Surprising volunteers with awards is one way to keep them on board

By Marlene Walk, assistant professor, Paul H. O'Neill School of Public and Environmental Affairs at IUPUI

The United States has a long tradition of volunteering. Back in 1737, for instance, Benjamin Franklin co-founded the nation's first volunteer fire brigade in Philadelphia.

And this custom is still going strong. About 77.4 million Americans volunteered 6.9 billion hours in 2017 - the equivalent of US$167 billion in paid work - according to the Corporation for National and Community Service, a government agency.

But how Americans volunteer has changed in the last 30 years. Among those who volunteer, about 33% logged 100 or more hours in 2015, down from 40% in 1989, according to an annual Census Bureau survey. I recently conducted a study with Ruodan Zhang, a doctoral student, and Laura Littlepage, a volunteering researcher. We took a look at the strategies nonprofits use to retain volunteers by focusing on volunteer turnover in a large Midwestern Boy Scouts Council. Read more.