I’m in China for the remainder of the summer doing volunteer work for an orphanage, but it’s the summer before my senior year. I’m wary of putting the experience on my application because I’ve been told that it may look fishy that I’m only volunteering over the summer. Does anyone have opinions? I really don’t want to seem like I’m piling up shallow activities as my volunteer work is genuinely meaningful to me.
Is this your only volunteer experience? If it really is meaningful to you, you should probably put it anyway, but make sure to describe concrete responsibilities that you’ve taken on, and to indicate that it is something you want to continue in college (assuming that it is)
Say what?! You want to omit a (supposedly) valid experience? Why? What colleges are you aiming for and where do they say you can’t vol over a summer, that it has to be some longer period? Don’t make college level decisions based on hearsay from uninformed folks. Be smarter.
by all means include it in your application. But it will carry no more weight than if you volunteered in the US.
@TomSrOfBoston Thank you! I understand that it carries equal weight, but I wanted to include the “abroad” detail to further emphasize the time limitation.
@lookingforward @soontobecolleger thank you both!
Glad to know about your volunteer work for the orphans. I would suggest you to put the experience on the application.
My brother also has experience of volunteering abroad with [mission humanitaire](http://www.mission-humanitaire-afrique.org), he has also mentioned his experience and it was very helped him in his career growth.