Engagement & Inclusion E-Bulletin April 2022

Welcome to our Spring-themed E-bulletin!

The E-bulletin is aimed at organisations who are working with groups and individuals who might benefit from volunteering. We aim to keep you up to date with our latest news and developments. If you have anything you would like us to include, please contact emma.mclean@volunteerglasgow.org

Give. Gain. Grow.

The sun is (mostly) shining, leaves are beginning to appear on the trees – Glasgow is springing back to life! Warmer days and lighter nights mean more opportunity to get outdoors. Volunteering in nature provides an opportunity to get active, boosting our moods and our physical wellbeing.

In the run up to this year’s #EarthDay on 22nd April, Volunteer Glasgow will be highlighting Glasgow organisations doing their bit to support the environment, and how you can help too!

As always, you can search for volunteering opportunities here but it is also worth checking out Glasgow Life’s volunteering platform which advertises opportunities to volunteer at one-off events as well as regular volunteer roles in its Museums, Arts and Music venues and Community and Sport facilities.

Latest Service Developments

Goodbye, Helen
Our awesome colleague, Helen Taylor, left us for pastures new last week after 16 years’ service at Volunteer Glasgow. We will miss her tireless enthusiasm, relentless pursuit of social justice, and her determination to provide excellent services particularly for those that need them most.

For those of you that worked closely with Helen over the years, I’m sure you’ll want to join us in wishing her every success and in thanking her for the hard work, the laughs and the hugs!

Hello, Amos
Amos has been a welcome addition to Volunteer Glasgow’s Organisation Support team and we are delighted to have him on board for one day a week, supporting the Engagement &Inclusion team.

Face to Face Appointments
We are excited to announce that we are now taking bookings for face to face appointments at our office at Brunswick House. If you would like to make an appointment with one of our team, please contact engagement@volunteerglasgow.org. Don’t be shy – we’ll even make you a cuppa!

Get Ready to Volunteer
If you are interested in volunteering (or an organisation working with individuals who may benefit from volunteering) and would like to find out more, you can now book a place on our Get Ready to Volunteer workshop on Wednesday 4th May at 10.30am. This general volunteering information session will take place over Zoom, and will last approximately 1 hour, covering the following:

What is volunteering?
Where you can volunteer?
Benefits of volunteering
Things to consider before volunteering
How to register with Volunteer Glasgow and search for opportunities

There will be time for Q&A’s at the end of the session.
You can book your place now.

We continue to support people to access volunteering in the following ways:

Our Virtual Drop-in Service continues every Wednesday between 11am-1pm.
Telephone and virtual appointments – contact engagement@volunteerglasgow.org if you would like to make an appointment for yourself or a client or service user to speak with an Adviser about volunteering.
Ad hoc Get Ready to Volunteer sessions for organisations – due to capacity issues, we may not always be able to provide these. However, if you are working with a group who might be interested in finding out more about volunteering, contact engagement@volunteerglasgow.org and we will see if we can provide an informal volunteering information session.
Boost Your Employability – an online ‘event’ page that highlights programmes running in the city that offer a range of personal development opportunities and may work well in conjunction with volunteering.

We continue to support organisations that are working with people who may be interested in volunteering by providing:

Quarterly Networking Sessions for organisations – our next sessions are scheduled for:
Tuesday 24th May 10.30-12pm on Teams & Thursday 26th May 1.30-3pm on Zoom
Watch out for updates on our website and social media after Easter including how to book your place.
Volunteering Toolkit training for organisations. The training enables your organisation to deliver your own volunteering information sessions and will help you provide better support to clients to help them access volunteering.
We are aiming to run these on a quarterly basis and will keep you updated on possible dates. We are looking at mid to late June for the next session.
Regular e-bulletins providing updates on our latest service developments.

Click here to view our Get the most from Volunteer Glasgow PDF document – an overview of all volunteering services. Please note we are no longer able to offer group volunteering taster sessions.

Boost Your Employability

We launched the Boost Your Employability online event just before Christmas. Please note, this is not an online event that you attend but a platform for promoting different programmes that are happening across Glasgow which might help people boost their employability and, combined with volunteering, provide an opportunity to learn new skills, build confidence and to gain valuable practical experience. If you are an organisation providing an employability or personal development programme and would like to promote it, please get in touch and we will add a description to the event page.

And finally…

Did you know that spending just twenty minutes in the open air gives your brain an energy boost comparable to one cup of coffee? And that’s without having to deal with a caffeine crash!

So now the weather’s better, why not swap that second cup for a brisk walk outdoors? If you’re feeling really adventurous, you could even check out the outdoorsy voluntary roles we have available at the moment. Simply tick the category box labelled ‘conservation / gardening’ on our search page and have a browse. 🌿 🌱 ☀️ 🧤 🌺

Happy Spring!