Wanted: More Men Committing More Time to Charities

From the time he began tutoring his fellow fourth-graders at Philadelphia’s St. Francis of Assisi School, Anthony Radocaj has spent much of his nearly six decades volunteering. The retired insurance executive has taught kids to read, helped with Hurricane Katrina relief efforts, and now heads a volunteer unit at a Philadelphia public school. “When it comes to volunteering, I have pretty much seen everything,” he says.

Everything, that is, except for other men volunteering alongside him. “No matter how many men I try to get involved, very few of them do,” he says. “I’ve organized volunteer recruiting events where 70 or 80 percent of the people who show up are women, and the ones signing on the dotted line to actually commit are 80, 90 percent women. And even when men do start, they often drop out shortly after.”

This situation not only prevents men from enjoying the benefits of helping others but also deprives charities of their skills, say observers.

Recession’s Impact

Mr. Radocaj’s point that women volunteer in greater numbers than men do is borne out by statistics:

• Twenty-three percent of men volunteered in 2008, compared with more than 29 percent of women, according to a survey released in July by the Corporation for National and Community Service. Mothers who worked outside the home had the highest rates of volunteerism.
• New York Cares, which each year connects 43,000 people with volunteer projects, has consistently seen its volunteer pool hold steady at about 70 percent female, according to Gary Bagley, the group’s executive director.
• At Hands on Network, an organization with 250 affiliates that also links volunteers to charities, the pool of helpers nationwide has “a 60-40 female-to-male split,” according to Amy Smith, the group’s president.

Some nonprofit experts fear that the current economic recession might further widen the gender split.

“With the pressure traditionally on them to be the wage earner, when things get tight economically, men are even less likely to find time for volunteer activities, when now is a really good time to shine in the workplace,” says Siobhan Canty, a philanthropy consultant who previously served as chief executive of Greater DC Cares, a group in Washington that matches volunteers with charities.

However, if the worst happens and someone does lose a job, she adds, it can mean a chance for charities to recruit. “We are definitely seeing increases in people using volunteering as a tool to remain relevant and employable,” she reports.

Lacking Role Models

Even so, charities that pair volunteers one-on-one with clients say the gender gap is especially acute.

“It’s a little easier recruiting men for garden cleanups, revitalization — one-shot, hands-on sorts of things,” says Mr. Bagley. “But getting men involved in social or educational programming with children, even tutoring adults — there’s a persistent problem.”

That problem is particularly evident at Big Brothers Big Sisters of America where more than 70 percent of youngsters seeking a mentor are boys, but only 37 out of every 100 inquiries about volunteering come from men.

Judith Vredenburgh, who stepped down in September after spending a decade heading the organization, says the gender split widens even further along racial and ethnic lines: More than half of the boys served by the national charity are black, but only 15 percent of the group’s male volunteers are African American.

Jim Cox, senior strategist at the Boys & Girls Clubs of America, in Atlanta, sees similar gender-skewed numbers in his organization. “We absolutely do not have enough male volunteers,” he says, leaving what he calls “a critical absence of males mentoring and role modeling for younger kids.”

This gap between male and female volunteers, says Mr. Bagley, “is something everyone knows about, but no one seems to know quite what to do about it.” And, he says, “there is a growing awareness across the sector that getting more men, particularly black and Hispanic men, engaged in social-services areas is essential.”

“The first thing we need to figure out is why,” he says. “Why don’t men come forward as often as do women?”

Men as Nurturers

Social roles do seem to play an inevitable part in men’s and women’s attitudes toward volunteering, says Mr. Radocaj, the Philadelphia volunteer.

“Growing up, our society tells boys they need to stand on their own, go forth and do things and get paid well for it — men shouldn’t have a nurturing side,” he says. “Particularly, I think, older men believe that, oh, volunteering is what my wife does, that volunteering isn’t macho.”

Michael Wingfield, who sells advertising at The Virginian-Pilot, a daily newspaper in Norfolk, has had a broad array of volunteer experiences and says that apart from a male-dominated stint in volunteer firefighting, he has mainly served alongside women — an experience he attributes to differences between the sexes.

“Men tend to respond to a crisis, they’re reactive, and women are proactive,” he observes. “Men sit with their spears waiting for someone to attack the village while the women gather the berries and tend the children and just generally keep everything together.”

Such traditional roles need to be challenged, and early, says Mr. Cox, “to help young boys see that part of becoming a man is to contribute and give back to society. Engaging young people to start mentoring as teens, or even younger, naturally develops the sense that nurturing is part of being a man.”

Beginning of a Trend

The volunteer gender gap does not appear to be carved in stone, however; Ms. Smith believes, in fact, that it’s slowly been closing on its own.

Years ago, she says, females made up about 80 percent of Hands on Network’s volunteers, rather than the 60 percent it has today. Ms. Smith says, “We are seeing more families coming in together as a whole unit, wanting to make service part of their lifestyle.”

It’s a trend Ms. Smith expects to continue: “Young people, the millennial generation in particular, do seem more service-oriented and the males are more comfortable volunteering. They don’t look at it as a separate component of their time but rather as elemental to their lifestyle to be engaged in service in their community.”

This comfort level may be due in part to mandatory community service as a graduation requirement in many high schools nationwide, as well as the opportunity to earn money for college while serving in AmeriCorps.

However, Ryan Schramm, a 26-year-old construction manager in Cannon Falls, Minn., who volunteers at Habitat for Humanity of Minnesota, says that for his peers, volunteering is “definitely becoming more of the norm,” partly because both young men and young women are less constrained by tradition than their elders. “With our generation, child care is a shared role, and it’s not uncommon now for men to stay home with the children,” says Mr. Schramm. “I do think this makes males more comfortable in helping situations.”

That blurring of gender roles, he says, also leaves younger men more ready to serve when the opportunity presents itself. Several years ago, while attending Minnesota’s Alexandria Technical College, Mr. Schramm helped organize schoolwide service days for students to help needy people. “We had plenty of young guys volunteering, and they had a great time doing it,” he says. “All we had to do was create the opportunity.”