Volunteers

The Sacramento Bee carried a good article about local nonprofits and the youth volunteers who work with them, creating a mutually beneficial situation where the youth gain from the experience—and in some cases gain school credit—and the organizations get vitally needed volunteer help.

Developing and sustaining the organizational environment to attract and benefit from volunteers—of any age—is an art unto itself, but one necessary to many nonprofits who have labor needs their available funding cannot afford, and it is good to see that many local nonprofits have created that environment.

An excerpt.

“When the region's school leaders began requiring students to perform community service about 10 years ago, they were largely motivated by what the experience could give to teenagers: character, civic engagement, a sense of purpose.

“A major side effect, it turns out, is what the requirement has given to local nonprofits.

"It's a whole volunteer force, or work force, that wasn't there before," said Christine Wallace, community resource coordinator at the Volunteer Center of Sacramento.

“She used to take the calls one by one from students (or their frantic parents) wanting to fulfill a school's community service requirement. Wallace tried to match each student with an organization that needed volunteers – but found that many were not set up to work with youth.

“All that's changed in the decade or so since it became common for schools to ask students to help their community, or engage in what educators call "service learning." Most charitable organizations in the Sacramento area now rely heavily on student volunteers.

"That's a huge trend," Wallace said. "In fact so much so that we … created an entire directory specifically for junior high and high school students."

“Dozens of community service opportunities for children and teens are now listed on the Web sites of the Volunteer Center of Sacramento and Hands On Sacramento: The Sacramento Area Emergency Housing Center is looking for kids age 16 and up to help homeless children with homework. Children age 10 and up can volunteer for Harvest Sacramento, gleaning fruit from area backyards and donating it to the hungry. And the Sacramento Tree Foundation takes volunteers as young as 5 years old, Wallace says, (as long as they bring mom or dad along).”