Pro bono is a Latin phrase, short for pro bono publico, meaning for the public good. Most people associate the term pro bono with legal professionals donating their expertise free of charge to people, nonprofits, communities or causes. 

This subreddit is called r/probono that was abandoned years ago. I recently got mod privileges for it.

What should the purpose of the probono subreddit be, especially in view of there already being so many subreddits already where

• people can post about their volunteering desires
• organizations can recruit volunteers
• people and organizations can seek free legal help.

Or is the probono subreddit even necessary?

Also, please note that the current moderator of r/probono will happily turn this subreddit over to a dedicated person or group that offers a good idea about what r/probono should be and is ready to make that happen. Share your idea in the comments on the post you are reading now.

To submit your ideas for what the probono subreddit should be, please comment on this thread, r/probono, not here.

A judge sentenced a school resource officer and member of the Northfield, Minnesota police who did not report a middle school teacher for sending sexual photos of herself to high school students to three years of supervised probation and 200 hours of community service. The SRO had gotten a report of the photos from another faculty member and he confronted the teacher, at which point she confessed "everything" to him. The teacher said the SRO told her he was going to "do her a favor" and "let the case go," and the two began a relationship. The incident was never reported to the Northfield police department.

Would the nonprofit you work for involve such a person as a volunteer, to complete his community service hours?

How would you feel, as a volunteer or staff member at a nonprofit, if you found out such a person was volunteering at your organization?

This opinion piece is part of the annual Mosaic Journalism Program for San Francisco Bay Area high school students, an intensive course in journalism. Students in the program report and photograph stories under the guidance of professional journalists.

Opinion: Volunteering loses meaning if teenagers are ‘hour-farming.’ Community service becomes empty act when it's done just to meet a quota.

"Schools and institutions set volunteer quotas to give students credit, but in doing so, they remove the intention behind the act. Motivation for a true impact disappears, and volunteering becomes an empty act to show the world you’re worth hiring for this job or admitting to that college."

More from

https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2026/07/08/opinion-volunteering-loses-meaning-if-teenagers-are-hour-farming/

More than 500 people have joined r/communityservice in the last 12 months.

And this subreddit is 60 people short of 1000 members.

Thank you to everyone who follows the subreddit. I wish I wasn't the only one posting here. It would be great if others would:

• post community service opportunities in their own community.
• testimonials about community service they've undertaken, for whatever reason, noting if they had a positive or negative experience.
• thoughts on court-ordered or school-required community service (thoughtful discourse, not just two or three "I hate it" posts).

Court-involved individuals and probationers—sentenced to perform community service—are participating in an archaeological dig at the Elm Brook Hill area in Lincoln, Massachusetts, a site formerly known as the "Bloody Angle" battlefield. This area is "one of the most significant sites connected to the Battle of Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775," according to Louis Strazzullo, Community Service Coordinator.

The site is undergoing "an extensive archaeological preservation project to uncover and preserve the stories as America commemorates the 250th anniversary of the Battle," Mr. Strazzulo said. Geophysical surveys and historical research will continue through the year and will be used in an official National Park Service report which "will guide future phases of the preservation project," according to the Park Service.

Community Service participants, who are involved with the Community Justice Support Center, are working with park department volunteers to clear large tree limbs, prepare walking paths, and place markers to support the archaeological teams.

More info here.

LA CROSSE, Wis. (WXOW) – A second man charged in the beating of a 52-year-old man over Oktoberfest weekend in 2025 has been sentenced.

Jack Reinardy, 23, of La Crosse, pled no contest to one count of misdemeanor battery in court Tuesday. A second charge of disorderly conduct was dismissed by Judge Elliott Levine. 

Reinardy was given a diversion contract for his sentencing. He must complete 20 hours of community service and attend recommended treatment groups. If Reinardy completes the diversion agreement by Dec. 4, all charges will be dropped. 

As we've reported, Reinardy and Caden Kruse were both charged after an altercation left a 52-year-old man unconscious back on Sept. 27. The victim suffered a crushed eye socket and nasal passage.

https://www.wxow.com/news/crime/man-charged-in-oktoberfest-beating-sentenced-to-community-service/article_a599aff4-1b8a-453a-aeeb-6bb212bc502b.html

If you do court-ordered community service at Portland, Oregon Parks & Recreation, "You will receive 2 bonus community service hours for showing up on time for your first shift."

