I need to do a 2-3 hour volunteer service project TONIGHT

December 2, 2008 8:27 PM

I need to do 2-3 hours of volunteer service TONIGHT. Got any ideas/projects for me?

Hi, I'm a first-semester candidate for my university's accounting club (Beta Alpha Psi) and our club has a 10 hours/semester service requirement for all members. I still need about 2 hours, and we are allowed to count up to 2.5 "non-Beta" hours towards the requirement. Unfortunately, I mistakenly thought that I had until the end of the semester (December 13) and signed up for a charity walk this weekend, but the officers just sent out an email this evening stating that all of our hours have to be turned in by noon tomorrow to be counted. :(

So I need to complete a 2-3 hour service project TONIGHT. I am seeking something that I can work on from home because it seems unlikely that I can find a legitimate local (Las Vegas) charity that could/would put a walk-in volunteer to work immediately tonight -- most organizations want volunteers to sign up in advance, go through some sort of orientation, etc.

Here are my skills and resources that I could apply to a work-at-home project tonight:
- Internet and online library database research
- Data entry and transcription
- Writing and editing
- Bookkeeping and basic accounting
- Microsoft Word, Excel, and PowerPoint, at an intermediate skill level. I have Office 2007 Student version. I can save files as 2007, 2003, or PDF.
- QuickBooks, at an intermediate skill level. I don't have it installed on my home computer so you would have to be a QuickBooks Online user for me to be able to help you.
- Basic statistics/econometrics (I can do statistical analysis in Excel up to running simple multiple regressions with Analysis ToolPak)
- General administrative assistant tasks

Most of my work and volunteer experience is actually in management and leadership roles, but I can't think of how to use those skills on a short project from a distance. However, you can take it as evidence that I am a responsible self-starter and don't require a lot of direction or oversight.

I don't know how permissive the club's standards are for what counts as an acceptable charity, so I want to error on the conservative side to ensure that it will count. Thus, I am looking for a charity that is:
- Formally organized/legally recognized
- Secular
- Non-political
- Human services-oriented
Past club service activities this semester have been for homelessness, hunger, developmental disabilities, and cancer, so ideally I'd like to work for a similar cause since I already know those are OK.

I am going to need a credible reference that I actually did the work. They verify non-Beta hours, and I'm sure that they will be skeptical of hours reported at the last minute (I know I would!) and thus I expect that they will check into this more stringently than usual. So, ideally, whoever will provide the reference that I did the work is listed on the charity's website somewhere, or contactable through an email address at the charity's domain name, or reachable via the charity's listed telephone number, or something like that.

So... anybody out there have some small projects that I can do for your charity tonight? You'll get 2-3 hours of volunteer work from a reasonably competent, resourceful, responsible person, and I'll get to advance from initiate to candidate in Beta Alpha Psi! (This is very important to me because accounting club participation is key to getting a job upon graduation.) Let's exchange MeFi Mail with our contact info, verify that we are each for real, and chat about what you need and what I can do for you.

If anyone has any other ideas on how I can get this done tonight, I'd welcome your suggestions.

Thanks!!!

posted by Jacqueline to education (9 comments total)

Just realized after posting that "2-3" might be misread -- that's 2 to 3 hours, not 23 hours. :)
posted by Jacqueline at 8:28 PM on December 2, 2008

Having worked with a similar requirement, you may be able to ask one of the coordinators for an exemption (explain your situation). Failing that, honestly? Make something up, and then go to your charity walk later.
posted by sonic meat machine at 8:55 PM on December 2, 2008

You could write articles on wikipedia. I would make sure it's a non-trivial subject (i.e. don't write trivia on your favourite tv show).

Also, a google search of "virtual volunteering" showed up other ways to volunteer online. Here's a place to search for online volunteer opportunities.

Here's a proposal that they wanted edited and re-written. If your a good writer why not take this on?
posted by If only I had a penguin... at 9:06 PM on December 2, 2008

Write letters for Amnesty International. You can even use the templates they have. Remember, international postage is 94 cents. Writing to all these cases (probably about 50 or so) could take two hours if you personally wrote some letters.

Priority Cases
Urgent Action Network
Freedom Writers Network
Holiday Card Action
posted by ALongDecember at 9:07 PM on December 2, 2008

Are they still tagging old Metatalk posts? Contact a mod to see if you can do that as volunteer work.
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 9:08 PM on December 2, 2008 [1 favorite]

Regarding Amnesty: there's also a lot of email actions you can send online, though some of these are more political.

And verification for the Amnesty work? Save a copy of each letter and hand them the stack if they ask. Or if you mail at the post office, save a receipt from the post office.
posted by ALongDecember at 9:14 PM on December 2, 2008

If you knit or crochet (I know you don't mention this in your post, but you might have left it out), take a look at these charities. You can donate afghans, caps, scarves, etc. to a wide range of groups, from chemo patients to premature babies to the homeless or families in crisis or even Afghanis.
posted by fuzzbean at 10:22 PM on December 2, 2008

Are there any festivals or events happening where you are? Often volunteers drop out at the last minute and you may be able to get an opening, even if it's something really simple like being a rover.
posted by divabat at 11:48 PM on December 2, 2008

Thanks for all the suggestions! I am working on this:
http://www.nabuur.com/en/village/khandbari/project/task/research-internet-places-link-or-post-information-about-sesf

That nabuur.com virtual volunteering site is really neat!
posted by Jacqueline at 12:01 AM on December 3, 2008