“Why are we doing this in the first place?”: youth motivations, school environments, and volunteer experiences in a system of compulsory school-based volunteerism

Abstract

ABSTRACT Compulsory volunteerism is required in many countries, with the goal of building long-term capacities for service in adolescence, yet the policy may not necessarily result in volunteerism or civic engagement in adulthood. Little is also understood about different school-based volunteering environments and how they interact with youth volunteer motivations. We aimed to understand varied experiences of mandatory school-based volunteerism – resulting from interactions between youth motivations and school environments – using in-depth retrospective interviews with 50 young Singaporean adults. Findings indicated that schools’ volunteerism culture and practices intersected with and influenced youth volunteer motivations in important ways. Schools with a strong intrinsic culture of volunteerism provided high-quality experiences to benefit everyone, whereas youth in schools that were extrinsically or minimally focused on volunteerism often reinforced individuals’ extrinsic motivation or amotivation for volunteering. Because interactions of youth motivations and school environments resulted in different volunteer experiences, understanding how compulsory volunteerism can be better tailored may potentially raise rates of long-term service. This study has implications for best practices in schools that may make compulsory school-based volunteerism more beneficial for youth.