Education, Language and Sociology Research ISSN 2690-3644 (Print) ISSN 2690-3652 (Online) Vol. 6, No. 3, 2025 www.scholink.org/ojs/index.php/elsr 68 Original Paper Exploring the Path of Establishing a Long term Development Mechanism for Volunteer Services in Higher Education Institutions Wenwen Ding1* 1 Jiangsu University, Zhenjiang, China * Wenwen Ding, Lecturer at Jiangsu University, Master of Law, with a research focus on ideological and political education Received: June 20, 2025 Accepted: July 5, 2025 Online Published: July 31, 2025 doi:10.22158/elsr.v6n3p68 URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.22158/elsr.v6n3p68 Abstract How to promote the high-quality development of volunteer services in universities has become a key concern and research topic in various sectors of society. This article starts with the significance of building a long-term development mechanism for university volunteer services, analyzes the problems that currently constrain the high-quality development of university volunteer services, and aims to construct a sustainable and stable development mechanism for university volunteer services by stimulating the intrinsic motivation of college students, improving management systems, and strengthening brand building, in order to truly play its due functional role. Keywords universities, volunteer services, long-term mechanisms, social governance Volunteer service is an important symbol of social civilization and progress, as well as an effective way to promote modernization of social governance and achieve shared social responsibility. In the new era, volunteer service has become an important carrier for cultivating morality and practical education in universities. With the promotion of relevant policies and norms at all levels, college student volunteer service has developed rapidly, providing a platform for college students to grow and serve society. At present, college student volunteers have become the largest and most dynamic team of volunteers in China, making tremendous contributions in promoting the spirit of volunteerism, serving the public, and supporting social construction. However, there are still certain shortcomings in the organizational www.scholink.org/ojs/index.php/elsr Education, Language and Sociology Research Vol. 6, No. 3, 2025 69 Published by SCHOLINK INC. mechanism, management system, and content innovation of current university volunteer services, which have a negative impact on the full play of their functions. 1. The Importance of Establishing a Long Term Development Mechanism for Volunteer Services in Higher Education Institutions 1.1 Beneficial for the Full Utilization of Educational Functions Volunteer service in universities is an important means to achieve the function of educating students. By integrating volunteer service into ideological and political education and practical teaching, college students can gain a firsthand understanding of social responsibility and moral obligations. In the process of participating in volunteer service, the personal values of college students will also be continuously tested and improved. At the same time, volunteer service can also help college students deepen their understanding of professional knowledge, achieve the organic integration of theory and social practice, improve their teamwork ability, social adaptability and comprehensive quality, and provide strong support for universities to cultivate socialist builders and successors with both morality and talent. 1.2 Beneficial for Promoting the Growth and Success of College Students For college students, volunteer service is not only a practical form of assuming social responsibility, but also an effective way to enhance their overall quality. By actively participating in various social service projects, college students can effectively enhance their practical and problem-solving abilities, and broaden their horizons and enrich their experiences through interactions with different groups and situations. In practice closely related to professional fields such as education, healthcare, and social work, volunteer service can help college students gain a deeper understanding of industry needs and enhance their thinking on their own professional learning and career planning. At the same time, the requirements for teamwork and continuous investment also provide good conditions for college students to exercise their organizational and coordination skills, as well as self-management abilities. 1.3 Helps Promote Modernization of Social Governance Volunteer service, as an important means of promoting social governance, can effectively alleviate the problem of insufficient public service resources at the grassroots level and provide new impetus for the modernization process of social governance. Through the active participation of college students, the community can receive diverse and specialized support, better respond to residents’ needs, and improve the quality of public services. At the same time, the extensive development of volunteer services can also strengthen the construction of spiritual civilization, promote the values of “dedication, friendship, mutual assistance, and progress”, and enhance the overall moral cohesion and sense of identity of society. Through multi-party cooperation and resource integration from the government, universities, and social organizations, volunteer service not only optimizes the efficiency of social resource allocation, but also lays a solid foundation for achieving the social governance pattern of “co construction, co governance, and sharing”. www.scholink.org/ojs/index.php/elsr Education, Language and Sociology Research Vol. 6, No. 3, 2025 70 Published by SCHOLINK INC. 2. The Problems in the Long Term Development of Volunteer Services in Current Universities 2.1 Some College Students Have a Relatively One-sided Understanding of Volunteer Service In recent years, volunteer service has been increasingly accepted and put into action by college students, but there is still a certain cognitive bias in its effective implementation. Some college students lack a profound understanding of the spirit of “dedication, friendship, mutual assistance, and progress” in volunteer service. They only see volunteer service as a task aimed at improving their grades, showcasing their abilities and image, and meeting school requirements. They fail to truly internalize the spirit of volunteer service as their moral pursuit, and there are problems with “formalization” in the participation process, resulting in negative tendencies such as “being volunteered” and “volunteering for the sake of volunteering”. 