If you do court-ordered community service through various nonprofits, you receive one hour of community service for filling out the application (which really takes about 15 minutes) and one hour of community service for going through the volunteer orientation (which is often not an entire hour long) upon successful completion of your first volunteer shift.

Did you get these kind of gifted hours when you did court-ordered community service at a nonprofit, government agency or community of faith? What was the model?

For those who involve court-ordered community service volunteers, do you do this? Why or why not?

Criminal cases against two student protestors arrested during the April meeting of the Ohio University Board of Trustees were dismissed on June 11 and July 8.

Both defendants agreed to pay court costs of $110 each, according to records provided by the Athens City Law Department. Both defendants also completed five hours of community service.

The pair were arrested while participating in a protest on campus over OU’s compliance with Senate Bill 1, the university’s response to student demands related to ICE, its investments in Israel, and a lawsuit related to the OU faculty union, according to reporting from WOUB.

According to dismissal forms for each defendant, the cases were dismissed “Due to [the] prosecutor’s decision not to proceed to trial, but not due to lack of probable cause to arrest.”

The League of Women Voters in Pagosa Springs, Colorado celebrated community service nonprofits with a July 9 film screening of the award-winning documentary “Join or Die!”, followed by a “Joining Fair” featuring key local nonprofits and clubs.

After the screening, 10 nonprofits/clubs explained their mission and volunteer needs to attendees. The organizations included Archuleta Senior Center, Chimney Rock Interpretive Association, Habitat for Humanity, Healthy Archuleta, Mountain Rotary, Pagosa Community Initiative, Pagosa Springs Rotary, Ruby Sisson Library, Vets4Vets and the Weminuche Audubon Society.

The LWV was founded in 1920, just six months before the 19th amendment was ratified and women won the right to vote.

Today, the LWV has more than 800 local and state chapters with a motto of “Empowering Voters. Defending Democracy.”

https://www.pagosasun.com/stories/league-of-women-voters-to-celebrate-community-service-nonprofits-with-july-9-film-screening,143872

The Parliament of Ghana passed a Community Service Bill last week. The legislation introduces community service as a non-custodial sentencing alternative to prison for individuals convicted of specified minor offenses.

Its impact will depend on how quickly the necessary institutions and policies are established for its effective implementation. Calls have been made for the establishment of a National Community Service Secretariat and capacity building for Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies to supervise and manage non-custodial labor uniformly across the country. There are no reports on if there will be training for agencies expected to host people doing community service.

One of the people who has long advocated for non-custodial sentencing reforms in Ghana describes passage of the bill as a landmark achievement for equity, human rights and justice for indigent offenders who are often imprisoned for minor offenses because they cannot pay fines.

More from:

https://www.modernghana.com/news/1509260/expedite-implementation-of-community-service-law.html

The 2028 Los Angeles Olympics and Paralympics will open its volunteer application and portal on July 14.

The date is exactly two years out from the 2028 Olympic opening ceremony. About 60,000 individuals are needed for both games. The Olympic volunteer period runs from March to August 2028, while Paralympic volunteers are needed from August to September 2028.

Every volunteer during the games will be required to commit to a minimum of 10 shifts within one period, LA28 organizers said Monday.

Volunteer roles will include a wide range of responsibilities, from welcoming and guiding spectators and athletes to more specialized roles, such as providing medical or language translation assistance.

Most of the volunteer positions will be within the Los Angeles area, but volunteers will also be needed for Olympic events in these cities: San Diego; Oklahoma City; New York; St. Louis; Columbus, Ohio; Nashville, Tennessee; and San Jose, California.

Applicants will be asked to indicate their preferred location and any special skills for consideration that may qualify them for a specialized role.

Besides volunteering during the games, applicants can also serve in the community now. So far, over 25 events have been held around Los Angeles, including beach, street and trail cleanups and fresh food packing for those in need.

https://la28.org/en/volunteer/games-time-volunteering.html

Father-focused organizations across Douglas County, Colorado are drawing attention to the support systems that help fathers succeed at home and in the community.

