{ "model": { "rank": 3880, "code": "thing-q188844", "model_id": "vr.tr.volunteering", "name": "volunteering", "purpose": "Let an agent explain volunteering and its forms, relay measurement, legal frameworks and research with attribution, describe programmes such as service years, and distinguish volunteering from unpaid internships, mandated community service and paid work.", "family": "Thing Registry", "category": "Activities and processes", "status": "research-draft", "kind": "thing", "plane": "ACT", "domain": "ACT.ACT", "industry": "", "version": "", "url": "/models/thing/q188844/", "tier": 2, "score": 81, "payload": { "layer": "wikidata", "aliases": [ "voluntary task", "Student Study-Service", "community service", "voluntary service", "village activity", "service year", "favors", "Citizens’ Council", "medical volunteerism", "garbage collection campaign", "digital volunteering", "First Spouse of Massachusetts", "Kibbutz volunteering", "First Spouse of Maryland", "virtual volunteering", "civic engagement", "Timurite movement", "sevā", "international volunteering", "civic technology" ], "aliasCount": 20, "merged": 20, "knownIn": 81, "facets": null, "markers": [], "lexicalClass": "", "senseRank": null, "alsoRegisteredAs": null, "source": { "dataset": "wikidata", "item": "Q188844", "url": "https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q188844", "license": "CC0 1.0" } }, "research": { "vercy": "1.0-draft", "publication": { "status": "research-draft", "adjudicationStatus": "unreviewed", "publishableCanonical": false, "generatedAt": "2026-09-13T01:10:31Z", "providers": [ "Claude" ], "breadth": "written by Claude from model knowledge without web access - no source was read, every claim is a lead to verify", "pass": 2, "wave": 3, "engine": "claude" }, "metaModel": { "id": "THING-Q188844", "registryId": "vr.tr.volunteering", "name": "volunteering", "version": "0.2.0-wave.3", "entryKind": "thing", "family": "Thing Registry", "domain": [ "ACT.ACT" ], "status": "research-draft" }, "canonicalUrl": "https://ver.cy/models/thing/q188844/", "model": { "registry_id": "vr.tr.volunteering", "name": "volunteering", "purpose": "Let an agent explain volunteering and its forms, relay measurement, legal frameworks and research with attribution, describe programmes such as service years, and distinguish volunteering from unpaid internships, mandated community service and paid work.", "definition": "The giving of time and effort without pay for the benefit of others, a community or a cause, through organisations or informally, in forms such as community service, voluntary service programmes, service years, student study-service and village activities, and in settings from charities and emergency services to international placements; volunteering is measured by statistical offices, supported by laws and policies, and studied for its social, economic and personal benefits.", "what_it_is_for": "Contributing to others and communities without pay.", "affordances": [ "explain forms and settings", "relay measurement and law", "relay research on benefits", "distinguish from related activities" ], "distinguishing_features": [ "Unpaid and voluntary", "Benefit to others", "Formal and informal", "Policy support" ], "appearance": "Not a visible object; people giving time in many settings.", "visual_identification": [ "Unpaid work for the benefit of others", "Formal, informal, service programmes, international volunteering", "Unpaid internships serve the intern; court-ordered community service is a sanction; paid work is employment" ], "physical_properties": [ { "quantity": "formal volunteers worldwide", "typical_range": "about 860 million", "unit": "people", "note": "UNV estimates, monthly" } ], "families_and_kinds": [ "formal volunteering through organisations", "informal helping", "community service and voluntary service programmes", "service years and national civic service", "student service-learning such as study-service", "international volunteering", "corporate and skills-based volunteering", "emergency and crisis volunteering" ], "related_models": [ { "relation": "is a kind of", "target": "unpaid work", "why": "in registry terms" }, { "relation": "is a kind of", "target": "voluntary action", "why": "in registry terms" }, { "relation": "is a kind of", "target": "voluntarism", "why": "in registry terms" }, { "relation": "is measured by", "target": "ILO volunteer work measurement", "why": "in labour statistics" } ], "identifiers": [], "standards_and_regulation": [ "ILO Manual on the Measurement of Volunteer Work", "National volunteering laws and insurance rules", "Safeguarding and background check rules", "International Volunteer Day, 5 December" ], "failure_modes_and_hazards": [ "Exploitation of volunteers as unpaid labour", "Voluntourism harms, as reported", "Confusing mandated service with volunteering", "Unsourced participation figures" ], "in_scope": [], "out_of_scope": [], "characteristics": [] }, "sources": [], "structure": { "bundles": [ { "id": "understand", "name": "Understand", "description": "What volunteering is.", "rationale": "Definition.", "layers": [ { "id": "definition", "name": "Definition", "description": "Definition and forms.", "findings": [ { "id": "definition-finding", "name": "Definition", "description": "Definition.", "questions": [ { "text": "What is volunteering, and what forms does it take?", "kind": "definition" }, { "text": "Is the activity volunteering, an internship, mandated service or paid work?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] }, { "id": "settings", "name": "Settings", "description": "Settings.", "findings": [ { "id": "settings-finding", "name": "Settings", "description": "Settings.", "questions": [ { "text": "In what settings do people volunteer, from local charities to emergency services and international programmes?", "kind": "definition" }, { "text": "Which entry fits the specific programme?