ENCINITAS -- School's out, and while many teens do a whole lot of nothing, Leslie Nesser will be working a 40-hour week as a volunteer at Scripps Memorial Hospital Encinitas.

"I actually really enjoy it," she said. "I would rather do this than sit at home doing nothing."

Leslie, 14, began volunteering at Scripps last summer and since then has racked up more than 380 hours at the information desk and mastering tasks in the hospital's administrative offices.

She said she's determined to join the hospital's Sunshine Team, volunteers who bring smiles, newspapers and other comforts to patients.

For Leslie, relating to patients and understanding the workings of a busy hospital is part of a larger plan.

"I want to be a doctor," she said during an interview at the hospital last week. "I know it's a really hard job and you can't just throw yourself out there without knowing what you're up against."

According to some hospital managers, Leslie happily completes any task they ask of her, such as stuffing envelopes, arranging flowers, wrapping gifts or filing paperwork.

"That gives me back valuable time to concentrate on other things," said Sheila Kadian of the hospital's administration office. "I can give her heavy tasks with very little direction."

Leslie said she has enjoyed the face-to-face contact with the public she gets when working at the information counter. In that position, she often escorts visitors to their destinations, which means she is very familiar with the layout of the 140-bed hospital on Santa Fe Drive.

For one month in July, however, the hospital will need to operate without her.

Leslie said she's leaving for Chicago to participate in policy debate camp at Northwestern University. She said she hopes to hone her skills so she can compete on San Dieguito Academy's varsity debate team. Leslie will return to the school as a sophomore this fall.

Three years of high school remain, but Leslie's already thinking about college.

She doesn't hesitate naming some of the country's top schools as places where she hopes to complete medical school: Harvard, Yale, Johns Hopkins, Stanford, Berkeley.

Leslie said she also could see herself starting college much closer to home, at UC San Diego.

"I hope so," said her father, John Nesser, who joined his daughter in talking to a reporter. The elder Nesser also works at Scripps Encinitas. As an access representative, he helps admit patients.

His wife and Leslie's mother, Rosario Nesser, also is a Scripps employee and works in Sorrento Valley.

At Scripps Encinitas, some managers said there would always be a job for Leslie.

"It's great to have someone young and fresh who always has a smile on her face," said Anamaria Repetti, senior director of development.

The volunteer corps at Scripps Encinitas includes about 275 people. About two dozen of them are teens, said Carrie Cushman, volunteer manager.

"She definitely has a passion and I think she enjoys being at the hospital," Cushman said. "Of course it helps that her father is here, as well."

An aspiring brain surgeon, Leslie said she has offered herself as a source of comfort for the sick and injured for years.

Once, when walking home with friends from school, a friend's little brother fell and skinned his knee. Leslie, a fifth-grader at the time, used bottled water she was carrying to wash the wound. She washed a leaf and used it as a makeshift bandage.

Her efforts seemed to help the boy, she said.

"We thought we were pretty smart."

Contact staff writer Adam Kaye at (760) 901-4074 or akaye@nctimes.com. Comment at nctimes.com.