Minnetonka High School is full of amazing clubs and activities, but it’s especially advanced when it comes to student volunteer opportunities. There are currently 24 clubs that focus on volunteering here at Minnetonka.

Michelle Seets makes these volunteer opportunities more accessible to students. She helps connect students and nonprofits, making student volunteers more accessible to the community when help is needed. Anyone involved in Minnetonka service clubs knows her through her reliable Schoology posts or from consultations with her about anything service-related. Her job is unique to the Minnetonka district, since not many other schools employ someone who specializes in student volunteering.

Seets also helps students gain recognition for their volunteering through the Presidential Volunteering Award and the Varsity Letter in Community Service, depending on how many volunteer hours they have devoted to their causes.

While these awards can be great additions to a college application, volunteering is more than just building a resume.

Michelle Seets has noticed how helpful volunteering is to students in other ways, helping build life skills like communication, business, and time management. Students learn to communicate with the organizations and people that they work with while learning to fit volunteering into their academic and personal schedule.

As a member for several volunteer clubs, Gabbi Tan, ‘20, has noticed how she uses certain volunteering skills while working with both students and adults.

“The main thing[s] I’ve learned from service in general [are] communication and collaboration,” said Tan.

As president of Earth Club, she has noticed how as a leader, you need to seek out people’s assets so they can bring their best forward.

Tan is also a member of the Tonka Steering Committee, working directly with Michelle Seetst improve Tonka volunteering. She is thankful for what Michelle Seets has done for her and all of the volunteering in Minnetonka and believes she would not be able to do as much as she does without Seets.

“She’s just really good at connecting people to what they want to do,” said Tan.

Seets says she enjoys her job most because she loves seeing how volunteering brings out the best in people.

“Every time you make something better for somebody else, you automatically feel better,” said Seets.

Michelle Seets encourages people to stop by the Activities Office if they have any questions. There is something for everyone when it comes to volunteering in the high school, and she loves to help people discover their passion for volunteering.