THE VIEWS OF SOCIAL WORK STUDENTS ON VOLUNTEERING: THE ANKARA UNIVERSITY SAMPLE

Abstract

The objective of this work is to reveal the views of the social work students on volunteering. The research has been conducted with the participation of 223 Ankara University Faculty of Health Sciences Department of Social Work students. Through complete inventory, the data were gathered from volunteering students; and analyzed with frequency distribution (f) and chi-square (X2) techniques. The female student count is 74% of the participants, whereas 26% are male. Additionally, 23.8% of the students are freshman, 30% are sophomore, 22.9% are junior and 23.3% are senior students. The students’ perception on volunteering follows mostly as sharing quid pro quo, providing all kind of needs, emotional support and working at an enterprise free of charge. While 33.6% of the students have been involved in certain volunteering activities during the past year, the percentage of students who have registered to one or more  non-governmental organizations (NGO) are more than the half. Moreover, the fields where the students mostly attend to volunteering works are children welfare, disability, youth and poverty. The reasons why the participants attend to volunteering activities are significantly love for people, the wish to accomplish something for the society and gaining information and experience. The social work education has a positive affect onmost of the students regarding volunteering, due to course contents (field study, NGOs, poverty and social work, sociak work with disabled) and field studies. The participation of female students during the past year is higher than the male students. Social work education influences the thoughts of students on volunteering in a positive direction. Adding a different course on volunteering to the schedule, more active student societies and academicians and more effective coordination with NGOs may have more improving results on the thoughts and attitiudes of students regarding volunteering.