You’ve asked yourself the same questions a million times…
“Why won’t anyone volunteer for our events?”
“Why is it always the same people who volunteer for everything?”
As a former PTA President at an elementary school I’ve asked myself the same questions at least a million times and the conclusion I have come to is that if you offer volunteers “meaningful” work to do they will be more likely to jump in for the less favorable jobs when you need them.
When volunteers decide to engage themselves in an activity they want to feel that they are making a difference. While serving popcorn at the fun fair is commendable and makes attendees of the event happy, there are more meaningful ways to engage your volunteers to allow them to make a larger impact.
I recently took the time to develop a volunteer reading program, with the support of the school reading specialists, to assist teachers in the classroom with readers in need of some extra attention. When the form went out to recruit our volunteer readers there were names on the list I had NEVER seen before. These parents wanted to volunteer, but apparently we had never given them the job that fit their needs as an individual. This new program now provided them an opportunity to offer their time in a way that they felt was important and also made a huge difference in the education of the students.
Additionally, these same volunteers, who had not volunteered before, recently spent 30 minutes of their Friday night helping at the fun fair – which was a first for many of them – but this was likely sparked from the new connection they felt with the school through their reading intervention work!
Overall, what I have learned over the last few years of recruiting volunteers is that the act of recruitment is not about filling MY space with bodies, it is about filling THEIR space with something that is important to them. By building a partnership between the school/PTA/district and the volunteers you will allow them to feel a greater connection to the success of everything that is produced from that structure/school/association – whether it be reading intervention or the success of the fun fair on any given Friday night.
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Jennifer DeFranco is a committed PTA advocate in Illinois and currently serves as the Membership/Marketing Director for the Illinois PTA. She also served as the 2010 Illinois delegate to the Mom Congress at Georgetown University and currently serves as a mentor for the 2011 delegation, presenting on bullying prevention. She is the mother of two outstanding elementary age children and a wife to an exceptionally wonderful husband. Connect with her on Twitter.