2.2 Insufficient Connotative Development of Volunteer Service At present, the content and form of volunteer service projects carried out by universities are relatively limited, lacking the motivation to promote connotative development in depth. Firstly, in the process of integrating volunteer service into education, teaching, and social practice in all aspects, the project content and form are relatively single, and many activities are limited to physical assistance or basic public welfare promotion, with insufficient integration with subject knowledge or social reality needs. College students find it difficult to exercise their professional abilities and social service awareness at a higher level through this. Secondly, the integration of information technology construction and online and offline is not mature, and many projects still use traditional models, failing to expand their impact through digital platforms or new media channels, and lacking interdisciplinary and cross departmental collaborative promotion mechanisms. Thirdly, it has not been closely integrated with teaching, scientific research, and campus culture construction, thus unable to fully play the three-dimensional role of all- round education. The comprehensive literacy improvement and social practice ability of college students have also been affected to a certain extent. 2.3 The Volunteer Organization Mechanism Needs to Be Improved The many problems presented in university volunteer services are closely related to inadequate organizational management, manifested in two specific aspects. Firstly, there is improper management of volunteer organizations. Some volunteer organizations lack clear guidelines and management processes, resulting in college student volunteers participating in volunteer activities without clear goals and plans, and the significance and value of volunteer service are not fully reflected. Secondly, there is insufficient protection and management. At the level of protection, legal and financial support are not sufficient, and there is a lack of detailed regulations on the protection of volunteer rights and risk prevention. There is often a lack of clear institutional basis for identifying accidental injuries or responsibilities of college students during the participation process. The funding mainly relies on government appropriations and scattered donations from society, with a single and volatile channel, making it difficult to support diversified and normalized project needs. At the management level, projects often operate in a phased or temporary manner, with relatively weak overall planning, training, and www.scholink.org/ojs/index.php/elsr Education, Language and Sociology Research Vol. 6, No. 3, 2025 71 Published by SCHOLINK INC. evaluation systems. Volunteers receive less professional training or safety education before serving, and their ability to cope with complex situations is limited in practice. The evaluation methods mainly focus on service duration or credit requirements, making it difficult to comprehensively measure the quality of service and the growth of college students. 3. Exploring the Path of Establishing a Long Term Development Mechanism for Volunteer Services in Higher Education Institutions 3.1 Vigorously Promote the Concept of Volunteer Service The fundamental reason for the phenomenon of college students being “volunteered” is their lack of understanding of volunteer culture and insufficient recognition of the spirit of volunteerism. Deepen the publicity and promotion of university volunteer services, guide college students and social groups to participate in socialized volunteer services with the appeal and influence of university volunteer services, and expand the coverage of volunteer service organizations and volunteer service matters. 3.1.1 Create a Volunteer Service Atmosphere Colleges and universities need to give full play to the role of public opinion guidance, build a good official account, radio station, school newspaper, publicity gallery and other publicity positions, and timely publicize the development of college students’ volunteer service activities, outstanding typical figures and deeds on the WeChat official account platform, bulletin board, school newspaper and other media. Through education and publicity, students can truly understand the connotation of volunteer service, believe in the spirit of volunteer service, cultivate their sense of mission and social responsibility in the times, continuously stimulate their internal participation motivation, and guide them to participate in social construction and development independently and voluntarily. 3.1.2 Utilize the Advantages of the Two Educational Channels of “Theory and Practice” College students are the main practitioners, and throughout the planning and summarization of volunteer service activities, attention should be paid to the group and individual characteristics of the practitioners, fully mobilizing their subjective initiative. Once the internal motivation of college students to practice the spirit of volunteerism is stimulated, they will participate in volunteer service spontaneously and voluntarily. Essentially, volunteer service is a process of learning through service, refining through introspection, forging through practice, and cultivating through adaptation. Universities should integrate the spirit of volunteerism into the ideological and political education of college students, and combine ideological and political theory with the spirit of volunteerism. College students internalize the spirit of volunteerism through ideological and political classes, and externalize it through diverse practical activities. 