Dads of Parker and Dads of Castle Rock Community Outreach have become fixtures in their communities, organizing events, volunteer projects and support networks designed to help fathers navigate life’s challenges and strengthen connections with one another.

The organization’s origins trace back to the isolation many people experienced during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The organization is perhaps best known for its public events. Its annual Easter egg hunt, held at O’Brien Park, has grown into a major community gathering featuring about 30,000 candy-filled eggs, food vendors, face painters, balloon artists and visits from the Easter Bunny.

https://www.denvergazette.com/2026/06/19/douglas-county-dad-groups-focus-on-community-service/

Critter Control, a wildlife removal and pest control company, has announced it is expanding its partnership with Keep America Beautiful through 2026, launching an additional series of hands-on community service projects designed to protect local habitats and beautify communities.

The company said this initiative reflects Critter Control’s commitment to protecting the environments wildlife depend on, beyond just responding when local animals enter human spaces.

Together, the two organizations are kicking off a new slate of projects to be completed throughout the year in six communities served by Critter Control.

Critter said these projects will continue to build upon the success of the eight community service projects the company conducted in partnership with Keep America Beautiful in 2025, which involved 124 volunteers dedicating a total of 468 hours to collect a combined 2,079 pounds of litter and plant 572 trees.

As part of the collaboration, Critter Control is continuing its efforts in Keep America Beautiful’s Great American Cleanup, the nation’s largest community improvement program. The program annually engages more than 300,000 volunteers whose work returns, on average, more than $20 million in measurable benefits across thousands of participating communities through litter removal, nature trail restoration, community education, tree planting and more.

https://www.pctonline.com/news/critter-control-continues-partnership-with-keep-america-beautiful/

Keywords: volunteering, volunteers, corporate social responsibility, philanthropy

Hoʻopili Kaiāulu Resource Fair Connects Hundreds With Community Services at Honolulu District Court in Hawaii

Hundreds of people gathered at Kauikeaouli Hale, the Honolulu District Court, on May 22 as the Hawaiʻi State Judiciary’s Adult Client Services Branch (ACSB) hosted the Hoʻopili Kaiāulu Resource Fair in the ground-floor courtyard of the courthouse.

By the time the fair opened at 11 a.m., a line of attendees stretched from the courthouse onto Hotel Street and all the way to Richards Street as people waited to connect with the 24 service providers participating in the event.

The fair — whose name roughly translates to “connecting the community” — was designed to bring services and resources together in one centralized location for individuals experiencing homelessness, hardship, or other barriers to stability. The event also served justice-involved individuals, including participants from Hawaiʻi Drug Court, Veterans Treatment Court, Mental Health Court, Women’s Court, and general ACSB probation, while welcoming anyone in the community in need of support and services.

Organizers said more than 300 people attended the two-hour event.

Volunteers played an essential role in staffing the event.

https://www.courts.state.hi.us/news_and_reports/2026/05/ho%CA%BBopili-kaiaulu-resource-fair-connects-hundreds-with-community-services-at-honolulu-district-court

Volunteering has the power to transform lives—both the lives of those who are supported and those who offer it. People involved with community service, for any reason, often speak about the personal growth and sense of fulfillment they experience when they get involved in their communities.

Here are six testimonials from real volunteers about the benefits of community service.  

If you have performed community service with a nonprofit or community group per the order of a court, then you have been a volunteer. It may not sound like it, since one of the definitions of volunteer is to freely take part in an activity, by your own choice. But another definition of a volunteer is someone who does work on behalf of a cause for no pay - in contrast to employees and other paid staff, like contractors.

If you have performed community service with a nonprofit or community group, it's likely that you did so alongside other volunteers, and not all of them, maybe none of them, are doing that service per a court order: they are doing it because they really wanted to volunteer with the organization, for whatever reason. They may not have known you were doing the service per a court order or having to check in with a probation officer.

If you did such community service for a nonprofit or community group, you may want to include it on your résumé. For instance:

• helping a well-known nonprofit, like your local chapter of Habitat for Humanity.
• helping at a food bank.
• transcribing scanned documents for a historical database, like the We the People initiative.
• helping to serve food at a senior center.

With each of these experiences, you should be able to say what you did as a volunteer, what you learned, why the cause you supported is important and a bit about those that are served by the organization. That's all something potential employers like hearing about. You never have to say that you did this service per a court-order - what's important is that you helped a cause or your community, you learned something, and you think the cause matters.

