Why Volunteer?
Volunteering is a wonderful asset for students on the pre-medical track during their undergraduate years. Beyond just resume building, it allows the opportunity to serve in your community, whether it be in a clinical or non-clinical setting, and to reinforce the notion that service is your passion. Ultimately, a career in healthcare is a career in serving others, so it is important to validate that helping others is truly something you would want to dedicate their life to.
Clinical vs. Non-Clinical Volunteering
While it may be obvious why a pre-med student would need clinical volunteering on a resume, it is equally as important to invest time in projects and communities outside of a direct healthcare setting. Non-clinical volunteering allows students the opportunities to explore passions beyond science and medicine as well as explore how multi-faceted health determinants can be. Working to clean up the environment, improve literacy rates, or eradicating a food desert can all teach lessons on improving the health status of individuals in our local communities.
Some of the organizations we work with at AMSA are listed below:
- Northeast Georgia (NEGA) Foodbank
- Books for Keeps
- River's Alive
- Project Safe
- Thomas Lay
- Habitat for Humanity
UGA AMSA does work to maintain the undergraduate role in the AU/UGA Medical Partnership Mobile/Athens Free Clinic. More information on this clinical volunteering opportunity is found on the Mobile Clinic's page under "Volunteer Information" then "Athens Free Mobile Clinic Volunteer Team."
AMSA encourages members to find clinical volunteering opportunities that they are passionate about. Various positions and organizations are listed under the "Clinical Volunteering" on the website.