When was the last time you volunteered? Always wanted to volunteer, but don’t know where to start? Not to worry! Just check out my short guide on online volunteering portals in Singapore, which are easy-to-use and will help you find a suitable opportunity in no time.
Gone are the days when volunteering meant holding a tin can and loitering around the MRT station pestering passers-by for donations. There are actually many meaningful and interesting ways to volunteer and with so many Voluntary Welfare Organisations (VWOs) in Singapore, they would be more than happy to receive a helping hand from you. So the next time you’re idling around on a Saturday and want to make better use of your time, check out these portals below to find a volunteering opportunity that catches your interest.
Giving.sg
I briefly mentioned Giving.sg before in my previous post on “Crowdfunding Part 2”. Giving.sg is a fundraising and volunteering portal created by the National Volunteer & Philanthropy Centre. It is part of the nationwide SG Cares movement, which aims to cultivate and increase volunteerism among individuals and businesses in Singapore. The movement hopes to strengthen our social fabric, build our community spirit and support, and boost our social capital.
Giving.sg’s volunteering portal has filters for ad hoc or regular volunteering, type of cause, number of openings, suitability, skills and distance – which help you find the perfect volunteering match. They offer various interesting opportunities, like gift wrapping, landscape and farm maintenance, exercise class assistant and children’s camp videographer, so there is surely something for everyone’s interests.
Creatives for Causes
Have a flair for writing, designing, photography or social media? Creatives for Causes offers skill-based volunteering opportunities and connects NGOs with creatives in Singapore who can do pro bono work for them. Creatives help NGOs to raise their social media profile and increase their reach to gain more volunteers and donors. Additionally, creatives can receive freelance assignments from start-ups, SMEs and businesses. Founded in 2012, Take a look at the short clip below to see how it works:
Creatives for Causes 30s Animation from Kevin Ng Jia Quan 吴佳铨 on Vimeo
Youth Corps Singapore
Lastly, Youth Corps is a volunteering platform and community specially for youths in Singapore aged 16-35. It was created by the government after Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong’s 2013 National Day Rally speech to “provide more support and opportunities to young Singaporeans to contribute to the community” (Straits Times, 2013). It brings together passionate and like-minded youths to lead meaningful service learning projects. The portal offers various ad-hoc, regular and project-based community service opportunities and focuses on causes like education, health, special needs, arts and sports.
After learning about the various volunteering portals in Singapore, are you feeling inspired? Hopefully you have seen that volunteering can be fun and easy to start, and you can bring your friends and family along too.
To link it back to COM125 and the Internet, online volunteering portals demonstrate the power of Internet platforms to bring together a large number of people to contribute towards a common purpose. They make it more convenient, accessible and easier for charities and project leaders to post volunteer openings and for volunteers to find suitable opportunities. By pooling together resources and creating centralised portals, these platforms help the spirit of volunteerism to grow in Singapore.
Cyber for Good 