Wish To Volunteer? Dubai Teens Launch Platform To Help Students Find Opportunities

Two Dubai students are on a mission to make volunteering easier and more accessible for teenagers across the UAE. Year 12 students Samaira Bhattacharya and Chloe Ramel from Nord Anglia International School Dubai have launched Volunteer Hub, a platform that connects students with local volunteer opportunities based on their interests.

“As high school students, we genuinely found it difficult to locate volunteering opportunities in the UAE,” said Samaira, who hopes to study medicine in the UK.“There are so many amazing initiatives available but they're not always visible or accessible to students without the right resources.”

Chloe added that the idea for the platform stemmed from their own experiences.“I was complaining to Samaira about not being able to find opportunities for the coming months and she said we should do something about that,” she said.“So we started talking and decided that we should set up this platform, Volunteer Hub, to help students across the UAE resolve this issue that a lot of us have.”

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Malak Ezzeldine, a budding economist and a Year 12 student at the same school added that the platform solved a lot of issues for students like her.“I had contacted so many NGOs looking for volunteer opportunities but no one would get back to me,” she said.“So, when I heard that they had launched this platform, I signed up for as many opportunities as I could. I even found one volunteer opportunity in my school which I found out only through Volunteer Hub.”

In just four months, the duo built the platform from scratch. While Samaira reached out to NGOs, Chloe developed the website using Wix. Volunteer Hub now features filters by location, cause, and type of activity - making it easy for students to find what suits them. According to the girls, the support from their teachers was integral in helping expand the reach of the platform.

So far, Volunteer Hub has partnered with 10 non-profits, including Sparkle Foundation and Thrift for Good , and has already helped over 90 students sign up for various roles in areas like sustainability, education, and animal welfare. Even though the platform is mainly aimed at students between the ages of 14 and 18, there is no minimum age for signing up.

Year 11 student of Springdales School Dubai Sampritha found her first volunteering opportunity through the platform in May and it was a memorable experience for her.“I signed for the beach clean up at Jumeirah and it was a great experience for me,” she said.“For over two hours we combed the beach for cigarette butts and other waste items. I also met a lot of other people. I am looking forward to doing it again.”

Samaira, who has previously volunteered as an English teacher for underprivileged students in India, said it was equally difficult to find opportunities in other countries as well.“Hopefully in the future, we could expand Volunteer Hub also to a wider reach, maybe use it in India and other countries as well,” she said.“We want to develop it into a global platform so that it makes it possible for high schoolers anywhere in the world to easily access meaningful ways to give back to the society.”

The duo also has a long-term vision for the platform.“We want to ensure that Volunteer Hub remains sustainable,” said Chloe.“Even when we head off to university, since we're currently in year 12, we want the platform to keep running. So we're working on building a leadership handover system to younger students within our school or other schools so we can keep the platform growing”

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