We sat down to have a chat with Lee Lin, a BA Education Studies student, on his experience with volunteering at ReachOut, a mentoring and education charity.
Would you be able to introduce yourself?
I'm Lee and I'm a BA Education Studies student. I’ve finished all my undergrad degrees and I am a potential master's degree student. Last year, I volunteered in the ReachOut programme as a Mentor, helping students build their confidence. It was an excellent experience, and I really enjoyed it.
What did the average volunteering session look like for you?
For our programme, we went to a school every Tuesday around 3:30–5:30 pm. Every week’s session was different. As ReachOut Mentors, we conduct every activity around 4 subjects, which are to build up students’ self-control ability, staying power ability, good judgment ability, and fairness.
Some students are talented in drawing, writing poems, or sports, but they are too shy to share this. Thus, we are trying to encourage them to be more confident, and we all believe that focusing on these character strengths would be perfect to encourage them to behave themselves.
My mentee was a student who was creative but also had a bit of low self-esteem. Before this program started, he was too shy to share his ideas and show off his skills. But he was getting better every week. I remember in the last session, his mum said to me that since her son joined this programme, he had become more confident and willing to show himself! His mum said that she didn't regret at all letting her son join this programme. On the one hand, I was very proud of my mentee, and I am so happy about his improvement. On the other hand, this program has also improved my sense of self-satisfaction. Being a ReachOut mentor was one of the most memorable things in my Year 3.
What attracted you to this opportunity?
I always enjoy interacting with people. Before I took part in this programme, I also did a volunteer teaching programme over the summer in rural areas in China. It was also a wonderful experience. I was looking forward to meeting students with different cultural backgrounds and sharing what like with them.
Being a ReachOut mentor was a new challenge for me. English is not my first language but it's the first language of the students, so sometimes I was a little bit nervous to talk with them. But I found that even though sometimes I might have trouble with some words, they don't care about it, so it was fine.
Congratulations on winning the Self-Control Award at ReachOut’s end of year awards ceremony. Would you be able to share what that was like?
It meant a lot to me. This award was about how you control your emotions and how you behave when the students are a little bit out of control. It means a lot to me because, to be honest, sometimes the sessions are not easy to handle. The students were emotional, so we had to face different kinds of situations which were very exhausting. With this award, I feel like my every effort and my patience was seen, and I am very grateful to the ReachOut team and my programme leader.
Has there been a particular highlight of your volunteering experience?
We had a session called Mentor Sharing every week, where each of the mentors had to share something. It can be anything like introducing yourself or sharing a habit. I remember I brought my guitar to one of the sessions and I decided to play the guitar and sing with them. I played Viva La Vida and another Chinese song, and what excited me was that they all enjoyed it. I also remember I hurt my fingers when I was playing, but I didn't notice that! It was bleeding and I missed it until some of our students saw that and asked if I was okay. I was really touched.
Another story I can think of is the week that my mentee had his birthday. He liked playing football and his football star was Cristiano Ronaldo, but he hurt his feet so every time we had a sports session, he couldn’t join us, and he had to just sit and watch what we were doing. But that week, I drew a postcard for him, and I wrote something for him which aimed to encourage him to be more confident. And after he read it, he started to cry, and he said to me that this was the best postcard he had ever received. It almost made me want to cry too. That was the moment that I felt like this programme was worth it.
Have there been any challenges that you have encountered throughout your volunteering?
Because I am a bit of an introverted person when I am in a group. For the first two and three sessions I found it a bit hard. Our job is to talk with the children, to open their minds, to open their hearts, but even as a mentor, I felt I couldn't open my heart when it was in the beginning. But after that, when we got more know about each other, things kept getting much better.
Would you recommend volunteering to other people?
Yeah, totally. I 100% encourage people to join these programmes. It’s worth it because every time you share something and talk with your mentees, the feedback you receive will make you feel like all the effort you put in is paying back. It’s kind of like a feeling of self-achievement. You will not regret it to take part in this programme!
Thank you so much to Lee for sharing their wonderful experience! If you would like to get involved in volunteering, make sure to check out our Volunteering Directory to find all of the latest opportunities across London!