Nick
If done properly, the volunteering is supposed to be on the job training. For us it is. We teach people how to run a retail business, our Internet Cafe, with all of the responsibilities of managing a business from properly answering the phone and greeting customers, all the way up to doing the financial and daily reports and processing inventory orders.  Unfortunately a lot of other non profits shove their volunteers into the file room filing papers or just assign them to cleaning and emptying trash. In those cases yes, it turns int a trap.  Our last volunteer was with us for about a year. She got hired by 7-11 and got a promotion within the first month. 2 Months on the job and they had her running a store when their manager called off.