In recent years, MLK Day has become a day of service, and as MLK Day approaches it always makes me consider the volunteer opportunities I my life. I am fortunate to be able to volunteer at my kids’ school and my synagogue’s religious school. I even coach my 7 year old son’s soccer team in the Fall and Spring – and as a non-soccer player, that one is pretty funny! But with two school age children and a husband who is an Elementary School principal, my personal passion to enhance education with technology leads to me often centering my volunteer time around education.
With so many amazing non-profit orgs in Boston, sometimes it is difficult to find just one meaningful volunteer opportunities that can also take advantage of my skills, but I feel lucky to have connected with a few groups that I can contribute to and that leave me feeling very fulfilled — and I’d like to highlight a few:
- Generation Citizen– Providing all students with an education in Action Civics. Action Civics provides students with the knowledge and skills necessary to participate in our democracy as active citizens. GC envisions a country of young people working as active and effective citizens to collectively rebuild our American democracy.
- VOLUNTEER to speak to a class, judge at Civics Day or attend the Civic Tech Challenge.
- Museum of Science– Ensuring students receive science and engineering education through innovative exhibits and events like the recent Science Behind Pixar exhibit.
- VOLUNTEER at a special event like Computer Science Education Week or support the museum with your expertise through a task force focused on Technology, Food, etc.
- Youth Cities– Teaching students about entrepreneurship by engaging local startup founders, venture capitalists and other entrepreneurs in our community and teaching them how to build a business.
- VOLUNTEER by becoming a mentor or attending the March to May bootcamp concluding event to hear more about the student projects.
- EdVestors– Improving urban education with a focus on Boston Public Schools. The work of EdVestors focuses on delivering dramatically improved educational outcomes for all students.
- VOLUNTEER by attending the Seed Fund Showcase or School on the Move event to support the org and the innovative schools in their network.
- Resilient Coders– Teaching young people from traditionally underserved communities to code, creating skilled workers, increasing diversity in the tech industry and filling the pipeline for the tech industry.
- VOLUNTEER as a mentor to RC students or to speak to a cohort of students during a bootcamp. You can also hire Resilient Coders to for technical projects like building web sites or apps.
This list is just a start. I hope you will share your favorite organizations where you spend your time @asprung or in the comments below. Happy volunteering!
