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Certificates for Volunteering activity


arthurb

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Hey Everyone

I’ve just came to realize, during my most recent volunteering experience, that some organizations would give out certificates to its volunteers. I’ve never requested a certificate from any of the organizations/groups I volunteered with, part of the reason may be that I mostly volunteered within my community instead of with larger international organizations. 
It’s kind of unnerving and I’m just wondering if medical schools would ever ask to see certificates in their applications. Do I have to reach out to the organizers of my previous volunteer projects and ask for some sort of proof of how many hours I’ve volunteered with them? 
For this reason, I’m also wondering if volunteering with larger, well-known organizations would look more appealing to Med Schools, compared to community-level involvements. I’m interested in volunteering for a local organization in China that focuses on raising the awareness of rare diseases, but would this be less advantageous when compared to, say, volunteering with a UN project? I do believe that I’d be helping people either way, but I’d also want to take the realistic factors into consideration. 
Thank you for any and all input! :)

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4 hours ago, robclem21 said:

Makes no difference. Just be careful that whatever you doesn't come off as "voluntourism". They wont ask to see a certificate.

Thanks for your reply! I’m also curious if there’s any sort of official website or documentation that I should keep to show how many hours I’ve volunteered for.  I know some of my fellow pre-med students measures their volunteering experience in terms of the number of hours, but personally I’ve never kept tab on these so closely…do I have to? 

p.s. I’ve only moved to Canada several months ago and still in the process of familiarizing myself with the whole system of Canadian med school applications. Please bear with me if this is a dumb question. 

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5 hours ago, arthurb said:

Thanks for your reply! I’m also curious if there’s any sort of official website or documentation that I should keep to show how many hours I’ve volunteered for.  I know some of my fellow pre-med students measures their volunteering experience in terms of the number of hours, but personally I’ve never kept tab on these so closely…do I have to? 

p.s. I’ve only moved to Canada several months ago and still in the process of familiarizing myself with the whole system of Canadian med school applications. Please bear with me if this is a dumb question. 

You don't have to keep an exact number of hours, and there is no official website. The way some applications are structured, they ask for the total number of hours for each activity. But if its a long-term commitment I would just estimate based on the average number of hours per week x duration of activity. Ideally your contact/verifier will vouch for you should the schools contact them, but they won't directly ask for "proof". I never kept track exactly.

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