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School-level feature — managed within your school portal at yourschool.deandesk.com.
DeanDesk has two related volunteer tools:
  • Volunteer Management — an application and approval flow that controls who can work on school projects. Found under Admin Dashboard → People → Volunteer Management.
  • Volunteer Hours — community-service hour logging for parents and other members, with admin review. Found under Admin Dashboard → Operations → Volunteer Hours.
They work independently: anyone in your community can log volunteer hours without going through the volunteer application, and an approved volunteer doesn’t have to log hours.
Volunteer hours are not the same as the My Hours page at My Profile → My Hours. That page belongs to the Time and Payroll feature and lets paid staff (teachers, TAs, admins) log additional work hours for payroll. Volunteer hours are unpaid community-service hours and are logged from the Dashboard widget or the My Family tab instead.

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The volunteer application flow

Members apply to become volunteers from the Projects page in the main portal.
1

Member applies

A member who is not yet an approved volunteer opens Projects and sees Join the Volunteer Program. They answer Why would you like to volunteer? and submit their application.
2

Application is pending

While the application is under review, the member sees a pending notice on the Projects page instead of the project list.
3

Admin reviews

An admin opens Admin Dashboard → People → Volunteer Management. New applications appear in the Pending Applications tab with the applicant’s name, email, application reason, and submitted date.
4

Approve or reject

The admin clicks the approve or reject action and can add optional notes. Approved volunteers gain access to the school’s projects. Rejected applicants can reapply later.

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Volunteer statuses

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Managing volunteers

Volunteer Management has three tabs:
  • Pending Applications — review and approve or reject new applications.
  • All Volunteers — every volunteer record, filterable by status (All, Pending, Approved, Rejected, Deactivated). From here you can deactivate an approved volunteer, reactivate a deactivated one, or delete a record entirely.
  • Project Assignment — pick an approved volunteer, check the projects they should work on, and click Save Assignments.

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Logging volunteer hours (members)

Any signed-in user — parent, member, student, teacher, or admin — can log volunteer hours, as long as the school has volunteer hours visible (see Visibility setting below). There are two places to log:
  • My Family tab — go to My Profile → My Family → Volunteer Hours. This tab shows your total approved hours, hours by category, and a My Submissions table. Click Log Hours to submit.
  • Dashboard widget — parents with the parent dashboard also see a Volunteer Hours widget on their Dashboard with their total approved hours and a category breakdown. Click Log Volunteer Hours to submit an entry without leaving the Dashboard.
The Log Volunteer Hours form asks for: Submissions start as Pending. While a submission is pending, you can still edit or delete it from the My Submissions table. Once an admin approves or rejects it, the entry locks. If a submission was rejected, hover over its status chip to see the reason. Only approved hours count toward your total.

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Reviewing hours (admins)

Open Admin Dashboard → Operations → Volunteer Hours to reach the Volunteer Hours Management page. At the top, three stat cards summarize activity: Pending Review, Hours Approved This Month, and Total Approved Hours. Below, the submissions table shows who submitted, the date, hours, category, description, and status. Filter by:
  • Status — All, Pending, Approved, Rejected
  • Category — Classroom, Event, Fundraising, Administrative, Other
For each pending submission, use the approve or reject action:
  • Approve — the hours are added to the member’s approved total immediately.
  • Reject — you must enter a Rejection Reason, which is visible to the volunteer on their submission.

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Visibility setting

You can hide volunteer hours from everyone except admins:
1

Open the Features tab

Go to Admin Dashboard → School Configuration → Features.
2

Toggle visibility

In the Volunteer Hours card, switch Show volunteer hours to non-admin users on or off.
When the toggle is off, parents, volunteers, students, and teachers cannot see or submit volunteer hours — the dashboard widget and the Volunteer Hours tab under My Family disappear for them. Admins can still review and manage previously submitted hours from the admin area. See School configuration for the other feature toggles.