Volunteer Teaching Opportunities in NYC

One can find a wide variety of volunteering opportunities available in New York City - so many opportunities, in fact, that it can be difficult to decide where your own time and talents will be of best use to the community.

Volunteer teaching is one area where your efforts can have both an immediate, and a lasting positive effect on your community. One study from UCLA¹ found that educational volunteers are a significant resource in building a supportive, welcoming environment for learning and that they contribute to improved attendance, grades, test scores, social skills, and graduation and college enrollment rates.

Not only does volunteering help contribute to positive outcomes for students – but volunteering has also been proven to benefit those doing the volunteering. Another study², this one from the APA, found that volunteering for 200 hours per year resulted in lower incidents of hypertension, improved psychological well-being, and increased physical activity of volunteers.

New York City schools and students have a significant need for the skills and knowledge of concerned, compassionate adults in the community. Volunteer opportunities are currently available through community organizations including:

Art Start

When educational budgets are cut, often it is the arts programs that suffer the most. However, arts education has been shown time and again to improve academic performance, attendance and graduation rates³, and may even rewire the brain to create a lasting positive impact on motor skills, attention spans, and social and emotional development.

Art Start matches underserved students, ages 5-21, with mentor-instructors to forge relationships based on artistry, creativity, and imagination. Workshops are held on weekday evenings on subjects including visual arts, music, dance, theater, photography, gardening, and music recording.

If you are interested in volunteering with Art Start, learn more here.

InsideSchools

InsideSchools is a project of the New School’s Center for New York City Affairs, mostly focused on gathering information about schools and providing it to parents at no cost.InsideSchools is an educational advocacy program, dedicated to improving education by providing independent information about NYC public schools to parents. InsideSchools also provides a wealth of information on free after-school and summer enrichment programs available to public school students – information that may not be available or accessible to parents in other formats.

Click here for more information on getting involved with InsideSchools.

Girl Rising

Girl Rising offers many ways to get involved. Find out more about volunteer opportunities with Girl Rising here.Girl Rising is focused on improving opportunities for girls throughout the world to become educated, empowered, and to reach their full potential. Created in the belief that storytelling can have a long-term impact on social change, Girl Rising presents the stories of extraordinary girls in film, books, and other formats. The organization then partners with schools, governments, and non-profit organizations to make those stories heard, driving change from one community to the next.

Reading Partners

Reading Partners is an organization that works with underserved schools to provide individualized attention to early learners, to help them build literacy skills, as well as improving social-emotional development, persistence, self-control, and confidence.

In just one hour per week, a Reading Partners volunteer can tutor and mentor a student in need, helping them to gain critical foundational skills for a stable future of academic excellence.

For more information on becoming a Reading Partners volunteer, click here.

Girls Write Now

Girls Write Now matches female high school students with professional women with expertise in writing and digital media, working together in a mentoring relationship to build a portfolio of work for the girls.

Girls Write Now focuses on serving a traditionally underserved group of students: girls of color, immigrants, LGBT and non-conforming, and other girls who lack the support systems that can provide them with the support that can make all the difference to their confidence and their future.

Volunteer mentors may be established professionals or young writers with only a couple of years of experience. Mentor applications open on April 1. Explore mentor opportunities available through Girls Write Now.

Girls Who Code

Girls Who Code aim to close the gender gap in STEM education by providing computer science education in after-school clubs. Girls may attend after-school coding classes to help provide computer literacy skills and a love of technology from third grade on, laying the groundwork for technological competencies and future STEM careers.

Girls Who Code clubs are led by facilitators, many of whom are not technological experts themselves. Instead, the organization asks that potential facilitators are available 3-4 hours per week, dedicated to closing the STEM gender gap, and comfortable with learning and exploring technological concepts along with their students.

Learn more about Girls Who Code volunteer opportunities here.

Stuttering Association for the Young

SAY, the Stuttering Association for the Young, is a national organization that empowers and supports young people with summer camps, speech therapy, and creative expression workshops. SAY’s Confident Voices Program won the 2017 National Art and Humanities Youth Program Award, the nation’s top honor for creative youth development programs.

SAY is actively seeking volunteers with a variety of skills and interests, including events planners, administrative and office support, social media, and hands-on volunteers at events and programs. To learn more about volunteering with SAY, complete the volunteer form here.

As an educational volunteer, you can benefit your community in many ways. Not only can you help the underserved in your community build a variety of skills and abilities, but volunteering also helps to create a positive cycle of community building, which can last well beyond the actual time that is given. Further, volunteering benefits volunteers as well: helping to reduce stress, increase self-confidence, and combat depression; all the while contributing to an improved sense of purpose for the individual.

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Sources:

¹ http://smhp.psych.ucla.edu/pdfdocs/vols.pdf
² https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2013-21685-006
³ https://www.onlinecolleges.net/10-salient-studies-on-the-arts-in-education/