Volunteer and your Resume Forum

[CyanIdes Of March]

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[lhn5007]

On my resume, I don't denote specific hours but time frames: January 2012 - December 2012.

I volunteered for an entire year at a local hospital where I stated August 2010-August 2011. This was almost 200 hours of weekly 4-hour shifts. Also, I just began working with a nonprofit last month and will continue until the beginning of school next year so I just put June 2013 - Present.

I've had small volunteering opportunities (and am still considered a volunteer) at my city's LGBT community center. The hours aren't substantial at all but I thought this would help diversify my application and placed this under my Personal section.

[you'rethemannowdawg]

In the professional world, there is a pretty strong presumption of honesty for resumes. Employers will give you the benefit of the doubt. I would guess AdComms will too. That's because it's crucial for the hiring (admissions) process for applicants to honestly represent themselves. Because of that norm, the consequences for seeming to lie on a resume are severe (rejection, straight up ding, reputation tarnished.)

With that in mind, I would just put down whatever you are comfortable with. I wouldn't think there's anything wrong with putting those 2 months on your resume as long as you put down that it's two months and keep it open ended so they know you're continuing with it. Also, unless they ask for an hours requirement I don't think you need to provide it. Even if they do ask for hours, 2 weekends a month volunteering is better than 0 weekends per month.

Maybe have a separate section for "Volunteer Highlights" where you put down the short-term things you did and just not include a standard "June 2007-October 2008" timeframe. For example, I think I put on my resume that I participated in an AIDS walk, which only consisted of raising money and doing the walk, probably 6 total hours of work.

If you're wondering whether it's worth it to put down your volunteering, I would say it depends on how much space you have on the resume and which areas are strongest. It sounds like you think your volunteering experience is a valuable piece of our candidacy, so I'd put it down.

[PRgradBYU]

What is the general consensus for how long/how many hours you should have put into a volunteer organization to be able to legitimately put it on your resume? I plan on starting in an organization this weekend, and every subsequent weekend until this time next year, but I'll only have 2 months or so before I apply to law schools. Would you put 2 months worth on your resume?

Also, I have another program I've been involved in but the volunteer portion is pretty sporadic and short term. I want to put it on there because I just think it looks interesting and fits with everything in my app, but I'll only have 10 to 15 hours of actual volunteer work by app time. Should I just leave that off or is there a way to include that somehow?

Thanks!

To the extent that you're not being misleading or misrepresenting your experience, I don't see anything wrong with putting two months' worth of a volunteer experience on your resume. It probably doesn't warrant its own section, however; I imagine a short-term volunteer gig like that would be a good item to include in a bullet list (e.g., in an "Other Experiences" category or something like that).

[A. Nony Mouse]

Since they're ongoing commitments, I'd put each on, as something like, "Organization X, Volunteer: April 2013-Present" (or whatever formatting variation you like).

[bp shinners]

I'd be wary if this is your only volunteer experience. If I was reviewing a resume and saw nothing, then 2 months of volunteer experience right before law school applications were due, I'd think the volunteering was just to add a line to your resume.

If, however, there's a reason outside of law school applications you're doing this (such as it dovetailed from a research project), then get it on there.

[CyanIdes Of March]

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[dr123]

The majority of my volunteer work is through being a member of coalitions/committees but I just put the year(s), ex: (City) Homeless Coalition, Member (2010-2011).