The 1997 National Survey of Volunteering suggests that young people's interest in volunteering has gone down by about 10 per cent since 1991. Although young people are aware of the potential benefits of volunteering they feel it has an ‘image problem’. They also encounter major barriers to involvement, including lack of time, lack of information and lack of ‘gatekeepers’. A solution is proposed in the form of the acronym FLEXIVOL: Flexibility, Legitimacy, Ease of access, Xperience, Incentives, Variety, Organisation and Laughs. Instead of attempting to make young people fit into existing volunteering, this article suggests that we should reshape volunteering to accommodate them.
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