Does your child's school track your volunteer hours?

[redshoes]

My sons' school requires 30 hours of volunteer work a year for each family. I have been put in charge of "building a better mousetrap" in regards to keeping track of these hours for all of the families in the school. Currently it's done through a clipboard sign in sheet at the front office and then a small group of volunteers who log them into a master Excel spreadsheet. Sadly, this previous year lots of errors were made and the end result was families that are frustrated that their time was not being counted. I'm trying to get ideas of how other schools do it in order to see what works. Does your school have a system that works well for them?

 

[NotUrsula]

How about a timeclock? Those are pretty fool-proof.

 

[merekc]

I'm curious, what happens if a family fails to meet the expected amount of time? Is there really a need to improve the system or is it more of an honorary thing?

I'm not flaming or criticizing, but the reason I ask is it seems difficult to require families to volunteer time. It is an interesting concept to me that a family would be required to volunteer and to the extent that people want to also "trap" them on tracking the hours.

Interesting....

 

[NotUrsula]

At our school, part of your tuition is paid in volunteer time. If you don't get it done, they send you a bill. It's a way to keep down tuition increases for families that are short on funds.

 

[merekc]

I'm thinking low-tech and cheap since I'm sure people want changes but there is probably no budget being directed towards it.

What about instead of clipboard have a binder (or two...A-M, N-Z). Each family has it's own sheet, in alphabetical order. They flip to their sheet document the necessary info, then someone just needs to total the hours at the bottom of each sheet. You could even have a set form that includes date, times, amount of time that day and running total of time for family so no one has to total just review.

Hope this helps.

 

[lovepurple]

At my son's school you log in to the computer at the office when you sign in and log off when you leave. I think it is similar to a timeclock but it is on the computer. I'm not sure what software they use, but it looks really simple. Nothing fancy.

 

[redshoes]

I'm curious, what happens if a family fails to meet the expected amount of time? Is there really a need to improve the system or is it more of an honorary thing?

I'm not flaming or criticizing, but the reason I ask is it seems difficult to require families to volunteer time. It is an interesting concept to me that a family would be required to volunteer and to the extent that people want to also "trap" them on tracking the hours.

Interesting....

When we enrolled our sons in the school, part of our contract with the school was to complete the volunteer hours. You are on your honor to complete those hours. If you don't do it, your student is still allowed to attend the school. There's no real punishment for not doing your time. When you have completed your time, you are sent a email saying you have reached your 30 hours and that's the end of it. If you want to continue volunteering great, but you don't have to log your hours anymore. It's a charter school, so all after school activities and other big events are ran strictly through volunteer hours. I guess it's a case of the school not wanting all the same parents doing all the work and the other parents obtaining the benefits of their work with out putting any effort into to the school themselves. I will be honest and tell you that at times it seems like a competition to see who can get the most hours between some parents. All the volunteer hours do benefit the school directly so although it's rather petty to try and one up each other, the outcome is positive.

 

[amid chaos]

Last year our local VIPS (Volunteers in the Public schools) logged over 40,000 hours in our small community. We have had to get creative to make sure everyone from parents, community members, administration and students log their hours.

At the elementary school we have a notebook, every volunteer has a page and they personally log their hours.

We find that the students prefer technology to log their hours...LOL. We have a gmail address that they can easily remember and can leave a message with their hours anytime. A staff member checks and log their hours.

 

[aprilgail2]

My sons' school requires 30 hours of volunteer work a year for each family.

I have to LOL at this! REQUIRING 30 hours makes it no longer voluntary- its forced LOL...when you volunteer you do it of your own free will with no requirements LOL.

I have never heard of a school requiring volunteer work per family though, in Jr high they want each kid to do 10 hours per school year and they get extra credit if they do.

 

[Cindy B]

My kids school requires hours for graduations.. I think my daughter has already logged 30 hours so far this summer-- and she started July 1.

