<p>I’m applying to several boarding schools this fall, and I know how good it looks to have a hundred or so volunteering hours on your record. In Croatia, the number of wildlife conservation programs outnumber the amount of charity and volunteering efforts. So that brought me to the question; can helping the environment sound better than helping people on? </p>
<p>Of course, I’m not just trying to help because it looks good to boarding schools. I truly want to do my part in helping. I’m just curious which sounds better when you put it on a resum</p>
<p>I’ve never heard that you have to have ANY volunteering hours to be considered for boarding school. Most 13- and 14-year-olds in the United States have done very little formal volunteer work. They are usually so busy going from school to sports to music lessons that they don’t have much time or energy left over. </p>
<p>If you were applying to college, that would be a different story. High schoolers are generally growing out of the self-absorption of their younger years and focusing on bigger causes. Certainly college admissions personnel want to see that a student is contributing to others, and they are curious to know what a student is like as shown by his/her choice of causes.</p>
<p>But to answer your question about volunteering for the environment vs. volunteering to help specific people: I don’t think it matters. What matters is <em>why</em> a cause is important to you and how hard you work at it.</p>