Volunteer Hours

[youngbreezy]

Greetings, all! 

I'm looking at applying to PA school this upcoming cycle. 

One thing I am uncertain about is how to go about representing my volunteer hours - I will have about 330 logged hours, and the majority of those hours are from volunteering with animals. 

For example, i spent 220 hours volunteering in wildlife rehab, 12 hours at an animal shelter, and 32 hours from a mission trip helping Guatemalan families with their pets and farm animals (vaccinating, deworming, surgery assist, etc).

Do you think these volunteer hours are looked down upon, since I'm not directly helping the people in the community, but rather am helping animals, which isnt related to the PA profession? 

I was thinking of describing each volunteer experience and relating it to how it can positively impact the community as well, but I'm not entirely sure how to go about doing that. 

Just to add, I do have some volunteer hours with people, and i will have about 2000 CNA hours logged, but I just have always cared deeply about animals, hence why I have chosen to volunteer with them. 

Thanks for reading/helping! 

 

 

[Guest HopeToBePAC]

I don't think these volunteer hours will be looked down on at all. Actually, having volunteer hours about something you are passionate/care deeply about is a plus --and if asked about your experience with animals, you'll be able to talk about it well. I would definitely put those hours on there (under the volunteering section), because by no means do volunteer hours have to be related to the PA profession, or medicine at all. 

[rev ronin]

The closer it is to human healthcare, the better a typical AdCom will look at it, but there's not really such a thing as "bad" volunteer hours, unless you're tone deaf and listing things contrary to the mission of the school, I suppose.  I struggle to think of a real example of that, though.