eprintid: 10091576 rev_number: 22 eprint_status: archive userid: 608 dir: disk0/10/09/15/76 datestamp: 2020-02-21 13:01:58 lastmod: 2021-12-10 23:55:28 status_changed: 2020-02-21 13:01:58 type: article metadata_visibility: show creators_name: Hoskins, B creators_name: Leonard, P creators_name: Wilde, R title: How effective is youth volunteering as an employment strategy?: A mixed methods study of England ispublished: inpress divisions: UCL divisions: B16 divisions: B14 divisions: J80 keywords: employment, mixed methods, transitions, unpaid work, volunteer, youth note: This version is the author accepted manuscript. For information on re-use, please refer to the publisher’s terms and conditions. abstract: Volunteering is routinely advocated in British policy as a key mechanism for young people to gain employment, but with little evidence of its viability as a strategy. Indeed, the limited research in this area suggests the link is weak and that access to good quality volunteering is differentiated along class lines. This article draws on a mixed methods approach, using survey data from the Citizenship Education Longitudinal Survey and qualitative interviews, to analyse the relationship between youth volunteering and employment. It finds that volunteering is not unequivocally beneficial for employment, particularly if it does not offer career-related experience or is imposed rather than self-initiated. It can even have a negative effect on employment. Furthermore, social class mediates access to volunteering opportunities most likely to convert into employment. We conclude there is little evidence to support policy assumptions that, in the short term, volunteering has a positive relationship to paid employment. date: 2020 date_type: published publisher: SAGE Publications official_url: https://doi.org/10.1177/0038038520914840 oa_status: green full_text_type: other language: eng primo: open primo_central: open_green verified: verified_manual elements_id: 1758183 doi: 10.1177/0038038520914840 lyricists_name: Wilde, Rachel lyricists_id: RJWIL24 actors_name: Austen, Jennifer actors_id: JAUST66 actors_role: owner full_text_status: public publication: Sociology citation: Hoskins, B; Leonard, P; Wilde, R; (2020) How effective is youth volunteering as an employment strategy?: A mixed methods study of England. Sociology 10.1177/0038038520914840 <https://doi.org/10.1177/0038038520914840>. (In press). Green open access document_url: https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10091576/3/Wilde_Accepted_version_How%20effective%20is%20youth%20volunteering%20script%20for%20publishing%20Feburary%202020.pdf