Volunteering comes from the heart. Can sincere things be forced? Not in my opinion. Think about it, will it benefit the community if there’s a group of crabby teenagers helping for nothing more than to get a few hours of service under their belt? Students should not be required to volunteer. Being stressed can be trouble.

While we’re talking about stress, it is mostly caused by homework and social standings. Many kids spend afternoons alternating between texting and studying. Stress can make students fall behind. It’s very possible they will put volunteer work before school work because kids might think it’s more important. If they do fall behind, it will make future years even more of a struggle. Children need a base. If that weren’t enough, think of how overwhelming it will be when students are told they must complete fifty hours. Managing time is hard. In volunteering, they might distance themselves from friends and family. Kids might also stop participating in after school activities. They can only take so much. Yes, I know there are outlets, but will there be time? Probably not with all that volunteer work. I mean, how can kids write in a journal or another relaxing activity when they spend so much time with volunteer and school work? They also won’t make great friendships.

Teens need time to find the right friends. They will be better at networking if their future job needs it. They will also build important social skills that will get them farther in life. If they can’t carry on a conversation, how will they ace an interview? Yes, they will meet people while volunteering. But since everyone needs to get in some hours— even kids that are not ideal acquaintances— the people they meet might lead them to do horrible things. Peer pressure comes a lot earlier these days. Peer pressure is being tempted by your peers to do bad things such as drugs. They affect your health and growth. In some cases, drugs and alcohol use is fatal. But peer pressure and popularity aren’t the only things crowding kid’s minds.

Students can get up to three hours of homework a night. This is very overwhelming as it is; we don’t need hours of volunteer work to top it off. Anyways, homework makes kids smarter. This leads to a better educated society that will solve community problems when they’re older. Right now kids need to concentrate on school because, let’s face it, not everyone can save a life and get a good grade on a math test in one day. Like I said, children need to focus on one thing at a time. They might choose to help out instead of doing their homework. For example, a girl might be at a shelter until nine o’clock at night. By the time she gets home and ready for bed, she realizes she has math homework. Now I know not every kid would just go to sleep, but there’s a great chance they will skip their homework and go to bed. Who can blame them? That’s why they shouldn’t volunteer. Even though it will make them feel good, they’ll fall behind in their studies. Failing a class isn’t exactly a good feeling. It might also build their morals, but what happens when they can’t get into a good college? It’s important to attend school past high school because you will get a well paying job that can support a family.

Required volunteer work is not the answer. Between positive friendships and good grades, volunteer work is putting too much on their plates. Is helping out worth getting held back?