VALUES OF VOLUNTEERISM AND COMMUNITY WORK

VALUES OF VOLUNTEERISM AND COMMUNITY WORK

2.

Mdm Ho Geok Choo asked the Minister for Community Development, Youth and Sports what is being done to (i) educate our youth about the values of volunteerism and community work; and (ii) imbue a sense of altruism amongst our youth.

Dr Vivian Balakrishnan: The Community Involvement Programme (CIP) is an integral part of the curriculum in our educational system. Through participation in community work, students learn to identify with the needs of the community and develop a sense of social responsibility. Local universities also consider the extent and impact of students' involvement in CIP as part of the discretionary admission criteria.

To complement CIP, my Ministry supports and facilitates volunteerism through programmes administered by the National Youth Council (NYC). The Young ChangeMakers (YCM) scheme, for one, provides individuals and groups of youth seed funding of up to

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$3,000 to initiate and implement projects for community benefit. To date, more than 1,000 projects have been supported. The Youth Expedition Project (YEP), launched in 2000, promotes youth leadership and participation in local and overseas community work. YEP has supported more than 20,000 youth and 900 expeditions to ASEAN, India and China.

My Ministry also works with other organisations to support youth volunteerism. For example, Singapore (SG) Cares, a nation-wide initiative by the National Volunteer and Philanthropy Centre (NVPC), offers youth a variety of volunteer opportunities to suit their interest and availability. At the recent International Association for Volunteer Effort (IAVE) Youth Volunteer Conference, over 300 youths from Singapore and around the world learnt about volunteering trends and the impact of their active participation in volunteer causes.

To promote informal volunteerism, NVPC also recently launched the "Vertical Kampung" initiative to recognise simple acts of giving and offering help to neighbours, and encourage youth to become life-long volunteers.

The Government's emphasis on volunteerism has shown positive result – youth aged 15-24 make up the highest proportion of the volunteering population. In 2010, 36%[1] of this group were volunteers, up from 25% since 2004.

[1] Results from National Volunteer & Philanthropy Centre's (NVPC) Individual Giving Survey 2010.

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