ESRC-IVR-Birkbeck Seminar 17th March 2011 This was the third in our series on youth volunteering which aims to foster exchange between academic research and policy and practice. This presentation was by Professor Clare Holdsworth, Keele University Find out more on the IVR website: http://www.ivr.org.uk/ivr-events/ivr-past-events/ivr-esrc-ivr-birkbeck-seminar-3

1. SCHOOL OF PHYSICAL AND GEOGRAPHICAL SCIENCES
Win, win, win?
A critical perspective on student
volunteering
Clare Holdsworth
Economic and Social Research Council,
Institute for Volunteering Research and
Birkbeck, University of London Policy Seminar
Thursday 17th March 2011

2. SCHOOL OF PHYSICAL AND GEOGRAPHICAL SCIENCES
Student Volunteering
• Empirical and theoretical basis
• Volunteering England
• IVR: Georgina Brewis (Birkbeck)
• National Coordinating Centre for Public Engagement
vinspired students programme
• University of Liverpool in collaboration with Jocey
Quinn (Plymouth)
• Impacts
• Challenges

3. SCHOOL OF PHYSICAL AND GEOGRAPHICAL SCIENCES
Who Volunteers?
• Pluralistic
• Volunteering rates from 15% to 63%
• Student experience at HE more important
than socio-economic background

4. SCHOOL OF PHYSICAL AND GEOGRAPHICAL SCIENCES
% Students Volunteer by Social Class and
Type of HEI: 2006-7
0
2
4
6
8
10
12
14
16
18
20
Managerial and
Professional
Intermediate
Occupations
Routine and Manual
Occupations
%ofstudentswhovolunteer
Highest tariff
High Tariff
Medium Tariff
Lower Tariff
Source: Futuretrack 2006 HECSU and University of Warwick n= 33303

5. SCHOOL OF PHYSICAL AND GEOGRAPHICAL SCIENCES
% Students volunteering by ethnic
group: 2006-07
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
Asian Black White Mixed Other
Highest tariff
High Tariff
Medium Tariff
Lower Tariff
Source: Futuretrack 2006 HECSU and University of Warwick n= 33303

6. SCHOOL OF PHYSICAL AND GEOGRAPHICAL SCIENCES
Students involvement in
‘charity/community’ society: 2006-07
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
Highest Tariff High Tariff Medium Tariff Lower Tariff
University-based
Off Campus
Total participation
rate = 16%
Source: Futuretrack 2006 HECSU and University of Warwick n= 33303

7. SCHOOL OF PHYSICAL AND GEOGRAPHICAL SCIENCES
Changes over time
• Shifts in organisational structures
• Missions, work-camps, SCA, university-brokerage
and social enterprise
• Diversity of student population
• Localised study
• Articulation of student experience
• ‘a degree is not enough anymore’

8. SCHOOL OF PHYSICAL AND GEOGRAPHICAL SCIENCES
Impacts of volunteering
• Subjective
• New skills, meeting people
• Having fun
• Helping out, making a difference
• Reinforce or resist student identity
• Wider impacts?
• Employability, community relations and social
justice

9. SCHOOL OF PHYSICAL AND GEOGRAPHICAL SCIENCES
Win/win/win
• Can volunteering bring together different
interest groups?
• students, local communities and universities
• Pluralistic nature of volunteering equates with
wide range of motivations
• Deconstructive and reproductive volunteering

10. SCHOOL OF PHYSICAL AND GEOGRAPHICAL SCIENCES
Working with others
• Volunteering with Homeless men:
• So you don’t want to go in there, oh yeah we’re
students, we’ve got this, we’ve got that, because it’s
not fair, that’s not what you’re there for, like you’re
there to be equal.
• Art mentor at local college
• And I think like university is the last thing on their
minds, not that it’s the only option for later
life, because quite like, people obviously like, it’s not
meant for everyone, but I don’t know, just with their
talents it seems like they should do something with it.

11. SCHOOL OF PHYSICAL AND GEOGRAPHICAL SCIENCES
Bridging communities
Volunteer organiser Royal British Legion:
I mean we are trying of course to encourage
more and more young people to come into Poppy
into the British Legion and I think that probably
you know by seeing the students there
actually, or the younger people actually working
with us, it would probably give them some
encouragement to say yeah, the Legion isn’t just
a, you know a drinking man’s club and you know
blazers and badges and standard bearers. I think
they would see probably a different face, a
different light.

12. SCHOOL OF PHYSICAL AND GEOGRAPHICAL SCIENCES
Normalisation of volunteering
• Students distinguished by what they don’t do
rather than how they participate in activities:
“It’s just like another thing for students that you
know we have to do now isn’t it? Work, work
experience, volunteer, all these things for the
university”

13. SCHOOL OF PHYSICAL AND GEOGRAPHICAL SCIENCES
Challenges
• Keeping volunteering ‘special’
• Enfranchising its unique contribution?
• Volunteering journey
• Habitual practice
• Articulate volunteering and social justice
• Socially literate graduate labour force?
• Student involvement
• Students more dissatisfied with organisation?