Benefits  

 

Professionals look toward volunteering as a way to give back to their community; CLASS offers them several benefits based on the unique attributes of the Community Leadership Initiative (CLI) Program:

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• Leadership Development: CLASS offers to all volunteer professionals a unique opportunity to develop their leadership potential. CLASS projects offers these volunteers a risk-free opportunity to try out new roles, experience leadership, explore new ways of connecting with strangers and working along with them in a team and take initiative to solve community problems. CLASS offers the infrastructure, processes and guidelines required for successful execution of the project; hence the volunteers can focus on applying their creativity towards solving the problems at hand. The foremost benefit that CLASS offers to its volunteers is a structured yet risk-free environment to try out leadership skills.

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• Networking Opportunity: CLASS also offers a networking opportunity to volunteers, as all of them are primarily professionals, representing various skill sets and coming from different backgrounds. This mosaic of skill sets and experiences is what brings into play the complementary skill set to each problem, thereby ensuring that the whole is more than the sum of its parts while offering volunteer professionals the opportunity to connect with different people and expand their horizon of contacts.

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• Group based learning: CLASS offers the opportunity for volunteers to try out new skill sets, learn new technologies or practices, maintain and keep current their skill set and explore beyond their boundaries that are usually set in their workplace. CLASS has formal mentorship programs and training programs that will assist new volunteers to quickly integrate into a team and even learn new skills from the mentors, providing professional an opportunity to gain experience in a new or different area of their industry, and/or in completely different industry.

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• Satisfactory Volunteering Experience: CLASS offers, above all else, a satisfying experience to volunteers by providing well-managed projects for well-defined problems and the entire infrastructure to make it possible. This ensures that the time, effort and skill provided by the volunteer professionals are utilized to the best possible extent and that the returns on social investment by these volunteer professionals are maximized.

 

In addition to the aforementioned benefits, CLASS also provides student volunteers with benefits geared specifically at them. It allows students to:

• Apply classroom-based knowledge to real life situations.

• Work on a team with experienced professionals.

• Achieve career goals through experience in fields in which they are interested.

• Network with potential future employers.

• Receive feedback regarding their efforts from clients (nonprofit organizations).

• Have experience to note on resumes and get recommendations.

 

CLASS functions as a facilitator for these volunteers by linking them with projects that require their expertise. As a result, all volunteers feel good about the time they are contributing and that they are also receiving benefits from their services.

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