Of all the things that pupils missed out on during the pandemic, paired reading sessions with an adult volunteer might not seem to be the most critical loss.

Yet evidence suggests that giving young people opportunities to interact with volunteers can have a real impact on their learning - and so the lack of such opportunities during Covid may have mattered more than we might think. 

In January 2021 the education and skills charity Education and Employers published a report that stresses the long-term positive effects for students of volunteering programmes in schools. It highlights that young people who can remember four or more activities with volunteers from their school days are nearly twice as likely to find it easy to pursue their career ambitions, and 42 per cent less likely to be not in education, employment or training (NEET) in their early twenties.

The report also states that experiencing 10 careers talks at age 14-15 typically correlates to an increase in earnings worth 8 per cent at age 26.

There is evidence, too, that volunteering programmes can boost learning. In 2002, American researchers Anne Henderson and Karen Mapp published a report, A new wave of evidence: the impact of school, family and community connections on student achievement, which found that volunteers can be significant resources in helping to create a supportive and welcoming environment at schools and facilitating students’ behaviour and performance.

Kitty Higgins, the chief executive of Bookmark, a literacy charity that provides volunteers to schools to support children with reading, has seen these benefits for herself. 

Bookmark offers a six-week programme to schools, in which children see trained volunteers twice a week for half an hour and do paired reading and literacy games. 

Feedback from participating schools shows that 86 per cent of teachers saw an increase in children’s reading confidence, and 71 per cent saw an improvement in reading enjoyment. As a result, Higgins believes there is a major opportunity for programmes such as Bookmark to close literacy gaps. 

“Typically the children we’re supporting don’t have opportunities to read at home, for a whole variety of reasons, and if schools are stretched or unable to give them extra support, we can provide additional capacity,” she says.

Volunteers in schools: relieving pressure on teachers

Nick Chambers, chief executive of Education and Employers, agrees that the strength of such programmes lies in building on schools’ existing offerings. He says that while volunteers can never replace teachers, they can be a great resource to fill gaps when schools are stretched. 

“Teachers are under pressure, and we can help them,” he says. “We’ve had cases when staff have been ill, and classes have been combined, brought into the hall, and we’ve delivered a virtual session.” 

As the education sector continues to battle with staff absences, the demands of Covid catch-up and an increasingly-stretched curriculum, could volunteers relieve some of the pressure, then? 

That depends, largely, on the individuals who volunteer, and how well those individuals are used. 

Helen Sanson is the director of The Switch, a charity that seeks to boost education and skills opportunities through a range of volunteer-led schools programmes. She says that when it comes to choosing the right volunteers, schools are now spoilt for choice: the number of people keen to offer support has increased since the pandemic.

“Lockdown has given different types of people the chance to volunteer. People who, for example, couldn’t leave the office for the whole morning to deliver sessions, can now do it virtually, in just an hour or two,” she says.

“There are all sorts of people: young, older, women, men, different ethnicities, different roles. They range from investment bankers and those working in tech to administration staff and those in insurance. There is a very wide range.”

With a glut of willing volunteers, now might therefore be the perfect time for schools to get volunteer programmes up and running again, if they haven’t done so already. 

So, which areas of the curriculum can volunteers support? And how can schools make the most of them?

How can volunteers help?

Literacy, of course, is a key subject where volunteers can help: Bookmark’s programme is already being used by 135 schools. The sessions can take place in person, or via video chat, making it a flexible option for schools and for volunteers. 

The Switch, too, offers literacy programmes, one of which is a pen pal scheme. Children are paired up with a “writing partner”, who could work in any role, in any company, and write regular letters to the pupil, sharing details about their own lives, and, in turn, asking about the child’s experiences. It’s been hugely successful, says Sanson. 

“It’s proved so popular because it can be done at any time of the day or night. We now have writing partners in Scotland, Belgium, Germany, and our furthest away are in Colombia,” she says. “The kids love getting the letters because they’ve never had a letter before, and it really engages them with writing: they really look forward to responding, and telling their pen pal what’s happening in their life.”

The Switch also has a programme called BEE: business, enterprise and employability, which covers financial literacy, enterprise and workplace skills. 

“Volunteers who work in finance come in and explain what the Bank of England does, for example; talk about interest rates, and how money is made,” says Sanson. “I’m not saying teachers can’t do that, but it’s another thing for them to have to learn, and teach, when they’ve already got a long, long list of things to cover. It fills a vital knowledge gap.” 

According to Sally-Anne Warren-Armes, the employer engagement manager at Eckington School in Derbyshire, the specialist knowledge that volunteers provide is essential, particularly when it comes to careers education. Without the support of a range of different volunteers, she says that her school’s extensive careers programme, in which Year 13 students are paired up with an industry mentor, simply wouldn’t be possible. 

“Teachers just don’t have the industry knowledge that volunteers do: we’d never have every career avenue covered if we did it all in-house,” she explains. “But our mentor scheme gives our students a direct connection and insight into the career they want to pursue, and really helps them to plan their next steps.”

Careers education is another subject area where volunteers can add significant value, then. 

At Education and Employers, the volunteering opportunities are all centred around careers: around 68,000 people have registered to say they’re interested in hosting a class at their workplace, offering work experience or simply talking to pupils about their careers. Teachers can go on to the website, search by their region and invite volunteers to go into school, or take part in a Zoom call. 

The sessions, Chambers explains, are interactive: volunteers will do a two- or three-minute presentation about their job, and then the floor is open to the children to ask whatever they’d like. The programme has always been popular, but Chambers says the charity has seen a bigger increase in interest from schools since the start of the pandemic. 

“Teachers really do want to give children aspiration, but they don’t always have the capacity. Inviting the volunteers to host events which look towards the future has been so positive,” he says. “We want to say to children, ‘The future is bright - look at these amazing careers you could do.’” 

In all of this, training - and, of course, safeguarding - is a priority. All of The Switch’s volunteers are DBS checked, as are those who work though Education and Employers. And although they aren’t replacing teachers, they are trained in basic teaching skills to ensure they align to the school’s approach.  

At the heart of all of these initiatives, then, is the desire to support schools and ensure that every child has access to opportunities that develop their skills and knowledge, both within school and in the world around them. 

“I’ve never met a teacher who said, ‘Oh, those pesky volunteers. I wish we didn’t have this programme in our schoo’,’” says Sanson. “We don’t want to be a burden - we want to add support.” 

Teachers, of course, will always be the experts in delivering the curriculum. But with pressure on schools mounting, it makes sense to accept a helping hand from those in the local community, and further afield, who are eager to provide assistance.