Welcome to the September volunteering round-up. Whilst there is a large focus on the UK cost of living crisis, we’ve made our first volunteering news item about the ongoing conflict in Ukraine.
What motivates people to volunteer their support to communities affected by the war in Ukraine? HelpAge have noticed that older volunteers have risen to this challenge more than any other age group. Read their inspiring stories here.
We’d love to hear from those of you who currently support or are seeking to support volunteers aged 50+. We are offering free places on a learning group that will meet online from early October to February.
We’re asking you to sign up for a minimum of three months and are particularly interested in hearing from frontline delivery organisations with an income of less than £1m. We are also keen to hear from volunteering leads who lack opportunities for their own learning and development.
This work is supported by the Centre for Ageing Better. Find out more about why we are doing this work in this blog.
Since the pandemic came into our lives, we have witnessed a boom in the use of volunteer management systems. Some volunteer centres have adopted a system to rota volunteers for vaccination efforts. Others have realised that software can help to redirect valuable time toward building communications and relationships with volunteers. In response, we have produced guidance to help you when choosing and implementing a volunteer management system.
Thanks to our friends at Zurich insurance, NCVO member Hyde Park Source share three top tips on working with volunteers.
On 17 October, NCVO is hosting an online members assembly with Birmingham Voluntary Service Council, 9.30am – 12pm. This will focus on volunteering, looking at our recent Time Well Spent report and, with our partner BVSC, sharing preparations for their Vision for Volunteering for Birmingham.
Do you love volunteering trends and data? We have a webinar that will interest you. We’re launching the latest Civil Society Almanac which draws data from the government’s community life survey on volunteering. Register here.
Trustees Week is an annual celebration of trustees and everything they contribute to our organisations. This year is focused on helping every charity trustee to keep learning, developing and benefitting from their role. We have updated all of our governance Help & Guidance and we’re running a series of free online events with expert speakers throughout the week.
Investing in Volunteers (IiV) is the UK quality standard for good practice in volunteer management. Congratulations to the following organisations for recently achieving their IiV!
Catalyst, Community Alliance Broxbourne and East Herts, Devon Wildlife Trust, Imperial Health Charity,
Martin House Children’s Hospice
Milton Keynes City Discovery Centre
Northamptonshire Youth Offending Service
Find out about how Investing in Volunteers can help your organisation here.
The next date for our online safeguarding essentials in charities course is 18 November, 10.00–15.00.
Our popular online good practice in volunteer management course takes place over two half days from 10.00–13.00. You need to attend both days as they’re two parts of one course. It’s so popular that we’re running two courses in October!
We’re offering online training on volunteers and the law. This half day course is available at 10.00-13.00 on 23 November.