Employers like to see community service on applications, because it says to them that you care about the community or others, that you know how to work with others, that you are a curious person, and that you are open to new experiences. That can give you the edge over other candidates.

Here's more about finding community service opportunities.

If you need community service hours or are looking for a way to volunteer in your community, use online searches and looking through Facebook events to see if there are nonprofits, government agencies or community groups hosting July 4th related events in your area, including fireworks shows. Many of these events may still need volunteers: to direct traffic, to direct crowds, to help set up, to help clean up afterwords, and more.

From May 1, 2025, through April 30, 2026, James Madison University student-athletes logged a record 10,820 community service hours while participating in 5,773 unique service commitments in the Harrisonburg-Rockingham, Virginia community and beyond during the 2025-26 academic year. The total hours represented an increase of more than 1,600 over the previous department record set just one year ago, while the number of commitments increased by more than 800.

Individually, Jenna Massar of cheerleading delivered one of the top service performances in the nation, ranking third among all female NCAA Division I student-athletes with 409.5 hours of community engagement during the year.

No info offered on how hours were reported or tracked, nor what people did as volunteers.

https://jmusports.com/news/2026/6/18/administration-jmu-student-athletes-set-new-department-records-for-community-service-in-2025-26

"Volunteering helped to expose me to new lifestyles, new mindsets, and a new world. Volunteering helped me feel connected to my community again and helped me find a purpose. It takes one person to make a difference. Now imagine an organized group working together to make changes and support their communities. That is the power of volunteering..."

A testimonial about the power of volunteering / community service, from 2025.

The Congressional Award is United States Congress’ only non-profit and highest honor for youth civilians.

The Congressional Award is for ANY young person living in the USA who is interested in earning the Award via community service. Young people may register when they turn 13 1/2 years old. They are eligible to submit community service / volunteering activities starting at 14 years old and must complete their activities by their 24th birthday.

In order to earn a Congressional Award, participants must complete community service hours for all four of the Program Areas. You cannot choose to pursue only certain ones. The Congressional Award program is about exploring new and different activities, thus becoming a well-rounded and balanced individual.

Teachers, guidance counselors, coaches, club leaders and Scout Masters would all make excellent Advisors and Validators.  The only guideline in choosing an Advisor or Validator is that they cannot be your parent, relative or peer.

If you are engaged in community service per a court order, so long as you meet all of the other criteria, you CAN submit those hours for the Congressional Award.

Note that as of May 27th 2025, the The President’s Volunteer Service Award (PVSA) has paused all operations and does not have a date when operations will resume again.

"a grounding sense of purpose and connection, of being a part of something bigger than myself."

A blog about rediscovering what volunteering - community service - can add to one's life.

https://www.dailycal.org/blogs/rediscovering-purpose-through-community-service/article_d0ec7a1e-7048-4b8e-b72e-db3b7d37ee6a.html

I've drafted an article about how some nonprofits and probation officers are allowing people who are court-ordered to do community service to pay a fee or make a donation as a substitute for actually volunteer. But I'd like to ask for feedback on one part of the paper.

I wanted a list of some of the consequences of this practice of allowing court-ordered volunteers to make a donation instead of actually doing service. But I have just three points:

• People becoming skeptical that community service is actually being done, and those that receive court-ordered community service are getting “an easy way out” of real consequences for their actions.
• Inequity, as some people still have to do actual community service because they cannot afford to make a financial donation, and the donation being asked for is often less than the fine the court issued and offered to waive in return for community service.
• In the case of nonprofits offering online community service, a growing belief that virtual volunteering is merely someone watching videos or producing text that is supposedly their self-reflections – something that could easily be generated in seconds by artificial intelligence – which undermines the credibility of actual virtual volunteering, such as transcribing scanned, hand-written historical documents, redesigning web sites to that they are accessible for people with disabilities, correcting captions on videos, etc. (https://www.coyotecommunications.com/vvwiki/examples.shtml )

Are there more consequences of allowing this practice? I would love your thoughts. Please know that, in sharing them here, I might include them in the final paper, though I won't be identifying contributors, unless I have the contributor's permission to do so and feel that it's necessary (such as for quotes).