Yes, winter vacation is all about resting and staying tucked indoors away from the cold. But you can always find a few days for growth in a personal and professional sense, and learning what Korean students do during this time couldn't hurt.
From volunteering to earning certificates in Korea, here are some activities you can check out in Korea to boost your resume!
1. Volunteering activities
Long before entering university, Koreans must fill up certain hours volunteering in and out of school to put on their papers. Even at universities, Koreans should complete their assigned hours of volunteering to qualify for graduation. The designated hours differ by school and the students' majors but usually fall between 20 and 60 hours.
These records are used not just for graduation but can be added to their resumes or their personal statements if the activity proved to be interesting for the student.
All the perks to richening the resume aside, trying volunteering activities in Korea is a fine experience, showing a nice act of service for people who need help as well as mingling with the volunteering community for the day.
Here are the major platforms for you to check out if you want to check volunteer recruitment.
a. Volunteer Management System (VMS)
VMS (www.vms.or.kr) is a platform run by the Ministry of Health and Welfare, where you can find volunteering positions categorized by region and apply right away. It's the major service used by all volunteers, including students and volunteers who track their records via the website — as of Jan. 2, 2025, a total of 9.45 million users are registered on this service.
So how can you use this website?
First, you have to sign up as a member of the system. You will need a valid phone number and your residence card number (ARC) to do so.
Once you sign up, you are now able to find volunteering positions sorted by the city's districts and apply to the ones you are interested in, as well as accumulate and track the hours of work you have done.
The positions vary from helping out at community service centers to teaching at local libraries, so check it out from time to time to find one that suits your interest!
b. 1365 Volunteer Center
The Ministry of the Interior and Safety runs the 1365 Volunteer Center service (www.1365.go.kr), which handles volunteering recruitments in local communities. It appears pretty similar to VMS and the two services share the values of catering volunteering programs for citizens. To pinpoint the difference, VMS focuses on the ‘social welfare’ factor and provides in-depth support from simple volunteer work to professional activities, while 1365 focuses on ‘volunteering’ and supports a wider range of activities, including volunteer work at public institutions. These two websites are linked and your volunteering activities can be linked or synchronized by signing up to both platforms.
Just like VMS, you can register with your personal information including your address, your phone number and your ARC number, and check out the local volunteering positions that are seeking volunteers.
c. Seoul Global Center
There are also fun programs like becoming the voice of an expat in Seoul, like the 'Seoul Quality of Life Monitors (외국인주민 서울생활 살피미)' program rolled by the Seoul Global Center. Every February, Seoul Global Center recruits dozens of foreign resident volunteers to voice their opinions about life in Korea. If you would like to represent your community and give some opinions as well as do some volunteer work, check out their website for any upcoming announcement this February.
Call for 2024 Seoul Life Monitoring program volunteers (last year's announcement) link
d. University notice board
Each school also has its own operating volunteering programs by season. For example, I once volunteered as a serving staff at school on Jan. 1 to provide tteokguk, or rice cake soup for local community service workers, a one-day volunteering event organized by the university. Like so, the school notice boards come up with some interesting in-house volunteering activities for you to sign up easily, without the need for authentication procedures as you are already an enrolled student of the school.
If you are interested in volunteering in Korea and seek more information, check these reviews by Kampers who have tried volunteer work!
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