Volunteerism
Published April 13, 2005
If all the volunteers in Strathcona County went on strike for one month, what would happen to our community? Take a second and really think about the answer. Our volunteers are definitely the heart of our community but they are also the engine that drives the activities in our community. Words alone cannot thank them for all they do. Volunteers typically are a selfless lot.
95% volunteer to help a cause in which they personally believe
81% volunteer to use their skills
69% because they or someone they know has been affected by the cause
Unfortunately, Canada's volunteer pool fell from 31.4% of the population in 1997 to 27% in 2000 and of those volunteers, of them contributed of the volunteer hours.
Recently, Linda Graff, an author and a voluntary sector and risk management specialist, presented a volunteer recruitment workshop for a group of local organizations. Parent groups, community clubs, girl guides, agricultural societies and sport clubs participated in the event and all had a common issue , they need more volunteers. To some groups money was not an issue, most had no problem in attracting participants to their activities but they all need more workers.
In a national survey the top four reasons people gave for not volunteering were:
1. did not have extra time
2. unwilling to make a year round commitment
3. would rather give money instead of time
4. had not been personally asked
Ms. Graff had the group take a look at how they could use the "I can't" reasons in their strategy to attract volunteers.
I can personally attest to the positive results from the exercise we went through. One of the local crime watch organizations immediately got a volunteer for a zone director by posing the question - would you consider volunteering? The answer was - "yes". Creating a specific job description that clearly outlined duties and specified a short time period resulted in not one but two new volunteers for a small but important task.
On behalf of the participants, I would like to thank Kik Konski and Scott Lundell of the Information and Volunteer Centre for organizing the workshop and former Councillor Bob Weller for his dedication of funds to make this workshop a reality.
When you see the red banners and posters displayed over the coming days recognizing our volunteers, ask yourself what else you could do to ensure we have the necessary volunteers to keep our community functioning. Strathcona County repeatedly bucks national trends for the betterment of our residents so I encourage you all to make sure the national downward trend in volunteering is not a Strathcona trend.
Thanks to you, the volunteers!
Jacquie Fenske
Councillor Ward 5
780-464-8147
fenske@strathcona.ab.ca.
Last updated: Thursday, March 25, 2010
Page ID: 2010