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "evidence", "name": "Evidence", "description": "Measurement and research.", "rationale": "Attribution.", "layers": [ { "id": "measurement", "name": "Measurement", "description": "Measurement.", "findings": [ { "id": "measurement-finding", "name": "Measurement", "description": "Measurement.", "questions": [ { "text": "How is volunteering measured, and what do statistics show, with sources?", "kind": "measurement" }, { "text": "Which sources are cited?", "kind": "provenance" } ] } ] }, { "id": "benefits", "name": "Benefits", "description": "Benefits and effects.", "findings": [ { "id": "benefits-finding", "name": "Benefits", "description": "Benefits.", "questions": [ { "text": "What does research say about the social, economic and health effects of volunteering, with findings attributed?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which references are standard?", "kind": "provenance" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "practice", "name": "Practice", "description": "Practice and policy.", "rationale": "Regulation.", "layers": [ { "id": "management", "name": "Management", "description": "Volunteer management.", "findings": [ { "id": "management-finding", "name": "Management", "description": "Management.", "questions": [ { "text": "How do organisations recruit, train, safeguard and recognise volunteers?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which entry fits volunteer management?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] }, { "id": "policy", "name": "Policy", "description": "Law and policy.", "findings": [ { "id": "policy-finding", "name": "Policy", "description": "Policy.", "questions": [ { "text": "What laws, insurance and policies support volunteering and service years, and what debates exist, with positions attributed?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Is the presentation neutral?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "context", "name": "Context", "description": "Ethics and history.", "rationale": "Context.", "layers": [ { "id": "ethics", "name": "Ethics", "description": "Ethics.", "findings": [ { "id": "ethics-finding", "name": "Ethics", "description": "Ethics.", "questions": [ { "text": "What ethical issues arise in voluntourism and unpaid labour, with positions attributed?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which entry fits voluntourism?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] }, { "id": "history", "name": "History", "description": "History.", "findings": [ { "id": "history-finding", "name": "History", "description": "History.", "questions": [ { "text": "How has volunteering developed across cultures and periods?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which entry fits the history of philanthropy?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] } ] } ] }, "openQuestions": [ "Should service year and international volunteering be separate entries?", "How should statistical sources be linked?", "The registry entry has merged aliases naming specific programmes and vague terms; should they be split off?" ], "statistics": { "bundles": 4, "layers": 8, "findings": 8, "questions": 16 } }, "draft": { "generator": "vr.draft.v3", "status": "draft-generated", "researched": false, "archetype": "abstract concept", "method": "Written from the archetype playbook - what this kind of thing needs beyond identity and provenance - and from the structure that recurred across 6,333 models already researched by two engines. Applied to this entry by rule. No source was read for this thing and no claim here is researched. This entry carries no facets of its own, so they were inferred from its domain - a guess about a whole domain applied to one thing.", "facetsInferred": true, "nextPass": "A researcher replaces this draft with a sourced specification. Treat every sentence below as a proposal to argue with.", "purpose": "Give an agent a durable, checkable way to recognise a volunteering, record what state it is in, and decide what may be done with it.", "whatItIs": "Let an agent explain volunteering and its forms, relay measurement, legal frameworks and research with attribution, describe programmes such as service years, and distinguish volunteering from unpaid internships, mandated community service and paid work.", "characteristics": { "substance": "activity", "origin": "conceptual", "agency": "inert" }, "whatYouCanDoWithIt": [ "observed and measured" ], "distinguishingFeatures": [ "Names folded into this entry, which a task may need to split apart again: voluntary task, Student Study-Service, community service, voluntary service, village activity, service year, favors, Citizens’ Council, medical volunteerism, garbage collection campaign, digital volunteering, First Spouse of Massachusetts.", "20 finer distinctions are held as aliases rather than separate entries, because telling them apart needs a task that asks for it.", "Described in 81 Wikipedia languages, which is a measure of how widely the thing is known, not of how important it is." ], "openQuestionsForResearch": [ "Which of the bundles below does a real task actually need, and which are ceremony?", "What does this thing have that the facets do not capture at all?", "Which neighbouring kind is most often confused with a volunteering, and on what evidence are they told apart?" ], "whatItIsMadeOf": "something that happens over time", "physicalCharacter": [ "Does nothing on its own; everything it does, something else did to it.", "These come from the domain this entry sits in rather than from the entry itself, so treat them as a first guess about the whole domain applied to one thing." ], "whatCanBeDoneWithIt": [ "observe it, measure it, record its state" ], "howItIsRecognised": [ "Nothing to see. What is recognised is an instance of it, and which instances count is exactly what is argued about." ], "relatedModels": [ { "relation": "covers", "note": "Finer kinds folded into this entry because telling them apart needs a task that asks for it. Each is a model waiting to be split out when one does.", "targets": [ "voluntary task", "Student Study-Service", "community service", "voluntary service", "village activity", "service year", "favors", "Citizens’ Council", "medical volunteerism", "garbage collection campaign", "digital volunteering", "First Spouse of Massachusetts" ] } ], "standing": "Described in 81 Wikipedia languages, which measures how widely it is written about rather than how important or how common it is. 20 finer distinctions are held inside this entry as names rather