Summer Maxim: Volunteer Now, Reap Benefits for Years to Come

Summer is a great time for teen-agers to learn in a way that is refreshingly different from sitting in a classroom: volunteering.

No matter a student’s favorite subject or career interest, there are opportunities to volunteer in that field this summer.

Volunteering can help students improve in related school subjects and make career decisions. It also looks good on a college application or job resume.

Here are my top suggestions for teen-agers interested in volunteering this summer:

If you’re interested in the arts, consider the Los Angeles Volunteer Center. It recruits youths for many arts centers, including Barnsdall Art Park (which houses four smaller centers), the Watts Towers Arts Center, the L.A. Photography Center and others.

Options include working as a docent, educating visiting school groups, helping at opening receptions of exhibits, assembling and disbanding exhibits, and helping in the offices. For information, call Jennifer Trochez at (213) 485-6984.

Kids City, a Santa Monica children’s advocacy organization that provides a variety of services and activities, accepts volunteers of all ages. Among the current projects are the production of a public relations video for the organization and working with an architect to plan and build a scale model of a new activity center. For information, call (310) 458-6666.

Learn more about the environment by participating in a Heal the Bay habitat restoration project. Two Saturdays each month, volunteers help plant, build fences, and remove weeds and other harmful plants from sites in Malibu, El Segundo and the Ballona Wetlands.

Heal the Bay also welcomes high school students to help in its office and plan programs for clubs on area campuses.

For information, call Toni Pogue at Heal the Bay, (310) 394-4552.

One of my best summers was spent working as a volunteer on the gorilla exhibit at the San Diego Wild Animal Park. If zoos and zoology appeal to you, consider volunteering for a Greater Los Angeles Zoo Assn. behavior enrichment project.

You can help find ways to eliminate captive animals’ boredom, design and construct stimulating animal habitats, grow the food that animals eat, and build furnishings such as feeders, swings and perches.

You must be at least 16. Call Jennifer Trochez at (213) 485-6984 to learn more.

You can learn about health and aging by volunteering for WISE Senior Services in Santa Monica.

Volunteer activities include helping to put on special entertainment programs in the day-care center for Alzheimer’s patients, and working with staff on day-to-day tasks such as serving meals.

You might also serve in the “friendly visitor” program, making house calls on older people and helping them by reading mail aloud, writing letters and going to the grocery store.

Call Joanna Hayes at (310) 394-9871 for the WISE programs.

There’s no better way to learn about government than to help in its operation--and you don’t even have to run for office. Instead, apply to volunteer in the office of a Los Angeles City Council member.

You must be at least 16, and your duties would depend on your skills, interests and maturity level. Call (213) 485-6984 to apply.

Law and criminology fascinate most teens, and you can learn more about them by volunteering in the Explorer programs sponsored by some local police departments. You must be between 14 and 20 years old and have a minimum 2.0 grade-point average.

Explorers work in police department offices, learn to write reports and maintain records, and work with detectives.

For further information, call the Santa Monica Police Department at (310) 392-7673, or the Los Angeles Police Department at (310) 202-4502.

Finally, if a career in teaching interests you, find out what the task of educating others is all about by volunteering for the Easter Seal Society.

The West L.A. office welcomes volunteers to provide job training or teach basic literacy to people with learning or physical disabilities.

They also need volunteers to help with light office work. There is no age policy. Call Easter Seals at (310) 204-5533.