3.2 Optimize the Volunteer Service Management System The management of university volunteer services plays a crucial role in the development of college students’ volunteer services, and has a significant impact on their cognitive, emotional, behavioral, and service outcomes. Therefore, universities should optimize the working and organizational mechanisms www.scholink.org/ojs/index.php/elsr Education, Language and Sociology Research Vol. 6, No. 3, 2025 72 Published by SCHOLINK INC. of college students’ volunteer services, achieve daily promotion of volunteer spirit, standardized organization of volunteer activities, institutionalized guarantee of volunteer services, and scientific evaluation of volunteer services. 3.2.1 Incorporate Volunteer Service into Talent Development Programs Universities can integrate volunteer service with campus culture, club activities, and social practice, making it integrated into teaching, research, and the daily lives of college students. If the participation of college students in volunteer service and the duration of volunteer service during their school years are included in the assessment scope, volunteer service related courses can also be offered to allow students to participate in courses in the form of credits. Volunteer service activities can also be fully integrated into ideological and political courses to help college students comprehensively understand the nature, participation methods, and other basic knowledge of volunteer service, and deepen their understanding of volunteer service. 3.2.2 Establish Multi Form and Deep Level Incentive Mechanisms Universities should promote the normalization and long-term effectiveness of volunteer services for college students through institutional construction. The quality and quantity of student volunteer service will be included in the incentive mechanism. In addition to taking volunteer service as a consideration factor in the comprehensive evaluation, award and evaluation of students, emphasis will be placed on the recognition of students participating in volunteer service, and appropriate spiritual awards will be given to students. For example, a series of activities such as the “most beautiful volunteer” search activity, volunteer service exemplary individual and team outstanding deeds sharing will be held to encourage college students to learn from excellent volunteers around them. This will play a positive role in guiding college students to invest in volunteer service with high frequency and quality. 3.2.3 Increase Support for College Students’ Volunteer Services Although volunteer service is a public welfare activity, maintaining the normal operation of volunteer service organizations and ensuring the normal participation of college students in volunteer service requires certain financial support. Increase funding support for college student volunteer services, firstly to ensure the life, health, and basic living of college student volunteers, by purchasing insurance and providing certain meal and transportation subsidies for college students participating in volunteer service activities. The second is to maintain the normal operation of college student volunteer service organizations. College student volunteer service organizations need to rely on certain activity funds, including necessary expenses for conducting volunteer service activities and organizing irregular team building activities to promote emotional communication among volunteers. 3.2.4 Establish a Scientific and Reasonable Evaluation Mechanism One is to institutionalize the evaluation content. The evaluation of college student volunteer service content is to assess the effectiveness of volunteer service. Firstly, there should be specific evaluation criteria, which mainly include college student volunteers, volunteer service organizations, and volunteer service projects. The content evaluation of college student volunteers mainly depends on their frequency www.scholink.org/ojs/index.php/elsr Education, Language and Sociology Research Vol. 6, No. 3, 2025 73 Published by SCHOLINK INC. and quality of participation. For volunteer service organizations, it mainly depends on the operation of the organization and the training of volunteers. For volunteer service projects, it mainly depends on the operation and effectiveness of the project. The second is the institutionalization of evaluation methods. The institutionalization of evaluation is based on scientific methods and standardized standards. Therefore, it is necessary to form standardized and unified standards, and use professional evaluation methods to truly grasp the growth and development of volunteers, the operation and implementation of volunteer service organizations, and the construction and implementation of volunteer service projects, in order to further regulate and strengthen the construction and development of college student volunteer services. 3.3 Build a High-quality Brand of Volunteer Service Building a volunteer service brand is the key to the high-quality development of the volunteer service industry. In response to the limitations and lack of in-depth development in the content and form of university volunteer services, it is necessary to further strengthen the deep integration of volunteer services with social needs, information technology, and professional characteristics, and strive to create a volunteer service brand with university characteristics that is recognized by service recipients, in order to enhance the social influence and reputation of university volunteer services. 