Basically the timekeeping is the clipboard and Excel system. However, I am pretty sure that one or two people (usually PTO moms) do this.

 

[mamacatnv]

My DD attends a Charter School - we do not have a parent requirement but we do pay fees. The fee's were instituted when parents either balked at the hours or didn't fullfill their obligations.

How about a basic 2 part receipt book - the volunteer fills it out and takes the top copy for their records and the bottom copy stays for the person doing the input.

 

[hrh_disney_queen]

I have to LOL at this! REQUIRING 30 hours makes it no longer voluntary- its forced LOL...when you volunteer you do it of your own free will with no requirements LOL.

I have never heard of a school requiring volunteer work per family though, in Jr high they want each kid to do 10 hours per school year and they get extra credit if they do.

The Charter schools in our city require a minimum volunteer hours. It's probalby one of the reasons it is run so well and has a waiting list for 3X as many applications as there are slots. I guess if the family doesn't complete their hours (40 hours per family) the child is not eligible to return the next year.

 

[mamacatnv]

Our school also has an extensive waiting list - there were several elementary grades that so far have not had a single opening for the coming school year due to returning students.

 

[joviroxx]

We have 25 hours to do per family. In our school, each homeroom has a "volunteer hours coordinator". When we volunteer, we have voucher slips that are signed by either the teacher or whoever is in charge of the volunteer activity (library, lunch, etc). These vouchers are handed in to your homeroom teacher and are forwarded to the coordinator who keeps track of your hours. Half way into the school year, we usually receive an update of hours registered.

In case of more than 1 child, your oldest child's homeroom is the one you turn in the vouchers to. It seems to work well. I usually make copies of the vouchers just in case but have only had to use them 1 time in 5 years.

 

[pyrxtc]

yes, we have a sign in/out sheet in the office and hopefully you remember to do this. There also name tags to wear while in the school and you must be fingerprinted to volunteer for anything that is around students.

We have a small school of 284 kids and had volunteer hours last year of over 6,000 hours that was logged in.

 

[GJM]

I have to LOL at this! REQUIRING 30 hours makes it no longer voluntary- its forced LOL...when you volunteer you do it of your own free will with no requirements LOL.

I agree with this statement -

Is this a public school? Our school doesn't really keep track of hours, and it is the same people that do volunteer. I would hate is our school required us to do a certain amount of hours - some people just can't do it, with jobs, smaller children and other commitments they may have.

 

[redshoes]

I agree with this statement -

Is this a public school? Our school doesn't really keep track of hours, and it is the same people that do volunteer. I would hate is our school required us to do a certain amount of hours - some people just can't do it, with jobs, smaller children and other commitments they may have.

No, it's a charter school. So when I put my oldest on the waiting list, I knew that was what I was signing up for. The nice thing about this school, is there is a list of volunteer opportunities that can be done at home without actually setting foot in the school.

 

[tigger813]

I was a teacher for 7 years in another district and was only able to volunteer once a year due to my schedule. What do they do with families like that? I volunteered this year weekly in my daughter's class and helped out additional times when possible.

 

[Pigeon]

No, we don't have coerced parent labor in our district.

 

[SKWDW]

My sons' school requires 30 hours of volunteer work a year for each family. I have been put in charge of "building a better mousetrap" in regards to keeping track of these hours for all of the families in the school. ...

Here are two suggestions for Volunteer Management Software.

The EZAnalyze TimeTracker is a macro-enabled Excel workbook designed to perform note-keeping and time-tracking functions, and generate reports easily for accountability and improved service to students. It works only on PC's. This could be worth a try and it's free. It is designed for school counselors although is customizable. http://www.ezanalyze.com

ROVIR www.rovirinfo.com, is another volunteer management software application that you might want to look at. Retriever of Volunteer Information and Reporting (ROVIR) is multi-user. It’s very comprehensive. You can receive the "light" version for free, which limits you to 50 volunteer names, but never times out.

Good luck!