Service and Volunteering

Volunteer Through Center for Community, Service, and Justice

Loyola’s Center for Community, Service, and Justice (CCSJ) connects you to the Baltimore community through service and service-learning. Additionally, you may consider winter or summer immersion opportunities or seek leadership roles in  CCSJ.

Volunteer in Hospitals and Community Health Centers

Baltimore is the home of over 20 major hospitals, numerous dental and health clinics, and a wide range of community health centers. Loyola students are currently volunteering, interning, and doing research in more than half of the area’s hospitals, including those listed below with links to each hospital's volunteer page: 

• Johns Hopkins Hospital
• University of Maryland Medical Center
• Mercy Medical Center
• Sinai Hospital of Baltimore
• University of Maryland St. Joseph
• Greater Baltimore Medical Center
• Ascension Saint Agnes Hospital
• MedStar Union Memorial Hospital (walking distance from Loyola)
• MedStar Good Samaritan Hospital
• Kennedy Krieger Hospital
• Mount Washington Pediatric Hospital
• Veterans Affairs Maryland Health Care Systems
• Levindale Geriatric Center and Hospital
• The League for People With Disabilities, Inc. (Opportunities for Occupational and Physical Therapy; Adult Day Nursing; Speech Therapy)

Think of health in creative ways as you identify volunteer options that acquaint you with social factors that influence health. For instance, soccer for refugee youth, after school science tutoring, physical activity for inner city youth, and college career mentoring are excellent ways to promote everyday wellness and encounter people from all walks of life. One good place to start is to search the opportunities offered through Loyola’s Center for Community, Service, and Justice.

Consider Global Health Volunteering

A culturally competent understanding of health includes appreciation of diverse health care strategies and understandings of health, including international health care. You can achieve this by reading excellent books and publications concerning global health issues, such as Anne Fatiman’s book The Spirit Catches You and You Fall or Tracy Kidder’s Mountains Beyond Mountains, a book about Paul Farmer. You can also expose yourself to international cultures in the United States through organizations that partner with refugees, migrants, or immigrants. These include Loyola’s Center for Community, Service, and Justice partners Soccer without Borders, Refugee Youth Project, and Casa Program. 

It may also be possible for you to consider international health-related volunteering in developing countries. The purpose of these immersion trips is to create a mutually beneficial partnership between you and the people whom you serve during your short stay. It takes humility and maturity on your part to be immersed in a cultural environment that is very different from yours. The world will change you perhaps more than you will change it. You will learn that the people at your destination are often eager to meet you and enthusiastic about your contribution. It will become your duty to know your acceptable scope of practice as a pre-health student who does not yet have direct training in any health profession. You are strongly encouraged to complete The Global Ambassadors for Patient Safety Online Workshop before you pack your bags and head to the airport.

Here are some international health-related volunteering organizations for your consideration:

• Child Family Health International
• Foundation for International Medical Relief of Children
• CIEE
• Atlantis Global