3.3.1 In Terms of Formal Innovation, We Attach Great Importance to the Integrated Development of “Online+Offline” One is to establish a unified volunteer service information sharing platform, realizing the informatization and standardization of project release, registration, training, evaluation and other links, and promoting effective linkage and resource docking among various departments. By establishing a digital management platform, not only can information be timely released and recruited, but the project process and effectiveness can also be more intuitively recorded and evaluated. Secondly, online knowledge popularization, guidance and training, project research, etc. can be carried out through new media platforms to broaden the scope of volunteer service participation, allowing more college students to break through the limitations of time and space and participate in public welfare projects in a more flexible and efficient way. 3.3.2 In Terms of Content Innovation, Create a “Professional+Public Welfare” Project Model Firstly, in terms of off campus cooperation, universities can establish long-term and stable cooperative relationships with social entities such as the government, communities, and enterprises. By signing framework agreements or co construction agreements, the rights, responsibilities, and obligations of both parties in project initiation, funding support, and achievement sharing can be clarified. Secondly, in terms of project design, universities can fully integrate the characteristics of various disciplines and practical social issues, such as combining the needs of social governance, community construction, ecological environmental protection, and other fields with the professional learning of college students to form a “professional+public welfare” characteristic project. This can not only provide real scenarios for college students’ practice and research, but also improve the level and level of volunteer service. Thirdly, in terms www.scholink.org/ojs/index.php/elsr Education, Language and Sociology Research Vol. 6, No. 3, 2025 74 Published by SCHOLINK INC. of brand building, universities can link communities, enterprises, and other social entities through their professional advantages to normalize their affairs. Based on their majors, volunteers can be assigned to different grid service demand modules, creating grid based volunteer service characteristics and logos, and enhancing the social recognition of college student volunteer services. 3.4 Strengthening the Professionalization of the Volunteer Team Training college student volunteers is to use corresponding carriers to focus on improving their work ability and knowledge level, effectively stimulating their potential, and matching the practical needs of service recipients to the maximum extent. While improving the comprehensive quality of volunteers, it also enhances the quality of volunteer service projects. 3.4.1 Determine Training Objectives and Develop a Comprehensive Training Plan In terms of goals, efforts should be made to start with volunteers’ service awareness, professional skills, teamwork ability, communication and coordination ability, and other aspects. Therefore, in the formulation of training plans, it is important to focus on detailed arrangements regarding training content, methods, time, etc., to ensure that timely adjustments and optimizations can be made based on the actual situation and needs of volunteers, and to ensure the pertinence and effectiveness of the training. 3.4.2 Enrich the Training Content and Emphasize the Combination of Theory and Practice In terms of training content, the focus is on professional knowledge, basic skills, service etiquette, communication and coordination skills of volunteer service, and emphasizes the combination of theory and practice, so that volunteers can gradually deepen their understanding and application of theoretical knowledge through practical activities while mastering basic theoretical knowledge. In addition, the training content needs to be differentiated and adjusted based on the specific field and target audience of volunteer service, always maintaining the pertinence and practicality of the training. 3.4.3 Improve Training Methods and Enhance Training Effectiveness In actual training, various forms such as centralized training, decentralized training, online training, and practical operations can be introduced, and reasonable choices are generally made based on the actual situation and needs of volunteers. For example, newly recruited volunteers can receive centralized training to quickly master basic service etiquette and skills; Volunteers with certain experience can adopt decentralized training or online training to enable them to achieve self-directed learning according to their own learning needs and practical arrangements. In addition, it is necessary to focus on strengthening practical participation to ensure that the theoretical knowledge learned by volunteers can be timely transformed into their own practical abilities. 4. Conclusion Exploring the construction path of a long-term development mechanism for volunteer services in universities is not only necessary to implement the fundamental task of cultivating morality and talents, but also an important practice to promote collaborative governance between universities and society. We should break through the existing development bottleneck, promote the formation of a high-efficiency www.scholink.org/ojs/index.php/elsr Education, Language and Sociology Research Vol. 6, No. 3, 2025 75 Published by SCHOLINK INC. development mechanism, and achieve its high-quality development goals by leveraging the subjective initiative of college student volunteers, optimizing the volunteer service management system, improving institutional guarantees, strengthening team building, and creating high-quality brands. Reference Cai, F. F. (2022). Research on Innovative Mechanisms and Methods for College Students’ Volunteer Service in the New Era. Scientific Consultation (Science and Technology Management), 2022(12). Dong, L., & Mu B. H. (2024). The Function and Implementation Path of College Students’ Volunteer Service in Education. Leadership Science Forum, 2024(2), 136-138. Fei, X. S., & Zhou, B. (2021). 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