than as separate models.", "structure": { "bundles": [ { "id": "identity-and-classification", "name": "Identity, naming and classification", "description": "How an agent tells one volunteering from another, and a volunteering from things that resemble it.", "rationale": "Recognition comes before every other claim. Without stable identity nothing else in the model can be trusted to be about the same thing twice.", "layers": [ { "id": "naming-and-identifiers", "name": "Names and identifiers", "description": "The names this thing goes by and the identifiers that survive translation and time.", "findings": [ { "id": "preferred-name-and-aliases", "name": "Preferred name, aliases and local names", "description": "Which name to use, which names mean the same thing, and which merely sound similar.", "questions": [ { "id": "preferred-name-and-aliases-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the name of a volunteering, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "preferred-name-and-aliases-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the name of a volunteering, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "preferred-name-and-aliases-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the name of a volunteering is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] }, { "id": "stable-identifiers", "name": "Stable identifiers and external keys", "description": "Identifiers that keep pointing at this kind of thing across systems and languages.", "questions": [ { "id": "stable-identifiers-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes an identifier for a volunteering, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "stable-identifiers-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about an identifier for a volunteering, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "stable-identifiers-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once an identifier for a volunteering is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "classification-and-granularity", "name": "Classification and granularity", "description": "Where a volunteering sits among kinds, and how finely a task needs to cut it.", "findings": [ { "id": "kind-and-parents", "name": "Kind, parents and neighbouring kinds", "description": "The classes this thing belongs to and the ones it is next to.", "questions": [ { "id": "kind-and-parents-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the kind of a volunteering, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "kind-and-parents-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the kind of a volunteering, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "kind-and-parents-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the kind of a volunteering is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] }, { "id": "distinguishing-features", "name": "Distinguishing features", "description": "What separates a volunteering from the things most often confused with it.", "questions": [ { "id": "distinguishing-features-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes what distinguishes a volunteering, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "distinguishing-features-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about what distinguishes a volunteering, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "distinguishing-features-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once what distinguishes a volunteering is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "state-and-lifecycle", "name": "State and lifecycle", "description": "The states a volunteering passes through and the events that move it between them.", "rationale": "Most decisions about a thing depend on what state it is in now, which is a claim with a time on it, not a property.", "layers": [ { "id": "lifecycle-stages", "name": "Lifecycle stages", "description": "From coming into existence to ceasing to be one of these.", "findings": [ { "id": "stages-and-transitions", "name": "Stages and transitions", "description": "The stages worth naming and what moves a volunteering between them.", "questions": [ { "id": "stages-and-transitions-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the lifecycle of a volunteering, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "stages-and-transitions-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the lifecycle of a volunteering, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "stages-and-transitions-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the lifecycle of a volunteering is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "observations-and-status", "name": "Observations and current status", "description": "What is observed about a volunteering, how often and by whom.", "findings": [ { "id": "observation-record", "name": "Observation record", "description": "How an observation of a volunteering is recorded so that it can be superseded rather than overwritten.", "questions": [ { "id": "observation-record-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes an observation of a volunteering, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "observation-record-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about an observation of a volunteering, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "observation-record-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once an observation of a volunteering is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "process-and-outcome", "name": "Process, inputs and outcome", "description": "How a volunteering proceeds, what it needs and what it leaves behind.", "rationale": "An activity is known by its steps and its results, and both have to be recordable while it is still running.", "layers": [ { "id": "steps-and-sequence", "name": "Steps and sequence", "description": "The steps of a volunteering, their order and what may run in parallel.", "findings": [ { "id": "steps-and-preconditions", "name": "Steps, preconditions and completion", "description": "What has to be true before each step of a volunteering and what marks it done.", "questions": [ { "id": "steps-and-preconditions-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes a step of a