was just about the funniest thing i've read on mumsnet. and i work in comedy.

Haven't read all the posts (not once I realised this was started in June...), but couldn't help being amused that anyone would think that any City institution is going to be interested in "genuine" volunteering. What use is a hard-core conscience to working in the City?... Volunteering for the purpose of showing how many hoops you are willing to jump through to sound better than your opponents and to demonstrate awareness of the importance of good PR is just what they are looking for. I would have thought it would count against you if you admitted to volunteering purely because your conscience told you to - you'd be more likely to be asked why you hadn't applied for jobs working for charities, instead...