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I’m sure I won’t be the first one to tell you that every mother is a working mother. That said, there is no excuse -- that’s right...I said no excuse -- for not volunteering in your child’s school. School volunteerism is mandatory, even if it requires doing work at the school on your days off, cutting out things for the teacher at home in the evenings or hanging the little cherubs’ masterpieces for the art fair in the wee hours of the night before the big event. I realize that certain jobs are more difficult to get away from than others, but trust me: Your kids see other parents helping in the school. They need to know that you care and are there for them.  Enough said.

The key is this: Choose your volunteer gigs very carefully.

Having logged more volunteer hours than I care to admit, I speak to you from experience when I make the following statement:

All volunteer jobs are not created equally, and knowing how to choose is half the battle.

You want to choose the gigs that offer the maximum bang for your volunteer buck! You also want to avoid “over-committing”. This isn’t good for anyone – you or your family. Again, I speak from experience, having had to dig my way out from the volunteer abyss. It wasn’t pretty, my friends, so consider yourselves warned. Start out small, and remember that when you volunteer for a post at school, it can often last the entire school term. Nine long months. The time it took to pop out one of your little Mini-Me's!

Gigs to Grab:

• Room Mom: This job is fun (with the right accomplices, of course) and takes far less time than one might think. As long as you steer clear of messy crafts at the parties, you will be golden. Let the kids mainline a little sugar, play some bingo, and do the limbo (bring your boombox and a broom). I always have a word search or two in case we have extra time, too. Other than the parties, there are usually a few phone calls to make throughout the year. This job has high visibility for a low number of actual volunteer hours.
• Coordinator of a Food Drive: I’ve held this post for the last six years at our school. This is one of those high visibility jobs that everyone gives you lots of kudos for, but here’s the trick: it takes very little effort -- especially after the first year. All it takes to get this one going are a few memo’s to parents and kids and delivering the goods to your local charitable organization. Once you figure a gig like this one out, hang on to it, and never let it go! The only downside to this gig is that in involves very little time spent with the kids.

Next time, I'll share more of those coveted "Gigs to Grab," along with those that you should give away.