volunteering, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "steps-and-preconditions-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about a step of a volunteering, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "steps-and-preconditions-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once a step of a volunteering is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "inputs-and-results", "name": "Inputs, resources and results", "description": "What a volunteering consumes and what it produces.", "findings": [ { "id": "inputs-and-outputs", "name": "Inputs, outputs and side effects", "description": "The resources a volunteering takes and the results it leaves, wanted or not.", "questions": [ { "id": "inputs-and-outputs-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the inputs and results of a volunteering, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "inputs-and-outputs-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the inputs and results of a volunteering, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "inputs-and-outputs-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the inputs and results of a volunteering is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "definitions-in-contest", "name": "Definitions and who holds them", "description": "What volunteering is taken to mean, and by whom.", "rationale": "When a field disagrees about a concept, the disagreement is the content. A model that picks one definition silently destroys the information.", "layers": [ { "id": "competing-definitions", "name": "Competing definitions", "description": "The main readings and the traditions behind them.", "findings": [ { "id": "definition-map", "name": "Definitions and their holders", "description": "Each definition with the school or body that holds it.", "questions": [ { "id": "definition-map-q01", "text": "Which definitions of volunteering are in use, and which tradition or body holds each?", "kind": "definition" }, { "id": "definition-map-q02", "text": "What turns on the difference between them in practice?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] }, { "id": "operationalisation", "name": "Operationalisation", "description": "How it is measured or applied when it has to be.", "findings": [ { "id": "operational-record", "name": "Measures and proxies", "description": "Instruments and indicators used to stand in for it.", "questions": [ { "id": "operational-record-q01", "text": "How is volunteering operationalised or measured in practice, and by what instrument?", "kind": "measurement" }, { "id": "operational-record-q02", "text": "What does that operationalisation leave out, and when does that matter?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "instances-and-use", "name": "Instances, use and consequence", "description": "What counts as an instance of volunteering and what follows from calling something that.", "rationale": "Applying a concept is an act with consequences, so a model must say what the label licenses and what it does not.", "layers": [ { "id": "instances", "name": "What counts as an instance", "description": "Clear cases, borderline cases and non-cases.", "findings": [ { "id": "instance-tests", "name": "Tests for an instance", "description": "What would settle whether something falls under it.", "questions": [ { "id": "instance-tests-q01", "text": "What would settle whether something is an instance of volunteering?", "kind": "boundary" }, { "id": "instance-tests-q02", "text": "Which borderline cases are argued about, and on what grounds?", "kind": "definition" } ] } ] }, { "id": "consequence", "name": "Consequence of application", "description": "Rights, duties or decisions that follow from the label.", "findings": [ { "id": "consequence-record", "name": "What the label licenses", "description": "What an agent may do once something is classified this way.", "questions": [ { "id": "consequence-record-q01", "text": "What follows practically once something is treated as volunteering?", "kind": "action" }, { "id": "consequence-record-q02", "text": "What must an agent not infer from the label alone?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "provenance-and-evidence", "name": "Provenance, evidence and time", "description": "Where every claim about a volunteering came from and when it held.", "rationale": "A claim without a source and a time cannot be superseded, only overwritten, and an agent that overwrites loses the ability to explain itself.", "layers": [ { "id": "source-and-authority", "name": "Source and authority", "description": "Who said it, on what evidence, and how strongly.", "findings": [ { "id": "claim-provenance", "name": "Claim provenance and confidence", "description": "The authority behind each claim about a volunteering and how confident it is.", "questions": [ { "id": "claim-provenance-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes a claim about a volunteering, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "claim-provenance-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about a claim about a volunteering, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "claim-provenance-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once a claim about a volunteering is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "time-and-versions", "name": "Time, versions and supersession", "description": "When a claim was true, when it was learnt, and what replaced it.", "findings": [ { "id": "validity-and-supersession", "name": "Validity period and supersession", "description": "How an old claim about a volunteering is retired without being erased.", "questions": [ { "id": "validity-and-supersession-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the validity of a claim about a volunteering, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "validity-and-supersession-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the validity of a claim about a volunteering, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "validity-and-supersession-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the validity of a claim about a volunteering is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] } ] } ] }, "statistics": { "bundles": 6, "layers": 12, "findings": 14, "questions": 38 } } } }